Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>]

Agree. It reads like farmers are just nameless factors of production,
interchangeable and unchanging. No consideration for the way they farm, who
they are, or anything else about farmers that can make a huge difference in
what is grown, how its grown and at what cost to the land, the water,
energy, air, the consumer, or the local community. It's obvious to us that
ignoring HOW food is produced and sold can turn all their computers into
boat anchors.

"While the “bigger is better” myth is generally accepted, it is a
fallacy. Numerous reports have found that smaller farms are actually more
efficient than larger “industrial” farms. These studies demonstrate
that when farms get larger, the costs of production per unit often
increase, because larger acreage requires more expensive machinery and more
chemicals to protect crops."
from http://www.keepmainefree.org/myth3.html

"The negative impacts of mono-crop, chemically intensive agriculture are
topsoil loss and soil erosion, aquifer depletion, pollution, loss of
genetic diversity and the overall breakdown of ecological systems. There
are deeper social issues connected with hunger and poverty. .. The
foundation of sustainability addresses concerns that go above and beyond
the term “Organic”. .."By nature, sustainable agriculture is generally
smaller in scale. From an economic standpoint sustainable agriculture works
to provide viable business pathways for small-mid sized farmers. The goal
is to create a decentralized, self-sufficient, local/regional food system
that empowers farmers and strengthens community."
http://www.communitymarkets.biz/questions.php

"Biointensive techniques can make possible a 200-500% increase in caloric
production per unit of area, a major increase in soil fertility while
productivity increases and resource use decreases, a 50+% reduction in the
amount of purchased organic fertilizer, a 99% reduction in the amount of
energy and a 67-88% reduction in the amount of water required per unit of
production, and a 100+% increase in income per unit of area."
http://biointensiveforrussia.igc.org/docs/695companion.pdf

"Economically, conventional agriculture in the US produces on the average
up to $100 per sixteenth of an acre; the net return on a $500,000
investment on the average 500-acre farm is about $12,000, or a little over
2  percent. We are depleting our agricultural economic base and indirectly
our farming community base. Biointensive economic mini-farming, in
contrast, can produce up to $20,000 on a sixteenth of an acre through
increased yields, decreased resource use, and direct marketing." -- John
Jeavons, http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_3659.cfm

paul tradingpost@lobo.net


*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 1/14/2008 at 4:21 PM E. E. Mitchamore Jr wrote:

>Farmers?
>
>E. E. "Mitch" Mitchamore
>www.hillcountrynatives.biz
>  ----- Original Message -----
>  From: TradingPostPaul
>  To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
>  Sent: Monday, January 14, 2008 10:36 AM
>  Subject: [Livingontheland] Shattering Myths: ?Can sustainable
>agriculture feed the world?
>
>
>
>  What is this report missing completely that would improve the outlook
>  further?
>
>  paul tradingpost@lobo.net
>  -------------
>
>  Shattering Myths: ?Can sustainable agriculture feed the world?
>  http://www.foodfirst.org/node/1778
>  By M. Jahi Chappell, PhD Candidate, University of Michigan Department of
>  Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
>  Fall 2007
>
>  For years, critics and proponents alike have worried that the related
>  methods of organic, low-input, low- or no-pesticide, integrated,
>  small-scale, and sustainable production may address environmental
>concerns,
>  but cannot produce sufficient food to sustain the large and growing
human
>  population.
>
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