Coast & Ocean Spring 2004 Ebb & Flow

FARMING AND THE COASTAL ENVIRONMENT

In our business erosion is usually a bad thing, but there is one kind of erosion I like to see: breaks in the levee separating farmers from environmentalists.

There is clearly much common ground between these groups. Farmers work in the natural environment, depend on natural resources for their livelihood, and affect the quality of those resources. Most coastal farmland accommodates wildlife habitat on its borders, and irrigation ponds frequently serve as refuges for fish, amphibians, and birds. Farmland is not covered with buildings and asphalt.

Although many farmers might spurn the title “environmentalist,” you’d be hard pressed to find a farmer who doesn’t like his or her work precisely because it means working outdoors with plants and animals, and depends on weather and other conditions outside of human control. Farmers have to respect the environment, but they also have to make a living. It’s hardly surprising that they resent principled outsiders with little knowledge of farming who tell them how to do their jobs.

On the other hand, farmers use water and land that could otherwise support wildlife, and farming practices often pollute the environment, sometimes with devastating consequences. Regulations are needed to protect the environment, but they can be so severe or inflexible that they needlessly harm an industry that is essential to the public good.

Is balance possible? It had better be—besides protecting vast amounts of open space, farmers produce the food and fiber on which we all depend. California’s coastal agriculture is some of the most productive anywhere. Although most of California’s coastal crops and livestock can be grown or raised in other parts of the world, those areas face similar environmental constraints. Simply exporting our problems is clearly immoral, and as we learn more about the world, we see that local environmental problems can have global impacts.

Recent coastal history offers proof that cooperation between farmers and environmental advocates can work to their mutual advantage. A few examples:

In the 1970s, western Marin County farmers and environmentalists joined to combat widespread development proposals and to address the effects of the 1976–77 drought. This led to the formation of the Marin Agricultural Land Trust (MALT), which has protected 32,000 acres of farmland through purchases of agricultural conservation easements. Coastal Conservancy funding was instrumental to MALT’s establishment, and we continue to support MALT’s efforts to preserve the agricultural heritage of West Marin.

Late last year, the Bay Foundation of Morro Bay purchased a conservation easement on the 1,860-acre Maino Ranch, using a $1.5-million grant from the Coastal Conservancy and an additional $500,000 from the Nature Conservancy. The ranch has long been grazed by cattle, while also supporting eagles, falcons, burrowing owls, steelhead trout, red-legged frogs, and other wildlife. The Maino family has worked with conservation organizations and public agencies for over ten years to minimize erosion and water pollution in ways that also improved ranching operations, and the easement ensures that the “best management practices” developed in that time will continue. It secures a future for ranching, wildlife habitat, and unspoiled scenery in the heart of the Morro Bay watershed.

As told in “Coastside Water Crisis,” in this issue of Coast & Ocean, environmental regulations can effectively shut down farming operations in some instances. Public agencies can help to prevent such losses—witness the Coastal Conservancy’s support for efforts to streamline permitting processes in San Mateo and Santa Cruz Counties, and to resolve the conflicts over stream water use. Research and studies that may be required for permits to use the coast’s scarce water are beyond the means of most farmers. Public agencies are better equipped to do such research, assist farmers with permit applications, and guide regulatory agencies in their reviews.

The future of California’s coastal agriculture is under threat from development pressures, expanding regulations, and overseas competition for markets. It may be overly optimistic to think that environmentalists will save coastal agriculture in California, or that farmers will one day be considered stalwarts of environmental protection on the coast, but without optimism, both farmers and environmentalists would have a hard time doing their work. We must continue to build alliances between these two groups on common ground, for the protection of farmland is a key to sustaining the environment on much of the coast.

—Sam Schuchat