Intermediate
Last updated
Last updated
A holistic policy can also associate actions by the local authority to link up priority land users and those who can support them. This is in particular the case with landowners and retiring farmers who control land that could be made available to agroecological farmers.
A huge amount of land is about to change hands in Europe. With a third (32%) of farm managers in the EU aged 65 years or more (), and many farms without designated successors, there is an urgent need to ensure that farmland is transferred to sustainable users. Furthermore, non-farming landowners should also be part of the conversation to lease land to specific users. Local authorities can provide skills and mediation to support extra-family land leases or transfers.
Especially if you are a small municipality and know your constituents well, you can individually check on farmers nearing retirement age. Ask them how they see the future, if they have plans for the farm, and whether they have an identified successor. You can tell them if you know of young people interested in farming in the area. The goal is to counterbalance natural social links between established farmers who already know each other and the likelihood that a farmer without an identified successor will sell the land to a neighbour or existing farm.
The local consortium of the Lluçanès area (grouping of 13 villages) works closely with the association of local forestland owners to manage wildfire risks through extensive herding. Through the “Boscos de Pastura” project, these actors work to:
Mediate and promote agreements to allow farmers to graze their animals in private forests (which reduces vegetation density and fire risk).
Channel public investment towards infrastructure and maintenance of private forests to make them accessible for farmers, e.g. perform prior forest management actions to ensure herders can access them.
Agreements involve local authorities, the landowner association, and private landowners and farmers. The benefits are multifold, in particular helping manage forests and wildfire risks and helping some new or established farmers consolidate their business through access to grazing land.
Key features:
Identifying and matching land offers and land demands
Local authorities acting as intermediaries between private owners and farming tenants
In some regions of Spain land ownership is highly fragmented and the rates of land abandonment are high (owners are sometimes remote, and their land is too small to constitute a viable farm). Since the 2000s, multiple land banks at the municipal or regional levels have been created. These can play different roles:
Generally, land banks consist of at least a website to connect landowners and those interested in land cultivation (owners can enter their plots, and farmers can register their interests);
Some land banks also facilitate lease transactions, by realising the contract and/or providing guarantees (paying rents to owners – who won’t deal directly with leaseholders –, guaranteeing the return of the land in a good state, guaranteeing the farmer’s right to use the land for the duration of the contract…).
Land banks have also played a role in the frame of “land mobility” pilot projects to reorganise parcels to create more viable farming units (these projects can include land clearing and other fieldwork to improve infrastructure). The plots of the area concerned by the mobility project are then incorporated in the land bank to facilitate contracts with private landowners.
Good idea! Get in touch with retiring farmers in your area
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Connect retiring farmers and new entrants
Connect private owners and farmers
