Land equity in California: Challenges and opportunities across the policy landscape

In recent years, the State of California has enacted several policies and programs intended to improve land access for the State ' s socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers. This policy bridge provides a brief overview of factors shaping land ownership and access in California before describing 4 recently enacted initiatives demonstrating how the State has operationalized farmer and land equity through legislative, policy, and programmatic mechanisms. These actions are grounded in effective organizing among non-State organizations and demonstrate an emerging commitment to both procedural and distributive forms of justice. While the long-term results of these recent developments remain to be seen, they demonstrate an evolving commitment among diverse State and non-State entities to understand and address systemic inequality in agricultural land access and tenure in California.