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Farmland is an essential resource for the sustainability and security of human food systems, environments, agricultural industries, and livelihoods. Beyond the provisioning value and services of farmland, such as with food and fiber, sustainably managed farmland provides several other invaluable ecosystem services, such as pollinator and wildlife habitat, carbon sequestration, nutrient cycling, water regulation, as well as amenity value (Power, 2010). However, the capacity of farmland and agricultural industries to provide these services beneficial to collective wellbeing depends on the availability and quality of farmland available (Barral et al., 2015; Hu et al., 2018; Benton et al., 2021).

Due to global urbanization, farmland availability has been increasingly under threat from social, physical, and climate factors (Hertel, 2011; Vinge, 2018). Preserving agricultural land for current and future generations is a worldwide topic that must be addressed urgently (Hertel, 2011; Caldwell et al., 2017; FAO, 2021). Research on the threats of urbanization on farmland resources specifically is of global priority and is evident in Canada (Qiu et al., 2015; Epp and Caldwell, 2018; Connell, 2020; Cameron and Connell, 2021), the United States (Moroney and Castellano, 2018; Narducci et al., 2019), Europe (Tan et al., 2009; Perrin, 2013; Skog and Steinnes, 2016), and China (Chien, 2015; Zhang et al., 2016; Hu et al., 2018; Duan et al., 2021; Miao et al., 2021). There is a need to address complex drivers contributing to farmland loss as well as diminishing physical capacity of lands to support climate change mitigation and adaptation measures (Masson-Delmotte et al., 2021). Agricultural and urban anthropogenic land uses have already partially converted an estimated 43% of global land area (Barnosky et al., 2011), having significant implications for the land base fragmentation, biodiversity loss, ecological health, and climate resilience (Laurance et al., 2014; Capmourteres et al., 2018). Additionally, once farmland is lost to urban development, its productive capability is lost forever (Moroney and Castellano, 2018). Thus, preserving and protecting existing agricultural land resources is critical for the future resilience and sustainability of food systems, communities, and agricultural economies.

Canada has a robust agricultural sector with over $100 billion annual GDP and 2.3 million jobs in agriculture and agri-food (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, 2019). Nevertheless, farmland is a limited resource in Canada, and only occupies 7.3% of the land area due to soil quality, climate, and terrain restrictions (Statistics Canada, 2014). Much of the most productive agricultural soils are located within Ontario, both the most populated part of Canada and where most farmland loss occurs nationally (Statistics Canada, 2016). Census data shows that total farmland in Ontario has fallen by 50% since 1941. Additionally, over 1.5 million acres of farmland were lost between 1996 and 2016 (Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, 2017). Like many fast-developing regions worldwide, urban sprawl has consumed large tracts of agricultural soils in Ontario during the past few decades. Urbanization is unlikely to slow down: the population in Ontario is projected to grow to over 20 million by 2046, representing a 35.8% increase from 2020 (Government of Ontario, 2022). Moreover, the fragmentation of the agricultural land base and the imposition of low-density urban sprawl into agricultural communities often poses challenges for agricultural viability and compatibility for farmers and non-farmers alike (Qiu et al., 2015; Epp and Caldwell, 2018).

Relative to the rest of the province, southern Ontario contains some of Canada's most finite and productive soils (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, 2019). The Canada Land Inventory (CLI) is used to designate land based on soil type, giving the land a numerical designation based on agricultural suitability (in terms of crop production). The CLI consists of seven distinct classes of agricultural land based on its productive potential, with classes 1, 2, and 3 soils considered to be “prime agricultural land.” By contrast, categories above soil classification 3 are deemed limited in their productive capability. Only 0.5% of Canada's total land base comprises Class 1 land (which is the highest quality in soil classification), and most of this soil is in southern Ontario (Walton, 2003; Caldwell et al., 2017). Since most of the future urban development is expected to occur in this region, farmland protection is vital for southern Ontario (Office of the Auditor General of Ontario, 2021).

While movements, programs, and policies to protect farmland from urbanization across North America have been implemented since the 1950s (Bunce, 1998), there is much to learn about the effectiveness of farmland protection policies (Liu and Lynch, 2011; Connell, 2020). For example, since 2005, the Ontario provincial government has established a series of policies to regulate urban sprawl and strengthen farmland protection, including the Provincial Policy Statement (MMAH, 2005c, 2014), the Greenbelt Plan (MMAH, 2005b), and the Growth Plan (MMAH, 2005a). Collectively, these plans establish a provincial land-use planning framework to identify policies for where urbanization should not occur to protect ecological features such as farmland, and guide transit-oriented development, intensification, and densification to already urbanized communities. These provincial plans are then interpreted and implemented at the municipal level, leaving room for variability in their interpretation and application of policies amongst local communities. Since establishing these policies, little research has evaluated farmland loss in southern Ontario to test their effectiveness in preserving farmland. This absence of evaluation is despite Ontario's farmland protection policies being internationally recognized for its success (see Government of Ontario, 2007) and establishing one of the most extensive greenbelts in the world (Carter-Whitney, 2008). This article attempts to provide a comprehensive provincial-wide assessment of one of the world's largest geographically protected farmland areas (Carter-Whitney, 2008), building off a study exploring farmland loss in two Ontario municipalities from Epp and Caldwell (2018). This study also contributes to the larger body of literature evaluating the effectiveness of farmland protection policies around the globe (Connell, 2020).

While the Canadian Census of Agriculture quantifies the amount of agricultural land in production, it lacks documentation of land-use planning decisions (i.e., non-farm and urban development), compromising the preservation of prime agricultural lands. This research fills this gap from a land-use planning perspective, for which the methodological framework can be applied in other municipal jurisdictions responsible for agricultural planning but have yet to officially account for the preventative loss of this vital resource (Robert and Mullinix, 2018; Connell, 2020; Cameron and Connell, 2021). An innovative approach to measuring farmland loss is introduced by tracking agricultural land conversion in municipal Official Plan Amendments across southern Ontario municipalities. OPAs are legally binding municipally-led administrative decisions to change a municipal Official Plan, which are required to redesignate lands to different uses so that new proposed uses may conform with the municipality's long-term vision for growth and physical development. In turn, OPAs reflect the potential loss of farmland and change in community development priorities over time. This approach provides a more comprehensive, accurate, and reliable picture of the state of farmland loss in Ontario by measuring the amount of converted farmland to non-agricultural uses when the land-use planning decision was made (Epp and Caldwell, 2018). The reliability of this method is relative to what could be inferred from the Canadian Census of Agriculture, or other methods of measuring farmland loss, such as land cover map comparisons (Chen et al., 2016; Song and Liu, 2017), plan quality evaluation (Connell, 2020; Cameron and Connell, 2021), GIS analysis and remote sensing (Qiu et al., 2015; Skog and Steinnes, 2016; Hu et al., 2018; Duan et al., 2021), propensity score matching (Liu and Lynch, 2011), econometric modeling (Qiu et al., 2015; Xu et al., 2019; Miao et al., 2021), statistical analysis of census data (Epp and Caldwell, 2018; Moroney and Castellano, 2018), and qualitative analysis of archival records and anecdotal accounts (Perrin, 2013; Cameron and Connell, 2021). The analysis of OPAs thus reveals how provincial policies shaped farmland loss at a regional scale between 2000 and 2017. Tracking the decisions made during this time frame reflects how municipalities may vary in their interpretation and implementation of the provincial land-use planning framework, inclusive of plans such as the Provincial Policy Statement, Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe, and the Greenbelt Plan.

This next section will review the context for the research, providing some background into the legislative and policy-setting justifying land-use planning and farmland preservation in Ontario. This section will then provide an overview of the study area, including geography, development characteristics of various regions, and land area.

This next section will outline, in detail, the methodological framework undertaken inclusive of secondary data collection and analysis procedures, as well as the approach of the methodology adopted and its contributions to the fields of agricultural land-use planning (and preservation) and more specifically, plan evaluation.

The Canadian Census of Agriculture is the primary data source for measuring farmland availability in this research context. The Canadian Census of Agriculture, facilitated at the federal level by Statistics Canada, is conducted every 5 years to collect data related to physical, economic, social, and environmental characteristics of Canadian agricultural industries, farm operators, and farm operations (Statistics Canada, 2021). While the census provides an enumeration of agricultural land in production at different geographic levels, it does not reflect local land-use planning decisions compromising the long-term preservation of these lands, nor does it distinguish between other classes of agricultural land productivity (i.e., prime vs. non-prime). When farmland is redesignated to non-agricultural land uses, on-site farming activities may continue, but these lands are eventually destined for conversion to non-farm uses (Epp and Caldwell, 2018). The census only tracks changes to land production; farms that have been redesignated for urban development but continue agricultural production would be counted in the census regardless of the land-use designation. The census would not capture farmland availability and, potentially, farmland under threat of development. As a result, the use of OPAs would provide a more accurate and valid measure of farmland availability.

This article tracks land-use planning decisions that convert agricultural land to other uses. Municipal OPAs were used as the primary data source to track farmland conversions. These amendments reflect a marked decision to permit the land to be used for an alternative, often development-driven purpose. This methodology responds to the gaps in quality data (specifically the census), documenting the change in farmland availability and the current impacts of non-farm and urban development contributing to long-term trends of farmland conversion. The resulting data provides insight into land-use changes as they occur before development and ultimately assesses the effectiveness of existing policy planning tools in their ability to preserve agricultural lands for the long term in Ontario. Overall, the method is valuable for evaluating policy effectiveness in real-time, in contrast to waiting for census results accounting for the loss of farmland after it has already occurred.

OPAs provide a consistent, valid, reliable, and publicly available source of data that can be used to track the conversion of prime agricultural land in Ontario reliably and at individual municipal levels, given as they are required by all municipalities when altering land-use designations [Drake, 2019; MMAH, 2021]. In adopting the following methodological process, this article quantifies the Greenbelt Plan's (MMAH, 2005b) effect and measures farmland loss in individual municipal plans in a given timeframe (2000–2017). This methodology has value applied to contexts in Canada and elsewhere, particularly municipal governments responsible for land-use planning, policy implementation, and decision-making. Measuring approvals at this level can help describe prominent regional trends, successes, and failures in managing growth.

The methodological process includes location analysis, boundary identification, and data collection. The first step was to determine where prime agricultural land existed in Ontario to determine the focus areas for the study. Information was drawn from various sources including the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs' Agricultural Information Atlas soil capability for agricultural mapping layer.² Thirty-six counties and regions with prime agricultural land were identified. The Official Plans of these selected municipalities were reviewed to determine what designations applied to prime agricultural land and any distinction between prime and non-prime agricultural land areas. Researchers collected the data in partnership with municipalities or independently through online databases. As a governance mechanism that mandates reporting, OPAs exist and are publicly available as prescribed by ministerial regulation under the Planning Act (1990), which outlines legislative requirements for the land-use planning process and decision-making in Ontario. As a result, OPAs are a mechanism and application required when a proposed use or development conflicts with a municipal Official Plan and requires an amendment to ensure plan conformity, which is subject to a public hearing process and is approved at the discretion of the municipal council. The primary data collected for this study is taken directly from OPAs approved at the upper-tier (i.e., region or county) level during the study's timeframe. Where available, secondary data including information from the accompanying planner's report, initial OPA application forms, archived municipal council minutes, and Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) case decisions were also used. Additional information collected included: application date, adoption date, OPA purpose, previous land-use designation, new land-use designation, special policy (if applicable), impacted area in hectares, lot and concession plan, other location identifiers and, if applicable, OMB appeals.

Applicable OPAs were categorized into three themes to illustrate and quantify the scales and community development patterns contributing to farmland loss. These categories represent the nature of the amendment. Redesignations to development tended to lead to direct urban expansion (often large-scale farmland conversion); redesignations to rural tended to occur on areas of lesser quality farmland, and the uses tended to be more “rural” (relating to villages and or hamlets). Lastly, site-specific policy amendments tended to be used where the land was still designated as “agriculture.” Still, the actual uses, while extensive, were not agricultural (e.g., an automotive speedway on an agricultural parcel). Applicable OPAs were organized into three categories:

These categories and examples of their respective development designations converted from prime agricultural areas are described in further detail in Table 2.

This next section will outline research results, including various trends relative to farmland loss from 2000 to 2017. First, it will outline trends of farmland loss at a provincial level, followed by region-specific trends related to Central Ontario, Southwestern Ontario, and Southeastern Ontario.

In tracking agricultural land conversion through regional and local OPA decisions, this article indicates patterns of future farmland loss in Ontario and the effectiveness of agricultural land preservation policies in real-time. Our analysis presents that 545 OPAs were approved, converting 29,217 hectares of prime agricultural land in southern Ontario from 2000 to 2017. While rates and nature of farmland loss vary regionally across the study area, large-scale farmland conversion caused by urban boundary expansion dominated Central Ontario, the region with the most significant population growth. Also, it accounted for the highest amount of farmland loss. In terms of the area lost, Southwestern and Southeastern Ontario accounted for the following highest levels of farmland loss during this period, respectively, due to an accumulation of permissions for site-specific uses. The highest peaks of farmland loss were accounted for in 2006, 2013, and 2015 as part of local MCRs and large-scale urban boundary expansions, reiterating the threats urban sprawl imposes on farmland loss. However, while most farmland loss results from large-scale urban boundary expansions, the cumulative effects of farmland loss resulting from rural designations and site-specific policy amendments on individual parcels should not be underestimated. Results in this study evidence a general decline in farmland loss in 2010–2014 relative to the 2000–2004 and 2005–2009 periods, before the establishment of provincial farmland preservation policies in 2005.

Overall, this article (Table 8) demonstrates that the establishment of several provincial policy initiatives in 2005, including the revised Provincial Policy Statement, the Growth Plan, and the Greenbelt Plan, has successfully minimized the rates of farmland loss and protected prime agricultural lands. For example, the Growth Plan establishes density and intensity requirements that several urban centers and regions outside of the Greenbelt (not subjected to Greenbelt Plan policies) need to adopt and implement into their Official Plans. While not prohibiting development in prime agricultural areas directly, these growth management policies facilitate the densification and intensification of urban areas and the mitigation of urban sprawl—highlighting the “other side of the coin” to farmland protection in land-use planning. Overall, these policies establish a framework that consistently contributes to enhanced municipal control over agricultural land conversion in southern Ontario.

The Inner Ring municipalities have played increasingly active roles in agricultural land protection with both planning approaches and local initiatives. The Outer Ring municipalities have seen increasing urbanization pressure. Data on farmland loss showed a mixed landscape of large-scale municipality-led urban boundary expansions and small-scale individual applications on policy changes to allow for non-agricultural uses. Southwestern Ontario has experienced limited urbanization during the past two decades, and this research did not detect an obvious upward or downward trend of farmland loss in these areas. Most of the farmland conversion cases in this area were small-scale applications to create small lots on existing agricultural land to allow non-agricultural uses such as commercial, recreational, residential, and agricultural-related facilities. Southeastern Ontario has the smallest provincial share of prime agricultural land and has seen minimal farmland loss since 2000. Most of which were small-scale individual application on land-use redesignations (partially reflecting reduced acreages of prime farmland). The provincial policy impact on farmland preservation is not as obvious in this geography.

The connection between minimized rates farmland loss and provincial farmland protection policies is particularly evident within Ontario's Greater Golden Horseshoe, particularly within the Inner Ring, also the Greenbelt Plan Area. During the initial implementation of the Greenbelt Plan in 2005, there was much scrutiny (and doubt) within Ontario from several stakeholders over the perceived efficacy of the policy (Hume, 2010). For example, anecdotal accounts share how farms in the Greenbelt's “protected countryside” were subject to development after the initial onset of the Greenbelt in 2005—signaling a perceivable policy failure amongst Ontario communities (Epp and Caldwell, 2018). However, as noted in our article, quantifiable evidence illustrates this is not the case. These agricultural parcels were “lost” to development at the time of the planning decision, which would have occurred before the implementation of Greenbelt policies. For instance, before establishing the Greenbelt Plan, there were 1,427 hectares of prime agricultural land redesignated across the Greater Golden Horseshoe between 2000 and 2004 within the current Greenbelt boundary. Approximately 1,420 hectares of the converted farmland were located in the Inner Ring area, and only 7 hectares of farmland were converted in the Outer Ring area. The annual average farmland loss in the Inner Ring area was 284 hectares. Since the Province of Ontario enacted the Greenbelt Plan, the total farmland loss in the Inner Ring area within the Greenbelt boundary dropped to 13 hectares during 2005–2017, making the annual average loss only 1 hectare. There were only three OPAs approved since the establishment of the Greenbelt, which affected prime agricultural land within the Greenbelt boundary. This article shines a light on the success of the Greenbelt Plan, evidencing the effect of the Greenbelt policies on farmland protection when comparing communities with high development pressure to those outside of the protected countryside. Moreover, these findings reiterate the lessons from other Greenbelt policy areas in the world to illustrate the critical and pivotal role policy plays in mobilizing sustainability and farmland protection within policy-protected areas (Carter-Whitney, 2008).

Concerning the success of other farmland protection policies, our analysis suggests that for those areas outside of the Greenbelt and Growth Plan areas, the agriculture policies of the Provincial Policy Statement have performed reasonably well in protecting prime agricultural lands. For example, outside of the Greenbelt, there has been an overall declining rate of farmland loss across the Greater Golden Horseshoe since 2005. Annual farmland loss outside the Greenbelt has dropped by almost 50%. Both the Inner Ring area and the Outer Ring have seen a decline in yearly farmland loss. The average of the Inner Ring's annual farmland loss dropped by 40%, whereas the average of the Outer Ring's annual farmland loss dropped by 75%. This is evident in regions such as southwestern and Southeastern Ontario, where only one policy layer (the PPS) is applied and implemented to protect prime agricultural lands at the municipal level, and trends of farmland loss are relatively low or consistent throughout 2000–2017. This is relative to areas subject to multiple layers of farmland protection policy, however, such as Central Ontario, which is experiencing consistent development pressure (i.e., the highest amount of farmland loss, urbanization, and population growth) and why we bring focus to this policy area in our discussion. Overall, the provincial-wide analysis of farmland loss has provided a way to evaluate whether more robust policy instruments are needed elsewhere in the province beyond the Greenbelt area.

This article reviewed southern Ontario's farmland preservation and urban expansion policies and evaluated their effectiveness with quantitative data. By tracking the agricultural land conversion through local Official Plan Amendments, this study documented farmland loss across Ontario between 2000 and 2017. Provincial policies and local municipalities' role in preserving farmland in different geographic regions were analyzed.

At a provincial level, data from 36 counties/regions shows that the provincial policies and local planning framework have perceivably worked in tandem to affect the agricultural land base in southern Ontario significantly. At a regional level, however, this study reveals that the loss of prime agricultural lands and resulting policy implications are focused within Central, rather than Southwestern or Southeastern, Ontario. In Central Ontario, which is the most urbanized area in Ontario, the Province's Greenbelt Plan has significantly reduced the rates of farmland loss within this geographic range since 2005. Elsewhere within the province, the Provincial Policy Statement and the Growth Plan, for example, establish requirements that municipalities are expected to adopt and implement into local Official Plans, which protect farmland in different ways.

This research has introduced a planning-based methodology to track the availability of agricultural land and has documented the farmland conversion at regional and municipal levels. Measuring approvals at this level can help describe prominent regional trends, successes, and failures in helping to guide growth as it occurs in real-time. This methodology has potential broader applicability in Canada and elsewhere, where land-use decisions primarily involve municipal governments. Moreover, the data in this research has provided a baseline for future farmland availability research, and has created a framework for further policy, agricultural, economic, and planning research.

The datasets presented in this study can be found in online repositories. The names of the repository/repositories and accession number(s) can be found at: http://www.waynecaldwell.ca/projects/.

All authors listed have made a substantial, direct, and intellectual contribution to the work and approved it for publication.

This research was made possible through funding support from the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.