Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[tradingpost <tradingpost@lobo.net>]

You spotted it; that was my #1 gag. Of course lots of no-till is chemical free. Let me add I don't see reaching 10 billion at all. Mother Nature has her ways & we're starting to see that already.

The writer says "Even small-scale farming leads to the clear-cutting of land, the reduction of biodiversity, widespread soil erosion, and the kill-off of otherwise beneficial insects". Well, it does with industrial farming Methods but it's not at all because it's small scale. And we don't need "the latest technology", we need the oldest technology. We've long known small farms are far more productive than corporate gigafarms.

"Even if the world's farmers were willing to shift to organic, it's not clear that it could produce enough to feed the planet without cultivating what little land remains in the wild (goodbye, Amazon rainforest!" But he already brought up the livestock impact; yet can't see that producing food just for people would free up plenty of land for future populations.

And GMOs do nothing but sell herbicides.

paul

On 9/26/2014 2:22 PM, John D'hondt wrote:

Well, it is a repetition of all the old myths and very few of these stand up to a critical look.
Hunter gatherers having an easy time is only true when there is big game (big enough to feed a family for a week) in big numbers and humans have good long distance weapons.
And  human numbers reaching 10 billion some time in the near future... Humans only managed to reach over the 1 billion because of oil and we have reached peak oil and the carrying capacity (sustainable number) of the planet for humans is now not much bigger than 200 million.
And so on. You don't need any pesticides for no-till but of course you are limited as to acreage because it means more work.
John

anyone want to punch holes in this? before I do

Menu for a Hot Planet (wrong in so many ways)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-feffer/menu-for-a-hot-planet_b_5881068.html