While working for SILT over the past seven years, I have had the pleasure of working on deeply meaningful projects that will have an impact on Iowa and its community for decades to come. SILT’s mission is long term. We are working with landowners now to provide land access opportunities for food farmers in the future. It has been inspiring to meet and work with landowners who are willing to think into the future and try something that goes against the grain of usual farm succession in our country. Landowners with the means to donate their land to SILT or donate a SILT Conservation Easement realize that they have the power to create opportunities for farmers where there were none before.

I get to talk to beginning farmers all of the time about their personal farm journeys. When asked what some of the biggest challenges for beginning farms are, many times they respond: “land access”. Because the average land price in Iowa has more than quadrupled over the last four decades, it is becoming increasingly difficult for those without family land or substantial financial resources to acquire land of their own. Without accessible farmland, the number of Iowa food farmers will slowly decline. Through SILT, and empowered landowners, food farmers are provided with another option for accessing land that is not on the open market.

I met Bob Winchell of Earlham, IA in 2019. During the very first phone call I had with Bob, he said he wanted to make sure “his farm remained a farm.” He told me that he wished to see future farmers have access to the land instead of seeing it developed like the land around it. Bob decided to place an Agricultural Conservation Easement on the land through SILT in 2020, restricting development and protecting the land as a place for permanent food farming.  Because of this easement, the land’s market value dropped nearly by half. Soon after Bob donated the easement, SILT connected him with two young farmers, Jordan and Whitney, from Grade A Gardens.

Jordan and Whitney had been looking for farmland in this exact area but were finding it difficult to pay the high prices seen around the Des Moines area. Since Jordan and Whitney were looking for land for growing food including vegetables, fruits, eggs, and meat they were great candidates for SILT protected land. Now, Jordan and Whitney live on the land and are running a large CSA feeding locally grown food to thousands of people in the Des Moines area.

Seeing this project from start to finish has given me the opportunity to see the importance of the work we do at SILT. Because of landowners like Bob Winchell, a piece of land that may have been turned into development has been transitioned into a place where food will be grown for years to come. We continue to cultivate stories like this through the work we do at SILT. Some days may feel like an uphill battle. It is easy to get bogged down and lose sight of the impact of this work. But, SILT is in this for the long haul and there are landowners out there who are willing to try something new. Over the last 7 years, I have seen several other successful farm protection projects that have provided land access to farmers where there was none before. It is this kind of work that gives me hope for the future of food farming in Iowa.