After Utah lost 20% of its farmland, the state’s Department of Agriculture and Food wants to set $12 million toward a measure that blocks farmers from selling out to developers.

The Department of Agriculture and Food is pushing to expand conservation easements, the process in which farmers are paid to give up specific development rights from their land’s deeds. While the lands are still privately owned, owners give up the right to sell their land, keeping it from being developed into subdivisions and used for mining extraction or other types of intensive development.