Global and local policy forces for landscape perennialization in central North American agriculture

Abstract

Farm production practices often focus on mitigating negative consequences of cropping – particularly annual crops like corn, cereals and oilseeds. Some of North America’s most-intensive farmlands are rapidly converting their remaining perennial cover to annual crops. While perennial cover like woodlands, grasslands and wetlands are valued for the many landscape services they provide, they are vulnerable to conversion to other cover types under drivers of landscape change. Conversions within farms constitute nuances rather than new land uses, yet landscape composition effects can be substantial when considering habitat, biodiversity, soil and water quality, carbon sequestration, and aesthetics. As the farm landscape becomes increasingly dominated by annual crop vegetation, the key drivers behind land cover types and management merit critical examination. This paper reviews recent studies on farmland composition and management in central Canada and the United States, identifying trajectories and magnitudes of landscape changes. To consider forces, both speculative examination of policies and information from farmer interviews help identify motivations for changes in perennial or annual proportions of farm landscapes. The paper concludes with forces that increase perennialization and existing or prospective pathways to improve the balance between annual and perennial vegetation.

Keywords:

• Agriculture
• ethanol
• forage
• pasture
• biofuels
• trade policy

Acknowledgements

I appreciate the comments of two anonymous reviewers and the editor in improving the manuscript for publication.