Farmland fight pits growth against survival
A Jonathan Creek field once meant for crops and cows now comes with a sales pitch — where pasture meets pavement, the future is already staking its claim.
Cory Vaillancourt photo
A low-flying plane circling his property was the first sign. The passes were frequent enough to be noticed. Haywood County farmer and longtime Farm Bureau President Don Smart knew immediately what that kind of attention usually means.
In the old days, Smart said, they’d have been looking for illegal cannabis or tobacco plantings, but that wasn’t why the plane was tracing slow, deliberate circles in the sky over his farm. Two weeks later, confirmation of his suspicions arrived in writing.
National homebuilder D.R. Horton wanted to buy his farm. Smart called the number on the letter.
“Give Mr. Horton a message,” Smart said. “Tell him he’ll be a-drivin’ a coal truck in hell before he builds a house on my farm.”
The interest in his property wasn’t random, Smart said at the Farm Bureau’s annual legislative breakfast, held at Lake Junaluska on April 1. His farm sits near infrastructure that developers look for — water, sewer and transportation — making it more valuable to them as a building site than as working land.
The plane, he said, made that clear before the letter even hit his mailbox.
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Horton’s approach reflects a broader reality facing farmers across Western North Carolina, where land is increasingly viewed as a commodity rather than a resource as growth accelerates and land values climb, forcing farmers into a narrowing space where holding onto land often means turning down life-changing money.
That tension — between agricultural use and development value — has been building for years across the region. Farm Bureau leaders have warned that farmland is being lost at an unsustainable rate, driven by population growth and steady in-migration into rural areas.
North Carolina has lost more than 600,000 acres of farmland since 2015, a figure that continues to grow as development expands outward from urban centers like Asheville and into mountain communities.
The American Farmland Trust’s 2024 “Farms Under Threat” report found that millions of acres of U.S. farmland have already been lost to development and millions more are at risk if current trends continue, threatening food production, environmental health and rural economies. In North Carolina, the report projects roughly 1.2 million acres could be lost by 2040, ranking the state second in the nation for farmland loss. Much of that conversion is expected to occur on the state’s most productive land, driven by low-density sprawl and population growth.
In 2024 Smart said that 40 years ago, Haywood County had nearly 80,000 acres of farmland, but now has less than 50,000. Valleys once defined by open pasture and working farms are increasingly being subdivided, with new construction replacing fields that had remained in agriculture for generations.
At the same time, farming itself has become more difficult. Rising input costs, labor shortages and unpredictable markets caused by short-sighted foreign policy decisions have made it harder for farmers to maintain operations, particularly when compared to the massive financial returns offered by selling land.
Hurricane Helene intensified those pressures. Flooding damaged farmland, destroyed infrastructure and forced farmers into extended recovery efforts that strained both time and resources.
Demand for state farmland preservation dollars currently outstrips supply by a factor of 8. File photo
For some, the storm accelerated decisions that had already been forming, pushing property owners closer to selling. The result is a widening gap between what land is worth agriculturally and what it is worth on the market — a gap that continues to drive farmland loss.
State Rep. Karl Gillespie (R-Macon) represents one of the most rural districts in North Carolina and works as a cattle farmer, giving him direct experience with the pressures facing agriculture. Gillespie said preservation efforts must be tied to the economic realities of farming if they are to succeed.
“I personally believe from my own experience the best way to do that, one of the best ways, in addition to preservation, is to make farming sustainable,” Gillespie said. “The best way to make farming sustainable and make it profitable.”
He said the state’s growth, while beneficial in many ways, is contributing to the loss of agricultural land. New residents are often drawn to rural areas, increasing demand for housing in places historically used for farming.
“North Carolina is doing a lot of great things drawing people to the state, but those folks are using valuable agricultural land when they come, so we’ve got to protect that agricultural land,” Gillespie said.
At the county level, Haywood Commissioner Tommy Long, also a cattle rancher, has experienced those pressures firsthand. Long said Hurricane Helene required immediate and sustained effort to protect livestock and equipment. That experience, he said, highlighted the physical demands of farming as well as the vulnerability of agricultural operations to extreme weather.
He also pointed to a potential funding mechanism tied to present-use value taxation, which allows farmland to be taxed based on agricultural use rather than development value.
When land exits that program — usually as the result of a sale — three years of rollback taxes are collected, creating a potential source of funding for preservation.
“All five commissioners agreed to have our staff look at some of these other counties that are doing that — set that money aside that’s paid back when a farm sells,” he said. “Set it aside and have a kitty there to help buy or help contribute to farmland preservation.”
Haywood County has lost nearly 50% of its farmland over the past 50 years. File photo
Ryan Manning works in farmland conservation across North Carolina for the Working Lands Trust, created in 2013 through a partnership led by the North Carolina Forestry Association alongside the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and other conservation and agriculture stakeholders to establish a nonprofit focused on protecting working farms and forests across the state. Manning said the issue is becoming more urgent as the farming population ages.
“The average age of the farmer in North Carolina is about 60 years old, which means, unfortunately, that we don’t have the luxury of time,” he said.
That shift, Manning said, will likely lead to changes in how land is used, depending on whether preservation efforts can keep pace. He said the outcome will be determined in the near-term and pointed to visible changes already occurring in Haywood County, where farmland is being converted into residential developments.
“If you want to see what that new land use looks like when you leave here, just drive down Raccoon Road and look to the right, and you will see what that new land use looks like,” Manning said.
Existing preservation programs, Manning noted, are not funded at levels sufficient to meet demand, with the gap between funding and need continuing to widen.
“The state only gets about six million recurring dollars for farmland preservation, and the demand is now regularly in about the $50 million range,” Manning said.
He said local funding will likely be necessary to close that gap, and that local communities will need to decide if and how much they are willing to invest in preserving farmland.
Echoing Smart’s grim prognosis, Manning warned that continued farmland loss could undermine the state’s number one industry, which generates more than $110 billion annually and accounts for about one-sixth of the state’s income and employment.
“It’s time to really put our money where our mouth is,” Manning said.
