Agriculture is the dominant land use in Texas. The state leads the nation in the number of farms and ranches and in total farmland — well over 100 million acres — and ranks first in cattle, cotton and hay. Around 80 percent of Texas is in some form of agricultural use. That makes the health of farm and ranch land more or less synonymous with the health of the Texas environment.
"Sustainable agriculture" is the idea that this land can keep producing food and fiber indefinitely without using up the very things it depends on — soil, water, and the people and economics of rural communities. In a state this varied, it looks different on a Panhandle irrigation circle than on a Hill Country ranch or an East Texas hay meadow, but the core challenges rhyme.
Soil: the foundation
Healthy soil is the first pillar. Decades of intensive tillage and continuous cropping can erode and deplete it; sustainable practice tries to build it back. The tools are increasingly well known: reduced and no-till planting to keep soil covered and intact, cover crops to hold soil and add organic matter, and crop rotation to break pest cycles. On the wind-scoured High Plains, keeping the ground covered is not just good practice — it is the difference between farmland and dust.
Water: the limit
In most of Texas, water is the binding constraint, and irrigation is the largest single use of it statewide. Sustainable agriculture leans hard on efficiency — low-pressure and drip irrigation, soil-moisture sensing, and crop choices matched to available water. On the Ogallala, where the aquifer is being drawn down faster than it recharges, efficiency is not optional; it is the only way to extend the life of the resource that makes the region's farming possible. The water side of this story is detailed in our profile of regional supply and demand.
Sustainable practices often cost more or pay off slowly, while the pressures on farmers — commodity prices, drought, debt and the lure of selling land for development — are immediate. Stewardship has to make economic sense, or it does not last.
Grazing the rangeland right
Most Texas agricultural land is not cropped but grazed. Overgrazing — too many animals on too little grass for too long — degrades rangeland, invites brush and erosion, and reduces both forage and wildlife habitat. Rotational and adaptive grazing, which moves livestock to let pastures rest and recover, can rebuild grass cover, improve water infiltration and support wildlife on the same acres that raise cattle. On Texas rangeland, good grazing is conservation.
Keeping farming viable — and in farming
The deepest threat to sustainable agriculture in Texas is not bad practice but disappearance. As land near the metros becomes worth far more for houses than for crops or cattle, owners face enormous pressure to sell and subdivide. Keeping working lands working — through conservation easements, agricultural tax valuation, and farm economics that actually pay — is itself a form of sustainability, and it runs directly into the spread of development across the state.
The bottom line
In a state that is mostly farm and ranch, sustainable agriculture is not a niche. It is the main way the Texas environment will either be conserved or lost. The good news is that the interests usually align: the practices that protect soil, water and wildlife are, over time, the same ones that keep the land productive and the operation solvent.
Sources & further reading
- USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service, Census of Agriculture (Texas).
- Texas A&M AgriLife Extension and the Texas Water Resources Institute.
- USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, soil-health and grazing programs.
- Texas Land Trends, Texas A&M Natural Resources Institute.