Little by little rural Texas shrinking

By MONETTE TAYLOR | South Central Texas Edition

Feb. 19, 2004 -- For generations, Texans have loved to brag about the wide-open spaces of their state ... and rightly so! Statistics show the Lone Star State stretches 773 miles from east to west and 801 miles from north to south. But of those miles and miles of Texas soil, fewer and fewer are being claimed as fertile farmland.

It seems many folks want a "little piece" of Texas, and what that has done is to contribute to the fragmentation of the state.

According to the American Farmland Trust special report on Texas, traditional farmers and ranchers are becoming fewer and farther between. While there are younger landowners who want to be a part of the Texas heritage, their intention is not to raise crops or livestock; it's to get out of urban areas to establish a home or even a weekend retreat.

Researchers have found the family ranches of 500 to 2,000 acres seem to be at the highest risk for loss. One survey of new landowners by the Texas A&M University's Real Estate Center reported "80 percent of buyers said that finding land for non-agricultural uses, like hunting, fishing and other recreation were 'very important' motives for their purchases."

Some of these land losses have been attributed to older landowners who decide it's time to try something different, and end up selling their property to developers who divide the land into smaller "ranchettes." The prices are better for the seller, since non-agricultural use land values have increased as farm land has disappeared.

According to reports, the majority of the examples of this can be found in the eastern half of Texas ... around the major cities, such as Dallas, Austin, San Antonio and Houston. While these are the larger areas to see the fragmentation of farmland, it can be found in areas such as the Trans Pecos, out in West Texas, and in deep South Texas, too.

Recently, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) released the preliminary Census of Agriculture, with the final data to be available in June 2004.

Every five years, the USDA NASS mails forms to all known and potential farm and ranch operators. Those who do not respond (which, by law, is mandatory), receive follow-up letters, telephone calls and in some cases, personal visits.

According to the USDA, this census is the only source of uniform data on "number of farms, land use, agricultural production and operator characteristics for each county, state and the United States." What it does is measure where farmers and ranchers stand with production costs, cropping systems, farm supply needs, and changing trends in the agricultural industry.

This information is used by farm and ranch organizations to evaluate and propose policies and programs, locally, that benefit ag producers. Farm and ranch cooperatives, commodity and trade associations and firms that market farm products use the data to "develop market strategies and to determine locations of facilities that will serve agricultural producers." Obviously, the information is used in drafting legislation for national and state agricultural programs.

In Texas, the Texas House of Representatives pushed for a program called "Purchase of Development Rights (PDR) in Texas," last spring. The bill would offer incentives for farmers and ranchers to continue owning and operating their land.

"The bottom line is that Texas landowners need more options to keep land in private ownership and management. A statewide Purchase of Development Rights program offers a realistic solution ...," said Julie Shackelford, American Farmland Trust's Texas regional director.

While many landowners admit there needs to be more choices, the PDR introduced in the Natural Resource Committee during the 78th Legislative session was altered and left "pending" in committee, when the Legislature recessed.

What some people seem to forget is that the fragmentation of farmland does more than offer more money to developers and some sellers; it can leave rural economies, such as stockyards, grain elevators, farm implement dealers and other ranch-related businesses no choice except to close their doors.