B.C. land speculation edges out young farmers

Monday, February 3, 2014

A recent story in The Vancouver Sun paints a grim picture for the next generation of B.C. farmers. The price of farmland is soaring, with an informal survey of Surrey realtors showing prices of "$100,000, $200,000 and as high as $1 million an acre."

Notes Kent Mullinix, director of sustainable food systems at Kwantlen Polytechnic University: "There's no form of agriculture that can survive those prices."

Prices are being driven by speculation on the Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR), which protects 4.7 million hectares of agricultural land for farming. But if land is reassessed and opened up for development, its value can soar. "Land for development has reached such a premium that having even a few acres excluded from the ALR is like winning the Lotto Max," Mullinix says. "People will pay $1 million an acre because if they get it (excluded), they'll make $20 million."

Meanwhile, that land is not being farmed. The Sun reports that a recent Ipsos Reid poll found that "few owners of underutilized (ALR) land were prepared to farm, expand farming or even lease unused land to other farmers."

All this is keeping young farmers from starting out in the business. Julia Smith, 42, currently leases small parcels of land, and tells The Sun, "I don't know anybody who could earn enough from farming to buy a farm. You pretty much have to inherit a farm."

B.C.'s number of farmers under the age of 35 is 30 per cent lower than the national average. BF