R.I. Gen. Laws § 2-23-2: Legislative findings.

The general assembly finds:

(1) That agricultural operations are valuable to the state’s economy and the general welfare of the state’s people;

(2) That agricultural operations are adversely affected by the random encroachment of urban land uses throughout rural areas of the state;

(3) That, as one result of this random encroachment, conflicts have arisen between traditional agricultural land uses and urban land uses; and

(4) That conflicts between agricultural and urban land uses threaten to force the abandonment of agricultural operations and the conversion of agricultural resources to non-agricultural land uses, whereby these resources are permanently lost to the economy and the human and physical environments of the state.