COM 0493.125 2000-2002 - Laserfiche WebLink

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EXHIBIT B Current Proposed Criteria in General Plan Draft Agriculture Designations - Draft General Plan Update 2002 (Intensive Agriculture: Sugar, orchard, diversified agriculture, and floriculture. High: Fertile soil. Low: Less fertile soil. Extensive Agriculture: Pasturage and range lands. Orchard: Those agricultural lands which, though rocky in character and content, support productive macadamia nuts, papaya, citrus and other similar agricultural products). Important Agricultural Land: Important agricultural lands are those with better potential for sustained high agricultural yields because of soil type, climate, topography, or other factors. Important agricultural lands were determined by including the following lands: • Lands identified as "Intensive Agriculture" on the 1989 General Plan Land Use Pattern Allocation Guide maps. • Lands identified in the Agricultural Lands of Importance to the State of Hawaii (ALISH) classification system as "Prime" or "Unique." • Lands classified by the Land Study Bureau's Soil Survey Report as Class B "Good" soils. (There are no Class A lands on the island of Hawaii. • Lands classified as at least "fair" for two or more crops, on an irrigated basis, by the USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service's study of suitability for various crops. • In North and South Kona, the "coffee belt," a continuous band defined by elevation, according to input from area farmers. • State agricultural parks. Some areas that meet the criteria for important agricultural lands on an irrigated basis only were included in the "Extensive Agricultural Land" category due to their remoteness from potential sources of irrigation. Certain areas that could have been classified as Important Agricultural lands have been placed within urban land use categories. Generally, these are adjacent to existing urban areas. This represents a decision that the orderly development of those urban areas justifies the eventual conversion of those lands to urban use. Because of the scale of the Land Use Pattern Allocation Guide maps used to designate Important Agricultural Land, the location of these lands should be verified by more detailed mapping when considering specific land use decisions.