Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Pete Vukovich <pvukovic1@yahoo.com>]

You won't get an argument from me as to whether technology or 'free market' philosophies save anything. Were on the same page there. In my mind, both are primarily either pipe dreams or snake oil scams. Neither are well thought out, and in the best of cases zero sum games. On balance, I'd say the 'free market' has made people clever but shallow and dumber, and technology has convinced them that someone or something else can do their thinking for them - its largest impact (IMO) being a loss of self reliance, and some deep confusions about how nature and people work.

The free market has created as much poverty as its concentrated wealth (according to our own labor department), and technology really hasn't helped most people make better use of resources and energy as much as it has presented us with new ways of wasting them. It would be hard to support an argument that says they'll fix agriculture.

Of course this list is a notable exception in both the free market and technology arenas, and like OWL it suffers from being 'outmoded' and 'useful'  - as opposed to 'cutting edge' and utterly trivial. People think here, and I'm grateful for their thoughts and information. I can't help but think without the computer and the internet some of the same people would be sending their thoughts and experiences pony express.



--- On Wed, 7/1/09, Tradingpost <tradingpost@lobo.net> wrote:

From: Tradingpost <tradingpost@lobo.net>
Subject: [Livingontheland] Peak Oil And World Food Supplies
To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
Date: Wednesday, July 1, 2009, 10:48 AM

You're right, Pete, it's heavy stuff and it's easy to see why experts, so
called, are all over the road on this.  Those links are highly useful for
those who want to get into the nuts and bolts of carrying capacity and
related issues. http://dieoff.org/ esp has an encyclopedia of links that
I've only been able to sample over the years. Hanson is not one of the
optimists. Personally I expect the catastrophic problems will first hit
certain places far worse than others, and we see it beginning in those
places. The immense slum cities in coastal areas are most vulnerable with
incredible population densities and no resources of their own. War and
disease take a high toll in some places already, and that can only spread
under global economic decline. As for the richer countries I see no
economic recovery, only gradual decline. IMHO. If I were young and just
starting out I'd go into business supplying the bare necessities of life,
starting with food and affordable shelter.

Supporting a family of 8 on a half acre would depend on the soil and
climate as well as their ability and other resources. What is or isn't
arable is an open question, true. My own place is not arable to most
people. We got our second inch of rain last week; we're in a treeless rain
shadow from nearby mountain chain. So we irrigate a small, intensively
managed garden that easily supplies two or three markets each week
July-Sept. And our closed fossil aquifer would last indefinitely if it
weren't for the 24/7 irrigated alfalfa fields.

Of course we're open to other viewpoints here. But the one I have to argue
with is the notion that somehow the free market or technology will keep us
in the style to which we've been accustomed .......

paul tradingpost@lobo.net

Many types of jobs will cease to exist: public relations executive,
marketing directors, et cetera. I think work will be very hands-on,
and a lot of it will revolve around food production.
    -- James Howard Kunstler, 2003



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