The Agriculture Retention and Development Act of 1981 bought permanent deed restrictions on New Jersey

New Jersey

New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

farms so that they had to always remain as farms, and could never be sold for housing or for non-farming commercial development.

History

In 1976 the state started a pilot program. The effect was to slow farmland loss in the state. By 1994 it had saved 22080 acres (89.4 km²).