Urban sprawl and disappearing farmland in British Columbia

Southern Ontario isn't the only part of Canada fighting urban sprawl. Greater Vancouver, which is the second most popular destination for new immigrants after Toronto, is also experiencing rapid population growth and there is pressure to build on BC farmland. From the Toronto Star (Down on the farm, the view is anything but rosy by Murray Whyte, May 27):

But it's not just the thought of friction with the new neighbours that has farmers nervous. It's the growing hunger for the land itself.

For decades, B.C. farmers have had a buffer. In 1973, then-premier Dave Barrett, concerned that the province was losing 6,000 hectares of farmland each year to development, established the Agricultural Land Reserve — 4.7 million hectares of the province's richest farmland to be held permanently.

The thinking was that the fertile soil found mostly in the lush Fraser Valley, the Okanagan Valley and Vancouver Island would be preserved to grow the food needed for the province's burgeoning population.

But with B.C.'s economy moving at high speed, many have grown concerned that the reserve's protective shell has weakened.

Earlier this month, the David Suzuki Foundation released a report investigating incursions into the province's ALR lands. According to the foundation, from March 2001 to March 2005, the reserve's governing body, the Agricultural Land Commission, approved 71.4 per cent of applications throughout B.C. to remove land from the ALR for development purposes. On the island, that approval rate soared to 86.8 per cent, the equivalent of 1,060 hectares.

Read all of Murray Whyte's Star article. The David Suzuki Foundation's report on BC's Agricultural Land Reserves can be downloaded at the bottom of this news release.