Editor’s note: This oped is by Alice Allen of Al-lens Farm in Wells River.
To conserve the land you’ve got to conserve the farmers. To conserve the farmers you’ve got to constantly encourage an interest in farming and forestry. To encourage interest in farming and forestry you’ve got to keep the younger generation tuned in to natural resource-related subjects. The study of forestry and woodlot management, wildlife habitat, water resources, dairy, market garden and orchard can be incorporated into regular classroom work. Thoughtful stewardship of these lands needs to be hardwired in to the brains of young people as well. Stewardship: “the responsible overseeing and protection of something considered worth caring for and preserving,” according to the dictionary definition.
Do we want to see the conserved fields and forest with a rural population who depend on tourism and outdoor recreation for their livelihood? Or do we want to see a thriving rural economy of farmers and loggers and market gardeners who are needed and appreciated for their skills and contributions to this thriving economy?
It becomes a question of values. Do we conserve farms and forests for the value of only the scenery, the picture postcard bucolic view of Vermont? Or do we invest in a future where keeping and enhancing these rural skills and values becomes an integral part of our own state government? Our state government is what we do together that lets us build our future. By working together, Vermont’s state government and her people, we can invest in the land. We can invest in the farmers and landowners who work their fields and forests. We can invest in those who raise the livestock and grow the crops. We can invest in the education of the young people who are the future of Vermont agriculture and forestry.
We can have and keep a tax structure that rewards the thoughtful stewardship of our ag and forest lands. We can have and keep a system of land values that promotes the transition of farms and working lands from one generation to the next. We can keep this process simple, too. There’s not much point in having a tax structure and conservation easements that reward thoughtful stewardship of farm and forestland if it is so complicated and time consuming that no one can take advantage of it without a team of legal experts.
I’m speaking from experience. Our 62-acre certified organic dairy farm now has a conservation easement with the Option to Purchase at Ag Value or OPAV. It has been a long, very long journey to make it to this point. A 62-acre certified organic dairy farm isn’t much of a farm you say? Hardly worth conserving in the scheme of larger farms and conservation projects you say? Bigger may be better in some places but in the case of Vermont, smaller is smarter!
With a conservation easement and the OPAV in place on this farm we’ve been able to offer it for sale at an affordable price to the next organic farmer. Our single-minded determination to protect this farm as a working farm has allowed the next generation the privilege of farm ownership to continue the legacy of a working dairy farm in this fertile river valley. Without the guidance and financial assistance of the Upper Valley Land Trust and the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board and the foresight of our state Legislature to maintain the funding, this conservation easement would not have been possible.
Each acre of productive land generates an income for not only the land owner but for our state as well. The positive impact of productive land goes far beyond monetary benefits. Food and forest products from local sources keep local jobs. Local supply requires a minimum of transportation from producer to consumer. When we factor in climate change, the less greenhouse gases we generate through transport, the more we can reduce Vermont’s contribution to GHG emissions.
- A healthy agriculture and forest products industry
- A strong land stewardship ethic
- A land conservation program and taxation system that encourages and enables current and future generations to work with the land
This will be the legacy we leave but only if we work together now.
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