THE FARMLAND CONVERSION DEBATE: NALS AND BEYOND.

The need to protect high quality agricultural land through public policies and programs at various levels of government has been debated in the U.S. for at least three decades. This article reviews the evolution of the debate before 1979, the ill-fated attempt of the National Agricultural Lands Study (NALS) (1979-1981) to resolve the debate, and the current status of the land conversion issue. Articulation of the issue has been impeded by confusion of objectives, semantic problems, unreliability of land conversion data, and excess capacity in the American farm economy. Land conversion estimates published in 1977 by the Soil Conservation Service and relied upon by NALS have proven to be misleading in light of the 1982 National Resources Inventory. State and local programs to discourage farmland conversion are Justifiable in terms of land use planning objectives, maintenance of a viable local farm economy, and avoidance of undue reliance upon marginal lands requiring costly technical inputs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]