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Despite assumptions that agriculture will automatically go into a mode of decline at the Rural Urban Interface (RUI), official statistics suggest that agriculture as a whole remains a strong (and in some cases a growing) industry in many U.S. RUI counties. RUI scholars have acknowledged internal family dynamics can significantly influence farm persistence and adaptation strategies, however, few studies have sought to document the specific role succession has on farm structure at the RUI. Building off rural geography models of farm organization at the RUI and succession research embedded in rural studies we analyze interviews from 33 U.S. farm families to 1) explore the relationship between farm adaptation and succession at the RUI, and 2) examine how succession is related to the different types of enterprises found at the RUI (direct marketers vs. commodity producers) and the types of growth strategies these farm families implement. We find that families who can not identify an heir either disinvest or enter a static management mode. Among farm families who can identify an heir we identify a variety of horizontal and vertical growth strategies (expanding, intensifying, and entrepreneurial stacking) designed to achieve farm reproduction goals. We discuss the theoretical and policy related implications of this research. (Contains 1 figure and 3 tables.)

Many local governments have enacted land use policies to address farmland loss and farm viability by protecting large blocks of farmland from residential growth. While the rate of suburban "sprawl" has slowed since the burst of the housing bubble in 2008, these policies remain the dominant approach to agricultural land use policy. Given the importance of exurban agricultural production, the growing diversity of exurban farms, and the increasing interest in local food systems by the public, it is time to revisit land use policy. Little is known about how farmers perceive land use policy environments, and whether diverse types of farmers have distinctive views on policy effectiveness. Therefore in this study we document land use policy environments of eight U.S. exurban counties. With farmer survey results we examine factors associated with farmers' perceptions of policy effectiveness. We find that the overall policy environment and differences in farmer and farm characteristics explain less variation in views of effectiveness than do farmers' perceptions of local community support, pressure from global markets, intensity of nonfarm development, and overall optimism about the future of agriculture. Farmers who market directly to consumers are particularly pessimistic about land use policies, as these policies were likely not designed with small farms in mind. Results suggest that next-generation policy efforts to encourage the sustainability of exurban farming could be more effective by creating stronger ties between farm and nonfarm populations, adopting flexible policies that recognize the different ways in which farmers adapt to urbanization, and ensuring that the voices of diverse exurban farmers are included in a participatory policy-making process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite population growth and development at the rural-urban interface (RUI), agriculture continues to persist there. This resilience is partially a reflection of land use policies and market support programs designed to protect farm and ranch land that is vulnerable to nonfarm development. Studies examining the RUI primarily focus on the diversity of production and markets and do not discuss the diversity of operators. As the farmland protection and food systems movements continue to refine policy objectives and decide how to allocate scarce resources, it is critical to have up-to-date statistics on the health and vitality of agriculture at the RUI. Using the 2007 Census of Agriculture statistics, we examine (1) the spatial distribution by county of high-value production and marketing practices assumed to play a role in the persistence and vitality of agriculture at the RUI; and (2) the demographic characteristics of farmers in these counties. We find that only some types of high-value production and marketing systems are more prevalent in metropolitan regions, including horses, nursery-greenhouse, and direct sales, while organic production, recreation sales, CSA farms, and value-added farms are more likely to be concentrated in nonmetropolitan counties. We also find that farmers at the RUI are extremely diverse and that a substantial number of beginning and women farmers are found in nonmetropolitan counties, along with a small but notable number of African American, Hispanic and Native American farmers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]