FEBRUARY 2017 • COUNTRY LIFE IN BC


FarmFolk CityFolk to protect farmlands through foodland trust


Initiative picks up where The Land Conservancy left off


by TAMARA LEIGH


LANGFORD – Agricultural land in BC is perpetually under threat. If it’s not at risk of development or non- agricultural uses, it’s often unaffordable to those who want to farm it. In an effort to keep agricultural lands in production, FarmFolk CityFolk (FFCF) have launched the Foodlands Trust Project. “There are a lot of small land trusts in BC. In some cases, they are set up for a single property and in almost all cases, they are for conservation land. It’s different when you have an active working landscape and you want to conserve land for providing food,” explains Heather Pritchard, the project lead for FarmFolk CityFolk in partnership with the UBC Centre for Sustainable Food Systems. “We need another land trust in BC that is provincial in scope.” The Farmlands Trust Project emerged from FarmFolk CityFolk’s Community Farm Program (CFP) established in 2006 to work with The Land


Conservancy of BC (TLC), a provincial trust with a mandate to acquire and protect land with cultural, ecological and historical value, including working farmland.


When the TLC ran into financial troubles and discontinued their farm program, FFCF continued to partner with other organizations to support alternative, community-led models of farmland ownership, access and governance. This project addresses the need for an organization capable of holding working farmland in trust, for outgoing farmers or landowners interested in donating land and supporting the expansion of other local and regional initiatives. “We started off thinking farmland and at some point in the development of a trust, we were challenged by Indigenous people we are working with to think beyond farmland. Farmland is tied to a specific activity, one way of producing food. In terms of Indigenous systems, they have hunting, trapping,


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From left to right Doug Brubaker, Nitya Harris, Joan Varley, Scott Harris, Matthew Varley and Diana Brubaker with FFCF’s Heather Pritchard commanding the pumpkin in front. MICHAEL MARRAPESE PHOTO


gathering, fishing, and they felt we were excluding them,” says Pritchard.


“We want to recognize and acknowledge Indigenous people and food systems in the way we think about and acquire land. That's the key piece in what makes foodland different from farmland,” she adds.


The organization is in the process of incorporating as a co-operative. Founding members will be community farms, funders and other land


trusts that want to contribute their expertise. Vancity has stepped forward not only as a funder but also as an active part of the trust, and the Real Estate Institute of BC has committed two years of funding to get the initiative off the ground.


First property


The first property in their land trust portfolio is the Lohbrunner Community Farm Co-operative in Langford. Norma Lohbrunner bought


the property with her husband Joseph in 1945 and continued to farm it after his death in 1968. She donated the property to The Land Conservancy in 2007 and continued to live there until her death in 2011. When Norma died, a group of local farm volunteers approached TLC and committed to keep the land in agricultural production.


When TLC started talking See LAND on next page o


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