Land Access

Land Innovations Trainings

For farmers

NYFC works with local partners across the country to offer full-day, in-depth trainings for farmers on the process of accessing land and partnering with a land trust, as well as brief single-issue workshops on topics including:

Using NYFC’s Finding Farmland Calculator
Searching for and evaluating farmland to buy or lease
Working with a land trust
Financial and business planning
Lending programs for beginning farmers
State agricultural land policy

Since 2014, we have provided tools and training to over 800 farmers and ranchers around the country.

If you are interested in working with us to hold a training in your region, contact our Land Access team.

For conservation professionals

Access to farmland remains one of the biggest barriers that beginning farmers face, but innovation and leadership demonstrated by a number of land trusts has opened up new possibilities for helping these farmers succeed. NYFC believes that these groups have enormous potential to make farmland across the country more affordable and accessible for the next generation of farmers.

Since 2014, we’ve teamed up with experts in farmland conservation to offer a series of Land Access Innovations Trainings for land trust staff and other conservation professionals with a high degree of commitment to protecting working farms and keeping land affordable for farmers. The trainings provide an opportunity for participants to learn from land trust staff, lawyers, and appraisers about innovative strategies and tools being used to ensure farmland stays in production and in the hands of farmers.

Following each training, all participants have access to our Dropbox folder of resources along with our Land Access Innovations listserv—an email discussion group we facilitate to connect organizations and individuals that are implementing working farmland conservation projects. The Dropbox and listerv provide access to information on funding strategies, monitoring and enforcement, legal considerations, and model documents on working farm easements and ground leases.

Since 2014, NYFC has trained over 100 land trusts and other conservation organizations across the country. You can read a post about our first national Land Access Innovations Training for land trusts here, and find more information about the tools and strategies we discuss in our case studies here.

If you are interested in working with us to hold a training in your region, contact our Land Access team.

Land Trust Trainings

For conservation professionals

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania | Wednesday, October 10, 2018

NYFC is teaming up with Equity Trust, American Farmland Trust, Pennsylvania Land Trust Association (PALTA), Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture (PASA), Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, Allegheny County Soil & Water Conservation District, and Allegheny Land Trust to hold a full-day, in-depth training on innovative tools that land trusts, farmland preservation boards, Soil and Water Conservation Districts, and other land access leaders can use to help put farmers on the land.

This day long session is designed specifically for agricultural professionals working on land access issues, and will draw both on local expertise and successful models from across the country. The training will focus on tools such as working farm easements with affordability and farmer ownership provisions; ground leases; and other methods of providing long-term land security to farmers.

Register Now.

Farmer Trainings

FINDING FARMLAND: Affordable Approaches to Land Access - Mills River, NC

November 1, 2018 10:00 am - 6:00 pm

455 Research Drive, Mills River, NC 28759

Accessing land is one of the most complex financial decisions that you will make as a farmer. Join NYFC, Organic Growers School, and Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy in a workshop designed to prepare early career farmers to approach land access with confidence. You will

Central PA Farmland Access Listening Session

October 3, 2018 5:00 pm - 8:00 pm

229 Cuba Mills Road, Mifflintown, PA 17059

Join the National Young Farmers Coalition at Village Acres Farm for a listening session to discuss the farmland access and tenure challenges that you have faced as a farmer or as an aspiring farmer in Central Pennsylvania. Farmer voices are

FINDING FARMLAND Tools & Strategies for Affordable Land Access

July 11, 2018 12:00 pm - 5:00 pm

294 Crosby Brook Road, Unity, ME

Accessing land is one of the most complex financial decisions that you will make as a farmer. Join NYFC, MOFGA, Land for Good, and Maine Farmland Trust in a workshop designed to prepare early career farmers to approach land access with

Finding Farmland: Tools & Strategies for Affordable Land Access

September 15, 2018 9:00 am - 4:00 pm

1503 2nd Avenue Northeast, Rochester, MN 55906

Accessing land is one of the most complex financial decisions that you will make as a farmer. In this workshop designed for aspiring and early career farmers, we will prepare you to approach your land access journey with confidence. You

Want more?

For more information on holding a Land Access Innovations Training (for land trusts or farmers) in your region, joining our Land Access Innovations listserv, accessing model documents and resources on this topic, or getting connected to our past presenters, email our Land Access Program Director, Holly Rippon-Butler.

Past Trainings

For Conservation Professionals

For Farmers

Land Access Innovations Partners

Land Trusts

Lead Mentor | Equity Trust is a national organization devoted to helping farmers achieve long-term and affordable access to farmland. Since the mid-1990s, Equity Trust has been a pioneer both in developing tools for addressing this need and in educating the land trust community about the issue. With a mission to “change the way people think about and hold property,” they have worked with the land trust and farmer communities to create some of the most innovative affordable farm partnerships in the country. In 2014, Equity Trust launched an exciting regional program to promote and finance farm affordability in the Hudson Valley of New York State. Learn more at equitytrust.org.

Attorneys, Appraisers, & Consultants

Jessica Jay, Attorney at Law, Conservation Law, P.C. | Colorado
Ellen Fred, Attorney at Law, Conservation Partners, PLLC | Michigan
Andrew Branan, Lawyer, The Branan Law Firm, PLLC | North Carolina
Nancy Duhnkrack, Pro Bono Program Manager, Coalition of Oregon Land Trusts | Oregon
Lindsey Jacobs, Lawyer | South Carolina
Jessica Jensen, Lawyer, Jessica Jensen Law | Washington
Scott Carlson, Farm Programs Manager, Carlson Appraisal Company | Michigan
Jim Waterhouse, Appraiser, Farm Credit East | New York
Tom Morgan, Appraiser, Duncan & Brown | Oregon
Kendra Johnson Katz, Farm Preservation & Land Access Consultant | California

Farmers

Organizations

NATIONAL YOUNG FARMERS COALITION

Land Access Innovations Trainings

NYFC offers land access trainings for farmers and land conservation organizations across the country.

Land Innovations Trainings

For farmers

For conservation professionals

Land Trust Trainings

For conservation professionals

Farmer Trainings

FINDING FARMLAND: Affordable Approaches to Land Access - Mills River, NC

Central PA Farmland Access Listening Session

FINDING FARMLAND Tools & Strategies for Affordable Land Access

Finding Farmland: Tools & Strategies for Affordable Land Access

Want more?

Past Trainings

Land Access Innovations Partners

Land Trusts

Attorneys, Appraisers, & Consultants

Farmers

Organizations