About this Research Topic

Background

Many of the key issues that threaten food security and agricultural sustainability are directly connected to land use. Climate change, soil degradation, water quality, natural heritage, and biodiversity all have a land-use component that is impacted by how farmers use their land. Likewise, planning decisions connected to urban growth, expansion, and on-farm diversification equally impact agriculture.

Land use planning provides a framework to address these issues. Municipalities make decisions related to land use and senior levels of government establish policy and legislation with the goal of addressing the public interest. An agricultural lens can be brought to land use planning with a goal of achieving enhanced outcomes – protecting farmland, farmers, and their livelihoods while at the same time protecting soil, water, air, and natural heritage resources towards a more sustainable form of agriculture.

The overall goal of this Research Topic is to encourage discussion and debate that will help to enhance food security, agricultural sustainability, and farmer livelihoods through the land use planning process. Related to this: how can issues connected to agriculture such as climate change, soil degradation, water quality, natural heritage, biodiversity, on-farm diversification, and urbanization be better integrated into land-use planning? Connected to this we encourage the submission of papers that look at how land use planning and planning for agriculture integrate and affect food security concerns.

We encourage papers that discuss planning policies that help to enhance land use and conservation practices to ensure sustainable agriculture. This includes papers that:
- consider how impacts related to agriculture (such as climate change, soil degradation, water quality, natural heritage, biodiversity and urbanization) can be better addressed and integrated in land use planning.
- look at how land use planning and planning for agriculture integrate and affect food security
- discuss the role of planning in land use and land systems as they relate to food security, and livelihoods.

Cross-national comparisons or case studies are welcome. We are also looking for the submission of perspectives from different countries including rural and urban perspectives on the issue.

This Research Topic has been developed in collaboration with
Kaela Anderson of the University of Guelph.

Keywords: agri-food systems, food security, land use planning, farmland preservation, conservation, agriculture, climate change

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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