WASHINGTON, D.C. (RFD News) — More than half of U.S. states now have some form of restriction on foreign purchases of U.S. farmland.
Harrison Pittman with the National Agricultural Law Center said most restrictions are aimed at foreign adversaries, while the majority of foreign ownership is held by other foreign investors.
“Most of your foreign ownership is Canada, the Netherlands, the UK, Italy, Germany. I’m probably leaving one out there. But that’s almost 70 percent, 66 to 70 percent of foreign ownership for those entities. When the real target was certain categories of foreign adversaries.”
Those countries include nations like China, North Korea, Iran and Russia.
Pittman said recent discussions around foreign farmland purchases have helped reshape the policy debate at the state level.
“At one bookend, at the end of calendar year 2022, a super majority of states in the United States affirmatively allowed for foreign ownership of all regardless of country of origin. Now we’ve crossed over by a handful of states, more than half, 30 or so states now have some type of restriction on foreign ownership. That part’s been a very significant change in terms just in terms of the number of states that have weighed in.”
Federal numbers show foreign interests currently hold around 46 million acres of U.S. farmland.
