Land Use Policy 27 (2010) 399–406

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Land Use Policy

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/landusepol

Tare land in Flemish horticulture

Kirsten Bomans ∗ , Klara Duytschaever, Hubert Gulinck, Jos Van Orshoven
Division of Forest, Nature and Landscape, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Catholic University of Leuven, Celestijnenlaan 200E, 3000 Leuven, Belgium

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The annual agricultural census in Belgium delivers quantitative data of net and additional areas of land
Received 5 November 2008 used for agriculture and horticulture. We introduce the term ‘tare land’ to indicate the latter as the area
Received in revised form 11 May 2009 of land fragments not directly supporting crops or fodder, at farm level or at higher (landscape, region)
Accepted 13 May 2009
level. For spatial planning and zoning purposes data on gross agricultural area (being the sum of net and
tare areas) are required. However, the quality of the tare data is not documented or even questioned. In
Keywords:
Belgian and international scientific and grey literature, little information on tare is available. In this paper
Horticulture
we define two classes of tare, functional tare (fTare) and plan tare (pTare). fTare encompasses the sum
Agricultural area
Farm structure
of the area of all additional land used by farmers for professional purpose or closely associated to the
Flanders net agricultural area but not directly used for the production of food, fodder or industrial crops. Plan tare
(pTare) is defined as these parts of the statutory agricultural area not specifically used in farming, such
as public roads and inclusions of non-farming buildings. By means of a GPS-survey and interviews with
farm managers, we used two methods to survey net and tare areas of land. On one hand we surveyed
the land within farm enterprises: 3 open air horticultural farms, 6 greenhouse horticultural farms and
one mixed farm (open air horticulture and greenhouse). On the other hand we surveyed 10 segments of
25 ha, all situated in one municipality within a major horticultural region of Flanders (northern region of
Belgium). fTare areas account on average for 21% of the total farm area in the case of open air horticulture
whereas the fTare area is 39% in case of greenhouse horticultural farms. These averages are significantly
different. The mixed farm had an fTare area of 32%. Within areas designated for agriculture plan tare is
44%. Hence only 56% of the land with an agricultural destination is effectively used for agriculture. These
figures illustrate the spatial importance of tare areas and the spatially extremely scattered organisation
of horticulture in the study area. Knowledge on quality and nature of tare areas is important for multi-
objective spatial planning in which economic and ecological sustainability of agriculture is considered.

© 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Introduction and problem statement
Agricultural areas are often monitored using net data on arable
land and grassland. Farms are frequently put in typologies, based on
the types of crops and animals, economical parameters and/or the
size of the arable land and pastures (e.g. Duvernoy, 2000; Poussin et
al., 2008). Little attention however goes to tare, being the sum of the
area of all additional land used by farmers for professional purpose
or closely associated to the net agricultural extent but not directly
supporting food, fodder or industrial crops (e.g. buildings, small
landscape elements, water areas, roads, etc.). By neglecting these
areas, there is a risk of a significant underestimation of the total
area occupied by agriculture. This makes tare a potential impor-
tant element to consider in land use planning, especially in regions
∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +32 16329772; fax: +32 16329760.
E-mail address: Kirsten.Bomans@ees.kuleuven.be (K. Bomans).
where there is a strong competition for land. Focusing attention
on tare and estimating its overall size and its precise patterns in
the landscape would be beneficial also in strategies and projects
concerning multifunctional landscapes and land use.
Land use planning in Flanders is embedded in a spatial structure
planning approach. A spatial structure plan (SSP) first and foremost
encompasses a vision and action plan for the spatial development
of an area given its socio-economic and environmental boundary
conditions and a number of objectives. It is complemented by a
spatial outline and area statistics. The plan is the strategic refer-
ence against which operational decisions affecting land use are to
be tested before being adopted and implemented. The approach is
hierarchical in nature. An overall regional SSP (rSSP) is elaborated
at regional level and subsequently refined at provincial (pSSP) and
municipal (mSSP) level.
One of the actions identified in the 1997 regional SSP was the
delineation of sufficiently large and contiguous zones of adequate
quality for professional agri- and horticulture, for a total area of

0264-8377/$ – see front matter © 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.landusepol.2009.05.004
400 K. Bomans et al. / Land Use Policy 27 (2010) 399–406
750,000 ha, i.e. 55% of the total area of the Flemish region. The figure
of 750,000 ha was based on the one hand on a projection of agri-
cultural census data resulting in an estimate of some 630,000 ha of
land effectively required for production activities, and on the other
hand on an estimate of non-productive but nevertheless required
land for the agricultural practice. Also this latter estimation takes
into account the presence of unavoidable ‘impurities’ within the
agricultural destinations to be delineated.
Motivated by the upcoming revision of the rSSP, it is necessary
to know how close to reality the assumption of total tare area taken
in 1997 is. But little information on tare area is available. The annual
agricultural census requires farmers to declare the extent of their
land used for various production activities also including tare area.
However, the accuracy of these tare data was already questionned
by Gellynck et al. (2007).
In this study, the spatial importance of tare is investigated in
detail. A distinction is made between functional tare (fTare), plan
tare (pTare) and census Tare (cTare) (see ‘Definitions’ below). Data
on functional tare are collected at farm and at segment level. Find-
ings for 10 segments (500 m × 500 m) and for 10 open air and/or
greenhouse horticultural farms are reported and discussed. The
evolution of functional tare at farm level is compared to the evolu-
tion of tare according to the census (cTare). In addition, the plan tare
is examined at segment level, i.e. the extent to which the current
delineation of the space reserved for agriculture is not effectively
used by agriculture.
Materials and methods
Definitions
Functional tare (fTare)
The sum of the area of all land not directly supporting food,
fodder or industrial crops but nevertheless used by farmers for
professional purpose or closely associated to the net agricultural
extent, is termed the functional tare area. This fTare area includes
buildings, reservoirs, access roads, buffer areas, ditches, storage
places, water storage devices, fences, etc. The net agricultural area
is the cultivated land of the farm. The gross agricultural area is the
sum of the net area and the functional tare area (Fig. 1). The fTare%
is the percentage of the gross agricultural area used as functional
tare.
Both farms and segments may encompass land that is not strictly
necessary for professional farming activities, like non-used fallow
areas, areas for hobby farming and the farm house with private
garden. ‘Non-used fallow areas’ are those areas that are not used
by the farmer. Fallow areas that are required within the production
system do not belong to this category. Hobby farming is defined as
the area used to keep animals or to grow crops strictly for personal
Fig. 1. Schematic representation of the total area investigated on farm level and on
segment level, divided into gross agricultural area, farmer’s house and other land
use.
use. The farm house with private garden is not considered to be part
of the functional tare, because it is assumed to have a residential
rather than an agricultural function.
Plan tare (pTare)
On segment level, several other land use types are present,
like residential, recreational and industrial areas, forest and nature
areas, roads, etc. These are termed and investigated as plan tare.
The gross agricultural area and the farm house and garden are
usually located within the boundaries of agricultural destina-
tions on the current spatial destination plans. However within
such destinations not only the gross agricultural area and farm
houses are present, but also ‘impurities’, i.e. land used for non-
agricultural purposes like residential units, transportation and
recreation infrastructure, etc. The extent of these impurities is
termed ‘plan tare’ (pTare). In fact, every spatial destination cate-
gory has its own pTare, being that part of the land used for other
activities than those according to the destination. In this research,
only the pTare within the agricultural destination is considered.
A schematic visualization of fTare and pTare is given in Fig. 2.
Census tare (cTare)
The census tare is the tare area retrieved from the census data.
Farmers are requested to declare the farm area used for buildings,
access roads, gardens, court, forested areas and non-used cultivated
land as cTare. Only aggregated data at municipality level are made
available for research.
Study area
The pilot study area is Sint-Katelijne-Waver (SKW), a munic-
ipality of 36.1 km2 in one of the three core horticultural regions
of Flanders (Fig. 3). The study area is characterized by a strong
dispersed urbanization and a high land fragmentation.
According to the agricultural census of 2005, farmers in SKW
declared on average a cTare (area on the farm used for buildings,
access roads, gardens, court, forested areas and non-used cultivated
land) of 9.6%. This is much higher than the average for Flanders (3%),
making SKW an interesting pilot case to investigate tare.
Data collection
Sample
Two sampling exercises were conducted. First, data on net
agricultural area, fTare and other land use were collected in a
farm sample consisting of 10 horticultural farms. The sample was
basically a convenience sample since the first farmers contacted
according to a list of farmers supplied by the municipal authori-
ties who were ready to cooperate in the research were selected.
Furthermore, because of the detailed character of field work, time
constrained the number of farms to 10 and the farms were rather
small. The gross agricultural area of the farms varied between 1.3
and 5 ha with an average of 2.6 ha. The average farm size is there-
fore much smaller than the regional average of farms in Flanders
(being 18 ha) and smaller than the average horticultural farm in
Flanders (4.9 ha). All land belonging to the selected farms was
inventoried. Three of the farms conduct open air vegetable horticul-
ture (cauliflower, leek, endive, courgette, rhubarb and maize), six
deal with greenhouse horticulture (tomatoes, sweet peppers and
lettuce) and one farm conducts both (lettuce in greenhouses and
cauliflower and leek in open air).
In addition, a segment survey was set up. Ten 500 m × 500 m
squares centered around each of the 10 farm houses (see Fig. 3) were
inventorised in order to study (i) the fTare on segment level and (ii)
the pTare as a function of land zoning. Segments on the border of
K. Bomans et al. / Land Use Policy 27 (2010) 399–406 401

Fig. 2. Schematic visualization of fTare and pTare.

Fig. 3. Location of the study area.

402 K. Bomans et al. / Land Use Policy 27 (2010) 399–406

Table 1 Results
Farm data obtained through the interviews.

General characteristics of the farm fTare characteristics of the farm
Farm type (horticulture in open air or fTare area
greenhouse)
Gross and net area of the farm fTare location on aerial photographs
Expansion of the gross and net area Evolution (increase/decrease)
since 1990 (yes–no)
the municipality were shifted in order to ensure the segment was
located completely within the study area SKW.
As the segments were located around the farm sample, there is
an overlap of the farm survey and the segment survey (see Fig. 2). In
general the farm area is smaller than the investigated segments and
the investigated segments include also other farm types than open
air horticulture and greenhouse farms. Therefore, the results from
the segment survey and not the farm survey are used to upscale the
fTare% to the level of the municipality.
Interviews and field inventory
The farmers in the farm survey were interviewed face-
to-face concerning fTare and characteristics of their farm in
October–November 2007 (see Table 1). Using orthophotographs
at scale 1/12,000 (AGIV, 2003) and the proposed categorization of
fTare, farmers mapped their cultivated land for different crops and
their fTare areas. Farmers were also asked to describe and quantify
the evolution of fTare since 1990 on their farm. This evolution is
compared to the evolution in the agricultural census data, starting
from 1990.
Because the estimations of fTare, gross and net areas from the
interviews were not always reliable and a demarcation of the fTare
area on the aerial photographs was not sufficient to establish a
detailed database on fTare, it was complemented and enhanced by
means of fieldwork with a Trimble Geo-explorer CE GPS device. The
GPS was also used to measure fTare, net areas and non-agricultural
land use in the 500 m × 500 m squares in order to assess pTare
and fTare on segment level. Cultivated land, tare-elements and
non-agricultural land use was geometrically registered and labeled.
Farm houses were labeled as a separate category, using a dataset of
the municipality with the location of farm houses.
Functional tare
For the farm-survey, the fTare% was on average 33% or 1/3 of
the total gross agricultural area of the farms. For the individual
farms, the percentage varies from 21.14% to 57.04% (see Table 2).
The majority of the fTare consists of buffer areas (including grass
strips and borders of parcels), roads and concrete surfaces, water
storage devices and buildings.
A significant difference was found between the mean fTare%
for greenhouse farms (39.33%) and the mean fTare% for open air
horticulture farms (21.41%). The difference is mainly due to sig-
nificant differences in areas for buildings, tanks and water storage
devices, being larger for greenhouse farms. The area occupied by
agricultural roads was significantly larger for open air horticulture.
No significant relationship was found between fTare% and farm
size.
In the segment survey, the gross agricultural area accounted for
35.5% of the total sample area. The other 64.5% includes land use
types without agricultural purpose (streets, houses and gardens,
forest, industry, hobby farming, recreation, etc.). Within the gross
agricultural area, the fTare% on segment level was on average 23%
(see Table 3). This percentage is more than twice the fTare% of SKW,
according to the annual census for 2005, being 9.6%.
Evolution of fTare
Most of the farmers expanded their farm since 1990 with new
fTare (e.g. buildings and access roads) and new cultivated land.
The interviews mainly pointed to a relative decrease in fTare areas
since 1990, because of the expansion of cultivated land that was
higher than the expansion of fTare. This decrease is confirmed by
the annual agricultural census for Flanders and specifically for SKW,
where the cTare% decreased in time (see Fig. 4). According to the
farmers, this decrease is partly due to the decrease in non-used
fallow areas that is also registered as tare area in the agricultural
census. The decrease in cTare% is stronger for SKW than it is for
Flanders.
Plan tare

Data management and processing 45% of the segment area within the agricultural destination zones
of SKW consists of net agricultural area and fTare. 11% is covered
The data obtained with GPS were differentially corrected using with farm houses and leasure gardens. 44% of the sample area is
the Flemish Positioning Service (FLEPOS), bringing the data to an land with no agricultural purpose. This brings the pTare% to a total
accuracy level of less than 1 m in the Belgian Lambert 72 coor- of 55%. The high percentage of pTare is mainly due to (i) houses and
dinate system (De Vidts and Dierickx, 2008). The measurements gardens of non-farmers (16%) and (ii) land for hobby farming (64%).
were incorporated into a geographic database, using ArcView-GIS-
software. The database includes spatially explicit information on
net agricultural area, fTare, farmer’s houses and other land use on
both farmer- and segment level (see also Fig. 2).
For the farm survey, possible relationships between fTare and
farm type and size were tested with SPSS 15.0 (˛ = 0.05), with
fTare% as the dependent continuous variable. The nature of the
test depends on the distribution of the data (normality and/or
homogeneity). Because of the low number of observations, nor-
mality was tested with the Shapiro–Wilks-test, homogeneity with
the Levene’s test. The categorical independent variable ‘farm type’
was tested with the t-test (in case of normality or homogene-
ity) or the Mann–Whitney U test (in case of non-normality and
non-homogeneity). The continuous variable ‘farm size’ was tested
with the Pearson coefficient (in case of normality or homogeneity)
or the Spearman coefficient (in case of non-normality and non-
homogeneity). Fig. 4. Evolution of the census tare in Flanders and Sint-Katelijne-Waver.
 K. Bomans et al. / Land Use Policy 27 (2010) 399–406 403

Table 2
GROSS agricultural area of the farms, divided into fTare and net agricultural area (Duytschaever, 2008).

Open air horticulture Mixed farm Greenhouse farm

Farm size (ha) 3.4 2.8 2.0 2.0 1.9 5.0 1.3 3.9 1.7 1.8
fTare (%) 21.78 21.14 21.31 31.68 37.28 28.75 38.07 36.06 57.04 38.76
av: 21.41—stdev: 0.33 av: 39.33—stdev: 9.41

Building 0.97 1.01 0.80 2.52 5.43 6.25 3.51 2.66 4.55 6.75
Office 0 0.04 0 0 0.09 0.02 0 0.05 0.12 0.07
Tank 0 0.06 0 0.07 1.03 0.34 0.79 0.55 0.29 0.73
Storage open air 0.76 0 0 0.69 0 0 0 0 0 0
Manure storage 0 0.59 0.36 0 1.90 0.48 1.55 1.75 0 0.37
Water device 0 0 0 5.30 4.63 4.99 8.90 8.16 14.40 4.18
Agricultural road 5.84 5.83 6.11 9.41 0 1.28 0 0.78 3.22 0
Petrified area 1.79 0.46 0.17 5.33 4.61 3.46 4.29 2.20 3.59 3.67
Buffer area 11.82 11.79 13.41 8.33 18.54 11.40 18.93 19.51 29.86 22.73
Ditch 0.58 1.36 0.46 0.02 1.04 0.53 0.11 0.41 1.01 0.28

Net area (%) 78.22 78.86 78.69 68.32 62.72 71.25 61.93 63.94 42.96 61.24

Greenhouse 1.72 0 2.11 34.28 62.72 71.25 61.93 34.29 42.96 61.24
Open air horticulture 76.51 67.05 76.58 34.04 0 0 0 0 0 0
Grassland 0 11.81 0 0 0 0 0 29.64 0 0

Total 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100

Discussion This study however shows much higher percentages: an aver-

Functional tare on farm level is higher than expected
fTare on farm level is more than twice higher than expected
from the agricultural census data. Three of the interviewed farmers
were willing to comment to this big difference. Their response to
the agricultural census on tare areas was compared to their real tare
areas (see Table 4). Two explanations for the strong difference were
given: (i) because the census is a snapshot, farmers only have to reg-
ister the cultivated land that is in use at the time of survey, leading
to an underestimation of the total cultivated land and probably also
to an underestimation of fTare and (ii) farmers do not exactly know
what this fTare is about nor the real dimensions, which often results
in a very rough estimation.
Gellynck et al. (2007) already stressed that the fTare% accord-
ing to the agricultural census (3% for Flanders, 9.6% for SKW) is
probably underestimated as an analysis on aerial photographs in
three case studies estimated an fTare% of 6.5% for whole Flan-
ders.
age fTare% of 33% for the 10 farms and of 23% for the 10 segments
of 500 m × 500 m. The difference between farms and segments can
be explained by the high portion of greenhouse farms in the farm
sample, having a significantly higher fTare% than open air horticul-
ture. Moreover, the 10 segments also contain other types of farms
with possibly lower fTare% than those investigated.
Assuming that the error on the census data is the same for Flan-
ders as it is for SKW (being 23/9.6), the adjusted fTare% for Flanders
is estimated at 7%. This percentage is very comparable to Gellynck
et al. (2007). However, although the research was carried out at a
much more detailed scale, it is based on data for just one munic-
ipality. Extension to other agricultural production activities and
upscaling to the level of Flanders is required.
The measured fTare% of SKW (23%) is much higher than the
adjusted fTare of Flanders (7%) and therefore not representative
for the region of Flanders. The horticultural character of the study
area and the small size of the farms can explain this higher num-
ber. Although this research did not find a relationship between farm
size and fTare%, one can expect that bigger farms with a substantial

Table 3
Gross agricultural area of the segments, divided into fTare% and % cultivated land (Duytschaever, 2008).

S1 S2 S3 S4 S5 S6 S7 S8 S9 S10

fTare 19.83 21.09 36.90 24.47 26.32 15.22 28.88 32.34 10.72 13.67
av: 22.94—stdev: 8.43

Building 1.30 0.92 5.08 2.80 3.51 1.21 2.12 2.82 0.31 0.50
Tank 0 0.026 0.302 0.199 0.430 0.047 0.239 0.322 0.019 0
Storage open air 0.18 0.26 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Manure storage 0.40 0 1.16 0.11 0.78 0 0.44 0.21 0.18 0.22
Water device 0 1.94 5.28 2.66 3.76 2.28 4.63 2.55 0 0
Agricultural road 6.23 8.69 0.76 4.31 2.23 0.99 0.53 2.45 2.07 3.23
Petrified area 2.55 1.96 4.26 1.62 4.08 1.83 2.13 2.04 0.14 0.10
Buffer area 7.44 6.89 18.82 11.55 11.15 8.22 17.77 21.00 6.48 8.64
Ditch 1.34 0.41 1.25 1.21 0.39 0.64 1.02 0.94 1.52 0.97
Cow shed 0.39 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Net area 80.17 78.91 63.10 75.53 73.68 84.78 71.12 67.66 89.28 86.33

Cultivated field 0 11.94 0.77 0 0 25.48 0.04 8.32 22.40 33.54

Grassland 18.46 13.09 4.93 3.57 14.08 6.77 16.01 10.30 33.59 15.73
Pasture 9.24 16.32 0 0 0 44.93 8.51 0 0 0
Greenhouse 2.76 12.54 53.27 31.67 52.58 7.50 39.00 32.53 15.38 1.31
Open air horticulture 49.71 25.01 4.14 40.29 7.01 0.10 7.55 16.51 17.91 35.75

Total 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100
404 K. Bomans et al. / Land Use Policy 27 (2010) 399–406

Table 4
Differences between responses to the agricultural census and measured dimensions of three farms (Duytschaever, 2008. AC = agricultural census, OM = own measurements).

Open air horticulture Greenhouse

Farm A Farm B Farm C

AC OMa AC OMa AC OMa

Gross agricultural area (m2 ) 14,600 34,421 47,000 51,137 10,000 13,831
Cultivated land (m2 ) 14,000 26,579 35,000 35,858 7,300 7,744
fTare (m2 ) 600 7,842 12,000 15,279 2,700 6,087
Tare% 4 23 26 30 27 44
a
To make the field data comparable to the census data, the area for the farm house was added to the measured functional tare data.

arable area will have a lower fTare%. This research was restricted to
10 small horticultural farms in one municipality, which can explain
the fact that no relationship was found. Municipalities with big
arable farms producing crops like grain, wheat, maize, sugar beets
and potatoes will probably have a lower average fTare% than munic-
ipalities with a lot of small horticultural or dairy farms. But also
an horticultural area, with bigger farms and more modern green-
houses compared to SKW could logically result in a lower fTare%.
The latter is confirmed by the census data showing a clearly higher
cTare% in the long established horticultural region of the study area
(A) compared to the recently developed horticultural region around
Roeselare (B) (Fig. 5). The figure also indicates higher tare percent-
age in the horticultural regions (see also Fig. 3) compared to other
municipalities.
Kristensen (2003) analyzed land use changes in relation to farm
characteristics, including farm size (ha) and proportion of culti-
vated land, which is higher for large farms than for small farms.
Westergaard (2006) found a significant influence of farm type as
dairy farms possessed a significantly larger building area than crop
farms and crop farmers were more active in establishing small
plantings. Kristensen et al. (2001) also found that crop farmers
establish more small biotopes, even though they concluded that
regional location was a more important determinant for this than
farm type. It however indicates that the type and area of fTare are
influenced by the farm type.
Functional tare plays several roles
fTare is not important solely because of the space it occupies. It
is also a key aspect to consider, because of the different functional-
ities related to fTare. This encompasses in the first place functions,
related to production activities of a farm (e.g. storage of machinery,
materials, fodder, harvested products, shelter for animals, process-
ing facilities, access, etc.). Therefore it is an important extra space
to consider from an agro-economic point of view. But fTare can
also be functional from an environmental perspective, including
functions like buffering (e.g. for erosion or transmission of pests
and chemicals) and preserving biodiversity in small landscape ele-
ments within or around parcels. Environmental compatibility in
agriculture depends to a great extent on the proportion of eco-
logically and culturally valuable areas in the form of structural
elements in typical landscapes, and virtually undisturbed habitats
in fields (Roth and Schwabe, 2003). Roth and Schwabe (2003) state
that a certain percentage of the farm should consist of these land-
scape elements to preserve ecological and cultural values and to
stimulate environmentally friendly agriculture. According to Levin
(2007), organic farms showed a significantly higher density of small
biotopes than conventional farms, which may be reflected in a
higher fTare% in function of the protection of biodiversity. Smeding
and Joenje (1999) presented a procedure to reorganise the lay-out
and management of farms in order to increase the biodiversity in
the agricultural landscape as well as the sustainability of farming.
In our terminology, this procedure includes an increase of fTare to
preserve biodiversity, like new or better connected linear woody
elements or nesting facilities for birds and mammals within farm
buildings.
fTare is neglected in farm systems and agricultural statistics
fTare% could be one of the farm characteristics to take into
account for the classification of farms into a new typology. Up till
now the main criterion for the division of the farms of the EU into
different types is the relative distribution of the farm income com-
ing from different production sources (field crops, dairy cattle, etc.).
This reflects that the typology was decided upon in a period when
the main goals of the agricultural policies were related to pro-
duction and economy. In scientific literature, farms are generally
put into typologies, based on the types of crops and animals, eco-

Fig. 5. Spatial distribution of the census tare in Flanders. A high cTare% occurs in the horticultural areas, with a higher cTare% in the long established horticultural region of
the study area (A) compared to the recently developed horticultural region around Roeselare (B).
 K. Bomans et al. / Land Use Policy 27 (2010) 399–406
nomic parameters and/or the size of the arable land and pastures
(e.g. Duvernoy, 2000; Poussin et al., 2008; Riveiro et al., 2008), but
none of these typologies refer to the surplus areas as defined in
this research. However, the concept of fTare is not new. An appli-
cation of the concept can be found in Westergaard (2006), who
measured farm borders, borders between fields, small biotopes,
building areas, roads, watercourses, hedgerows and uncultivated
field margins. fTare is also conceptually comparable to the differ-
ence between the agricultural area (AA) and the utilised agricultural
area (UAA), data that are collected by Eurostat. AA is the total agri-
cultural area, UAA is described as the total of arable land, permanent
pasture and meadow, land used for permanent crops and kitchen
gardens. The UAA excludes unutilised agricultural land, wood-
land and land occupied by buildings, farmyards, tracks, ponds, etc.
(Eurostat, 2008). However, the glossary of the Eurostat Yearbook
defines AA and UAA as synonyms and only the UAA is used fre-
quently in agricultural studies (e.g. Râmniceanu and Ackrill, 2007;
Riveiro et al., 2008). The Farm structure survey (FAO, 1999–2000),
a statistical survey of farms and horticultural enterprises in all EEA
countries, defines the category ‘other land’. This category includes
wooded area, land occupied by buildings, farm yards, tracks, ponds,
quarries, infertile land, rocks and agricultural land which is no
longer farmed, for economic, social or other reasons, and which
is not used in the crop rotation system. This definition covers most
of what is called fTare in this paper. However, data on the cate-
gory ‘other land’ are hard to find. Ten out of eleven reports from
the farm structure survey of 1999–2000 (available online) do not
include numerical data for this category of land use. However, tak-
ing only into account the net area, an underestimation is made of
the total area that is necessary for a professional farm and for the
agricultural sector to operate. Also the Farm Accountancy Data Net-
work (FADN), a database that includes since 1989 data on more than
50,000 sample farms across the EU15, does not take into account
tare. Reidsma et al. (2006) even literally mention that a weakness
of FADN is that its major unit of data collection is the UAA, not the
area actually occupied by the agricultural business.
Despite the limited attention to tare land use, both at scien-
tific and policy level, the objectives of the agricultural policies
have been broadened more strongly towards environment, land-
scape and rural viability (Andersen et al., 2007). Especially in the
context of an increasing multifunctionality of farms (Brandt and
Vejre, 2004; Meert et al., 2005; Vandermeulen et al., 2006), deeper
knowledge on fTare in general and its environmental component in
particular could be useful in the new era of agro-environmentalism.
Plan tare is significant
The pTare within the agricultural destination zone of the inves-
tigated segments was 44%. This means that almost half of the
investigated area within the agricultural destination has another
land use than professional agriculture, being mainly hobby farm-
ing (64%) and residential areas for non-farmers (16%). The strong
urbanized and fragmented character of this study area makes a
clear demarcation of land for professional agriculture very diffi-
cult, which can explain the high percentage. Gellynck et al. (2007)
already indicated that less urbanized regions probably lead to lower
percentages of plan tare. Also the high number of farmers who stop
their farming activities (a decrease of 44% between 1990 and 2005
from 395 to 223 farms) partly explains this high percentage. Lots of
former farms are transformed to residences for non-farmers. Van de
Sype (2008) pointed out the increase in grassland in the area since
1987, which is due to (i) the conversion of open air horticulture
to (smaller) greenhouses and (ii) the retirement of farmers with-
out a successor. Because of the high degree of speculations and the
fragmentation of ownership, the price of available land rises and
405
discourages farmers who want to expand. Those areas are often
left fallow or are used for hobby farming, mostly for horsekeep-
ing. Daniels mentioned already in 1986 the growing importance
of hobby farming in Oregon and Vejre (2008) also highlights the
increasing number of hobby farmers in Denmark because of land
prices that are too high for full time farmers.
Implications for spatial planning
A realistic estimation of fTare at the regional scale is an impor-
tant element to consider in spatial planning. It gives the planners a
scientific basis to weigh claims for space from the agricultural sec-
tor. Based on the fTare of 7%, the gross agricultural area in Flanders
can be estimated at 675,000 ha. At a more detailed level however, it
is necessary to make a differentiation into farm types and farm size
to estimate fTare. This is also important in the context of projecting
future land use within the agricultural sector. Obviously, other ele-
ments like multifunctionality and spatial integration are important
when defining prospects and land needs for the agricultural sector
and the rural area in general.
The high percentage of pTare noticed in the study area can be
considered as an indication for poor policy performance and calls
for a revision of the agricultural designation. The goal to realize uni-
form and continuous agricultural areas is not at all reflected by the
pTare in the study area. Different other land use types than agricul-
ture occupy the statutory agricultural area. However, the high pTare
measured in the study area is also due to the high level of multi-
functionality and urbanization in SKW. A more extensive sampling
is necessary to found these conclusions based on pTare.
Conclusions
This paper pointed out the quantitative and functional impor-
tance of functional tare both on farm and segment level. Although
the applied method to investigate fTare is labour-intensive, a
well organized and well-considered sampling could lead to better
insights concerning functional tare as it proved to be a quantitative
and qualitative significant item to consider in land use planning,
especially in regions where there is a strong competition for land.
It leads to a more detailed and therefore better quantification of
the land requirements of different agricultural activities. At least
in Belgium, census does not seem to deliver accurate data on the
subject. The functional tare, accurately measured in one case study
area, was more than twice as high as expected from the agri-
cultural census data. In addition, plan tare was found to be high
indicating weak planning performance in the agricultural desti-
nation zones of the study area. This is the result of the presence
of non-agricultural land users within those zones but also farm-
ers contribute to pTare since they often use a part of their land
for non-agricultural production purposes like hobby farming and
non-used fallow. But the pronounced urbanised and horticultural
character of the study area leads to fTare- and pTare-percentages
which are probably higher than what can be expected at the level
of the Flemish region. The significant differences in fTare% for open
air horticulture compared to greenhouse farms already indicate the
importance of the farm type to assess tare. Other farm types, not
investigated in this study, are expected to show a lower fTare%.
To obtain applicable data on tare, a more extensive sampling is
necessary, encompassing farm types and segments in different agri-
cultural regions.
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