Greenbelt Expansion Policy Statement
The Wellington Federation of Agriculture has confidence in the current County of Wellington’s Official Plan and the protection for agricultural land provided within that plan. Similarly, the province provides clear protection for agricultural land within its Provincial Policy Statement.  If land use planners adhere to these existing protections, additional land use restrictions are superfluous.
 
The Wellington Federation of Agriculture believes that any municipality within the County of Wellington (including the City of Guelph) must establish substantive proof that the current Official Plan is inadequate before requesting additional land use restrictions such as a greenbelt designation.
 
If there is conclusive evidence that existing protections for agricultural land are failing, then Wellington Federation of Agriculture would expect specific criteria be required for any formal request for a greenbelt designation. These criteria would include a study characterizing the current state of agriculture. That study would include an analysis of the viability of farms in the designated area. WFA would expect the requesting municipality to provide a reasonable business case that farm viability would be preserved or improved by a greenbelt designation. This business case must address the potential impact on farm equity.
 
Other criteria would include an analysis of the impacts of approved and proposed developments not restricted by a greenbelt designation e.g. the GTA West corridor, aggregate extraction.
 

Ideally, the WFA would prefer that the current greenbelt (as defined by the Greenbelt Act, 2005) be reviewed after it has been in place for a full ten years as promised by the province. Subsequent to a comprehensive and favourable review, WFA would reconsider its current policy on greenbelt expansion
 
Land Use Policy Statement, 2005

 

Agriculture -
an economic engine
for Wellington County		   Wellington County contains over 470,000 acres of farmland under the control of some 2,600 farmers representing just over 70% of the total land area of the county. As the most significant group of landowners, farmers have over $2.2 billion dollars invested in land, buildings, machinery and livestock in the county and generate over $400 million dollars in farm product sales a year. Ultimately this economic engine of Wellington County survives on the careful management of the fertile soils of its agricultural lands.
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