The future is green . . .
It’s obvious that food is a
critical component of human living and its production a significant environmental concern. Because food production entails changing the way nature works on its own for human benefit using gardening/farming techniques it is important that we use techniques that don’t degrade the environment, hence the call for sustainable agriculture.
While there is still quite a lot of discussion about what sustainable agriculture is there are some overall themes that most proponents agree on. First is ending the use of synthetic chemicals that don’t readily degrade in the environment allowing these toxins to move away from the farms where they were applied. Instead we should do our best to mimic natural systems like using naturally occurring pesticides that quickly degrade, or better yet, use bio-controls like friendly insects to take care of pests. We currently farm in large single crop variety plots called monocultures that are nothing like natural plant communities. Many sustainable farmers have moved to mixed crop plots that are less appealing to pests because they mimic natural biodiversity. Industrial agriculture grows plants for food, removes those plants from the land and transports them to cities where they are consumed. To replace the nutrients in the soil we use chemical fertilizers produced from fossil fuels. In nature, nutrients taken from the soil are returned through the decomposition of plant and animal matter in a continuous cycle of renewal. In the future we need to find ways to close our nutrient cycle.