Integrating Agriculture into the Landscape

Benefits:

By taking these actions:

Conflicts between agriculture and urban land uses can be reduced;

Development can be integrated into the landscape without displacing agriculture;

Rural areas can develop according to their unique "sense of place" and history, without having urban development patterns imposed that can eliminate a community's rural character.

Impediments imposed on the continuation of agriculture by urban development patterns can be alleviated or removed.

An owner's equity in his or her land can be maintained.

Planners will be able to better understand agriculture, its place in the landscape, its contribution to the environment, its economic importance and its role in our very survival; and will be able to create and implement policies designed to facilitate the continuation of agricultural enterprises.

Land use planning in Florida will have a better potential to be broadened to encourage a better mix of land uses — made up of a mosaic of natural landscapes, working landscapes, rural landscapes, suburban landscapes and urban landscapes, without having one type of land use overwhelm or displace another.

Regressive tax policies that force landowners to intensify uses on their properties, convert agricultural operations to urban and suburban developments, and carve up wildlife habitats, just to satisfy tax requirements, will be eliminated.

Tax policies that act as disincentives to agriculture and, thus, speed the conversion of these lands to asphalt, will be turned into incentives for maintaining and improving agricultural activities on the landscape.

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Photo courtesy of South Florida Water Management District
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