Identifying, Preventing and Dealing with Right-to-Farm Issues in New Jersey.

Farmers and non-farmers are being brought closer together as residential development and suburban growth increases. In order to determine areas of conflict in New Jersey and develop educational outreach efforts to prevent or reduce them, a survey of Rutgers Cooperative Extension faculty and staff who work with commercial agricultural interests was conducted. Respondents (n=29, 88% response rate) were asked to identify and rank the most common complaints or inquiries related to right-to-farm issues and farmer/non-farmer conflicts.  The top three first-ranked issues were pesticides (applications, residues, drift, safety/dangers), identified by 37% of respondents, followed by noise (trucks, pumps, equipment) and growers rights (ordinances, migrant workers, labor housing, construction, etc.) (17% each), and manure related issues (odors, flies, storage, spreading, handling) (13%).  The top three second-ranked issues were pesticides and manure (19% each); noise, water use, and animal issues (hunting, animal rights, livestock production) (15% each); and pollution (dust, dumping, greenhouse emissions, farm cleanliness, runoff, lighting, etc.) (11%).  The top three third-ranked issues were pollution (26%), manures and animal issues (17% each), and water use (13%).  This information was used to develop a survey tool asking over 50 farmers about strategies and techniques they have used with non-farm neighbors or municipal officials to prevent or deal with such issues.  Their advice and experiences were shared at a series of workshops and in a 29-page brochure “Farmer-to-Farmer Advice for Avoiding Conflicts...With Neighbors and Towns”.  Impact of this information sharing was evaluated.