Aiden Irish

June 28, 2026

Recently, I decided that I would need to move my farm from its current location within the next several years in order to be able to expand my farm business. It has gotten me thinking about the difficulty of finding land as a beginning farmer, a topic that has never been far from my mind since I first started.

So, let’s talk about farmland access, some of the major reasons why it’s so hard to find, and the role policy does (and could play) in addressing what is arguably the most fundamental need of farming (and no, in-door hydroponics neither will nor should replace in-ground agriculture, but I’ll address that later).

Two Primary Threats to Farmland

There are two primary threats to farmland in the U.S. that make it particularly difficult for new and beginning farmers like me to access land; consolidation and development.

In many ways, U.S. agriculture mirrors all of the trends that we see in the broader U.S. economy. This includes decades-long consolidation of farms into a smaller number of larger and larger operations. According to excellent researchers at the U.S. Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service, cropland - land to grow grains, produce, etc. (rather than land for animal grazing) - has become increasingly consolidated over the last three to four decades.

Between 1987 and 2017, the share of all U.S. cropland operated by large farms, farms that individually operate over 2,000 acres, has grown from 15 percent to 41 percent. What this simply means is that farms are growing larger and squeezing out small and midsized farms. This trend was kicked into overdrive with Earl Butz, the Secretary of Agriculture under President Nixon in the 1970s, who famously told farmers to “get big, or get out.” The trend has been consistent ever since. 

At the same time, farmland has also become a speculative asset for non-farmers. Famously, Bill Gates is the largest private owner of farmland in the U.S. Though his 280,000-acre holding is small as a percent of total U.S. farmland, it is notable that he and other wealthy investors are buying up land. (Rather infamously, Howard Lutnick, the current Secretary of Commerce, called himself a “soybean farmer” during an interview, because he owns farmland that he leases to farmers who grow soy.) In short, they expect it to become increasingly valuable, hence their investment. International entities are also buying up American farmland for development and investment. 

Consolidation by large farm operations and purchases by non-farming entities creates an economic war for a scarce resource that prices out smaller farmers, particularly new/beginning and disadvantaged farmers who do not have significant financial assets. As new farmers, we most often find ourselves renting farmland from other owners. Across the U.S., about two million owners rent out almost 350 million acres of farmland, which is over a third of all U.S. farmland. Of that rented land, 79 percent of it is owned by individuals or organizations that are not themselves farmers, including the previously mentioned billionaires.

If you are like me and hope to buy farmland someday, you find yourself in stiff competition for an exceedingly limited resource. Out of 900 million acres of farmland in the U.S., only about 23 million acres are expected to be sold from a farmer to a non-relative in the next five years (i.e., not being passed down to children who want to farm). Those 23 million acres means that only 2.5 percent of all U.S. farmland is expected to be available for sale in the next five years.

At the same time as farmland is becoming a consolidated speculative asset, it is also facing significant pressure from urban sprawl. American Farmland Trust (AFT) has published a series of studies exploring how urbanization is consuming U.S. farmland. I highly recommend reading the report as well as spending some time with the interactive data dashboard they created that allows you to see how much farmland is expected to be converted to urban development under different scenarios. The topline takeaway is that between 2001 and 2016, 11 million acres of U.S. farmland was converted to urban/suburban development and this trend will continue unless policymakers intervene. This is equivalent to all of the land planted in fruit, nuts, and vegetables in the U.S. combined.

The Struggle for Farmland in Western Washington

Western Washington State is primarily facing farmland loss due to growing development. For reasons I completely understand, this is a desirable place to live, which is part of why the greater Seattle metro area has grown by over 30 percent in the last 25 years and is expecting similar growth in the coming decades. Unfortunately, all of that population creates at least three challenges for people like me trying to continue farming in this region.

First is the development that I previously mentioned. Farmland – particularly farmland that is not in a flood plain, which is the case for a lot of the Snoqualmie Valley where I live – is also prime development property. Large developers can always pay more than any farmer can, so without policy intervention, much of that prime farmland is just being converted to urban sprawl.

Second, growing population and development pressure simply creates a price war for all properties in which farmers – particularly new farmers – are unable to compete. Land prices have nearly doubled, or sometimes more than doubled in my area around Carnation in the last five years, a trend that parallels what has happened across the U.S. during and after the Pandemic.

Finally, it is important to note that with changing socioeconomics of place, what people consider aesthetically acceptable also changes. I find a lot of beauty in well managed working farmland, even if it sometimes means that there are plastic hoop houses (aka “high tunnels”), livestock, and piles of compost. However, this is not the case for people who have not spent time around agriculture. A trend I have observed since moving back to the region in which I grew up is that the newer, often wealthier residents expect a certain bucolic atmosphere, but have limited tolerance for the dynamics of working land. Local zoning, HOAs, and simple social pressure can make it difficult to operate as a production farm. This is part of why I am having to move and the cause of many farms like mine having to leave.

What Role Can Policy Play

As always, policy plays an enormous role both in creating the problems that we see and in solving it. The current trend towards large, consolidated farms started with explicit federal policy under the Nixon Administration. Meanwhile, development and urban sprawl is shaped by local zoning and land-use policies. Shifting from a decreasing farm population to a thriving one requires renewed attention to ensuring farmland access. There are many potential starting points, but I will start with four.

First is conservation. In order to ensure farmland access, there needs to be farmland to access. This is where local municipal and county planning are absolutely essential in order to prevent the kind of runaway sprawl that the AFT report outlines. The good news is that King County has creatively used tools like transfer of development rights – a tool that allows developers to offset their development impacts by supporting conservation elsewhere – to conserve farmland. However, these kinds of programs for farmland conservation do not do enough to actively identify and protect critical farmland at risk of being developed. Additionally, as the AFT report outlines, there needs to be pressure on local governments to require more high-density development rather than permitting low-density sprawl (e.g., suburban single-family developments and shopping malls). More pressure is needed on local officials to ensure that the ongoing development of this region is focused on densification and protecting existing farmland.

Second, the growing trend of farmland becoming a speculative asset for wealthy investors should worry us all. It doesn’t take much imagination to see this contributing to a future where farmers are increasingly beholden to the whims and preferences of their wealthy landlords, creating a new fuedal system of tenuous tenant-farmers. Towards addressing this, Senators Booker and Sanders recently introduced legislation that would restrict the ability of wealthy entities to purchase farmland as a speculative investment. This is an important step towards protecting access to farmland by farmers, not wealthy interests. It's still in Congress, so keep your eye on it. 

Additionally, there needs to be support for new, beginning and small farms that can help them grow and thrive. This kind of work has been the focus of a research group I have been associated with for years called “Agriculture of the Middle.” Ag of the Middle – as we call it for shorthand – recognizes that midsized farms are essential to the U.S. food system and the management of its farmland, but often struggle to survive in an increasingly consolidated economy. The group is dedicated to developing research, technical assistance, and policy to support these mid-sized operations, including through farmland access. Ag of the Middle is a valuable group to follow if your interested in or concerned about protecting a robust and healthy mid-sized farm economy.

Importantly, there are a variety of programs that currently exist in the U.S. government that can support new, beginning, and small/midsized farms in accessing farmland and developing viable businesses. However, these programs are often spread out across various agencies and departments. Simply providing a one-stop-shop where farmers can get help finding resources would be a valuable resource. Towards that end, our very own Representative Strickland, along with a number of other Congressmembers, introduced legislation to establish the Office of Small Farms.” This new office, if established, would coordinate programs and facilitate access to resources for farmland purchasing and business operations that are aimed at small operations specifically. This piece of legislation is also still in Congress, so keep a close eye on it.

Finally, for many of us who are younger farmers, the very idea of the individual farm and farmer is changing. This has included more movement towards cooperatively owned and/or operated farms and farm businesses. Cooperatively managed pieces of farmland have been essential to my own developing farm (I’ve rented farmland in two such contexts). Cooperative land with multiple small farms is valuable not just as resources that allow for access to affordable land, but also provides learning and support networks among participating farmers. I frequently share tools, help/get help on tasks, and benefit from a social network in what can otherwise be a fairly solitary profession.

There are growing number of examples where land is made available for cooperative use. I am a member of and participate with Sno Valley Tilth, which operates a piece of land near me that makes farmland and infrastructure available to farmers. Viva Farms similarly provides space for small farms to operate on shared land. Tierra y Libertad in Whatcom County is another powerful example of cooperative farm business as a means of fostering agency among farm workers.

Cooperatives have a long and rich history on the American continent and exist in a variety of forms. I am talking here about land cooperatives, but they also exist as sales cooperatives, cooperatively owned processing businesses, etc. (I am also part of a sales cooperative). Importantly, cooperative land management was and remains the baseline in most Indigenous communities. Even within the individualistic context of modern U.S. agriculture, cooperatives have always played a critical role in agricultural economies, and there are resources from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to support them. Yet, the myth of the rugged individual farmer in the U.S. has persisted despite this history. There is a need for both more resources and better facilitation of access to those resources, particularly for new, beginning, and historically disenfranchised farmers. Additionally, there is need to overcome the myth of the farmer as a “rugged individual” that is both untrue in the history of farming and actively divides famers from each other. This is changing, but we need to hasten its end by supporting and highlighting the historical and ongoing importance of cooperative farming organizations.

Farmland access is one of the most important threats to a viable next-generation of farmers in this country and is actively pushing many new farmers out of the business in our area of Western Washington. The problem is facilitated by policy that enables speculation and farmland, permits urban sprawl, and allows for consolidation across agriculture. 

It’s a solvable problem, but it needs to be addressed more aggressively if there is going to be a new generation of farmers.