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| A map from the 1910 Census showing holdings of Black farmers. Each dot represents 50 farms. (Image from Ag Census Library at Cornell University) |
Black-owned acreage fell by nearly half in the 20th century, from 15 million acres in 1900 to 8 million acres in 2017. "Black Americans lost land in the 20th century for a variety of reasons, including violence, intimidation, immigration to the North, and discrimination by the USDA. But legal experts also blame vulnerable forms of land ownership, such as heirs’ property," Sarah Melotte reports for The Daily Yonder. Black farm owners in the Southeastern Black Belt and the Gullah Geechee Corridor have been particularly vulnerable. About one-third of Black-owned land in the South is considered heirs' property.
Heirs' property is "complicated and ambiguous" since there is no clear land title, and "leaves the heirs more susceptible to losing the land and to not realizing its full economic potential," Melotte reports. "Heirs’ property rights are one way developers walked away with some of the region’s most desirable and profitable land at bargain-basement prices."
Legal snarls from heirs' property still prevent many rural Black landowners from accessing government programs today. "Organizations are trying to fix that problem. The Sustainable Forestry and African American Land Retention Network, for example, supports Black rural land owners with the goal of keeping land in the family and increasing wealth through forestry. But there are still pressures that threaten land ownership for Black Americans," Melotte reports. "As development sprawls from an urban center, adjacent rural areas face higher demand for housing and other resources."
from The Rural Blog https://ift.tt/l3Hg6a4 Black-owned acreage fell by almost half in 20th century, partly because developers exploited informal land ownership - Entrepreneur Generations
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