THE ECONOMIC PAMPHLETEER: Zoning Considerations for Urban and Peri-urban Agriculture

First paragraph: Every year, about 1.2 million acres of U.S. farmland is converted to residential and other commercial uses, according to the American Farmland Trust.[1] This includes some of the most fertile farmland in the nation, as many of our major cities were originally established in fertile farming areas. With more than 900 million acres of farmland remaining, we are not likely to run out of land for farming in the near future. However, farmland conversion is clearly putting the long-run sustainability of U.S. food production at risk. [1] American Farmland Trust, http://www.farmland.org/programs