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Agricultural Site Assessment Tool

Raymond E. Massey and John Lory

Summary

Agricultural Site Assessment (AgSite) tool is an interactive website that provides farmers an individualized report of the physical, environmental and cultural characteristics of any parcel of land in the contiguous United States. This project addresses legal risks and production risks. Production risks are identified in the data layers detailing soils, floodplains and wetlands present on the specified parcel. Legal risks are identified in the data layers detailing streams and waterbodies, threatened and endangered species and community concerns. An earlier version of this tool was available for Missouri land only. Lenders and rural appraisers used the earlier version to identify possible liabilities before making their decisions; animal producers used it before siting animal feeding operations; farmers used it to evaluate the productivity of their land or land they were considering for an agricultural endeavor. AgSite can give preliminary information on the impact of such regulatory actions as the Waters of the U.S. rule recently promulgated by the EPA and the nutrient reduction strategies being developed in several states. AgSite can be used for strategic planning, addressing financial risk. AgSite works on desktop and mobile platforms. Individualized reports have hyperlinks to educational, regulatory and assistance information. Our goal is to prevent problems by giving farmers information that insures they are aware of potential risks, able to evaluate risks and make decisions to reduce risks. AgSite is free at AgSite.missouri.edu.

Details

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