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livingontheland - Re: [Livingontheland] Fertilizer use by crop in Brazil

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Subject: Healthy soil and sustainable growing

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Chronological Thread  
  • From: Mark Nagel <activism98201@verizon.net>
  • To: Healthy soil and sustainable growing <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] Fertilizer use by crop in Brazil
  • Date: Thu, 27 Apr 2006 14:55:44 -0500 (CDT)

Thanks Paul.

I was going to mention the report's comments about poor use of organic
fertlizers, but felt that this would suggest a solution, when in fact there
isn't any solution when, as you note, you're exporting (and burning) your
minerals.

One can see that as natural gas prices increase there will be a push to
utilize animal manures. This should be a no-brainer, but unfortunately
industry will look to scale this up. Scaling up will likely mean that more
animals will be raised and more forest land cleared for them. And at some
point there's going to be contention between land for the animals and land
for agriculture.

It's really a shame that we're heading down the biofuels path, as this just
perpetuates the inefficiency of long-distance food transport. And I see it
as a wicked trap to suck small food producers into the corporate web, where
they'll fall prey to the big conglomerates (and loose their land).

Anyone want to speculate on how long it is before agribusiness and big-energy
combine? ADM and Exxon for example? As we here are all to familiar with,
food IS energy!

BTW - Wouldn't marginal land produce less energy dense biomass? In order to
make up for this lesser density more land would be required. And marginal
land isn't likely going to be nice flat or gently rolling land, which means
that it'll be fairly difficult (read energy intensive) to cultivate.


Mark Nagel
Everett, WA


=====================
From: TradingPostPaul <tradingpost@riseup.net>

Good work, Mark. Elsewhere in the FAO study I see Brazil makes extremely poor
use of animal manures, as does the U.S. And their chemical fertilizer use is
almost exclusively for export crops, not food staples for the masses. What's
wrong with this picture? Not that this country is any shining example. I know
some have argued we can all grow crops for ethanol on marginal land without
sacrificing any food cropland, but that's not what's being done. If land can
be cultivated mechanically for ethanol crops, then it can be cultivated for
food crops instead.

paul, tradingpost@riseup.net





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