Room for The River: Hatfield Comprehensive Plan Centers Thriving Agricultural Economy

In 2022, Regenerative Design Group (RDG) led a research and community engagement process to develop a guiding framework for the future of agriculture for the Town of Hatfield’s Comprehensive Plan. The process articulated key adaptation and resiliency actions for the town to undertake in support of a more robust and regenerative local agricultural sector.

The Town of Hatfield, situated along the Connecticut River in Western Massachusetts, has been engaged in a comprehensive municipal planning process over the last three years. Hatfield 2040 is a collective effort between town administrators and elected town officials, the Commonwealth’s Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness (MVP) Grant Program, and several key consultants. The entire team worked together to identify and develop solutions to both immediate and potential threats to the future of the town, from infrastructure vulnerable to flooding and climate instability to affordable housing, open space, and economic development.

The plan is set to be released later this fall with a public celebration.

The Changing Face of Hatfield Agriculture

While many towns in the Massachusetts MVP program have undergone planning processes over the last decade, Hatfield is among the few to have identified agriculture as an integral part of the town’s future. The town boasts some of the richest agricultural soils in the country with an agrarian history spanning over 350 years, and working lands remain a prominent feature of the community despite several waves of intensive housing development and significant farmland loss over the past century. Preserving this heritage and finding pathways forward for the small local farms that continue to persevere through challenging economic and climate times is no small task.

RDG worked with the Town Agricultural Commission and local farmers to identify what steps the town must take to ensure that local agriculture continues to survive and thrive into 2040. Hatfield’s floodplains and terraces support an active farming community of approximately 36 farms stewarding 2,750 acres of cultivated farmland, which make up 25% of the total land in town. Nearly one-third of this land is in broadacre potato production, while the rest is a mixture of corn, hay, and other specialty vegetables. Major challenges identified by farmers included:

• the increasingly volatile climate
• a drainage system badly in need of repair
• declining soil fertility
• the high cost of infrastructure
• the dwindling supply of labor and reliable market outlets

RDG’s analysis of farmland in Hatfield showed that 83% of its agricultural land was degraded but retained a high regeneration potential. Soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks were either low or very low on 27% of cultivated areas. RDG also identified that 508 acres of Hatfield’s farmland is now in classifiable wetlands, and 965 acres or 35% of Hatfield’s farmland lies within the 100-year floodplain of the Connecticut River; one that is increasingly prone to more frequent and severe flooding events. Hatfield now has little choice but to find a way to “make room for the river” using nature-based solutions such as widening riparian corridors and restoring floodplain forests.

Climate Adaptation and Regenerative Farming

The 2023 growing season underscored the urgency around improving the resiliency of local farms and supporting the local agricultural economy. A warm, dry winter produced dust storms across many bare fields in late winter; a late spring freeze wiped out many fruiting crops; and severe flooding in late summer destroyed or contaminated hundreds of acres of annual crops. The financial and mental stress of successive years of climate, economic, and political volatility has many growers feeling disillusioned and uncertain about how they will continue to sustain operations moving forward.

In a broader context, the face of agriculture is changing dramatically and farmers are under a lot of pressure to reinvent whole systems of operation to cope with the changes. Farming regeneratively requires an approach that prioritizes soil health and resilience, or the ability to bounce back after increasingly volatile weather systems, while improving productivity and whole ecosystem health over time. These practices can take many years of study, labor, and expensive infrastructure before yielding economic returns, but many growers recognize that the current scenario of continuous crop loss and degradation to soil systems is even less viable.

The Future of Hatfield Agriculture

Hatfield’s farmers will need a wide range of public support and investment to help sustain their operations and adapt their farming practices, along with the coordination and transfer of considerable financial and knowledge-based resources, and broad engagement across both public and private spheres. They also need an informed consumer base that understands the realities of farming and values the important role that local farmers play in stewarding the town’s most precious natural resources.

In the final plan, RDG put forth a useful framework to help Hatfield prioritize municipal action steps to support local farmers and promote more regenerative farming practices. These included resolving ditch and wetland conflicts with an ecologically sensitive approach, managing development pressure on unprotected farmland, acting on government funding opportunities that would benefit local farms, and reactivating the Town’s Agricultural Commission to promote local agriculture and educate the public about soil conservation, biodiversity, and regenerative agricultural practices.

The plan ultimately encourages Hatfield residents and town officials to create a culture of support for local agriculture and celebrate growers who are already improving their practices. These steps will go a long way in helping Hatfield farmers to prepare, protect, and prosper into 2040 and beyond.

By Seva Water, Regenerative Agriculture Planner

(In-line photo courtesy Lindsay Sabadosa, distributed by State House News Service)