Tetlom."I suspect, much of permaculture is small scale "gardens"...

Tetlom.
"I suspect, much of permaculture is small scale "gardens" where people are motivated by respect and a desire to understand more about natural systems - the food is a bonus. Easy to be righteous about this stuff.

Large Scale Agriculture is a totally performance based investment, often heavily subsidized. Respect of environment is not a number 1 priority. You would know better than I, how much damage to environment actually comes from this sector. I doubt it is all Benign and full of earthworms.

Do you believe that Monsato could ever "release" something that could do irreversible damage ?

Do you think there is room for better practice to be introduced into a percentage of Large Scale Agriculture?"




Agriculture is not subsidised at all in Australia.

Agriculture causes all sorts of environmental damage. Has done since time began. In fact it's done more damage than anything else since it's why there are so many people on the planet. If it was not for chemical fertilizers and the green revolution when food production exploded, the worlds population would have platued out at about a billion people as it was 150 years ago.

But since human populations have exploded, there's nothing much can be turned around now is there? It's too late.

The best thing for the environment would be if human populations stopped growing, and agriculture could be limited to as little amount of land as possible. This would allow more forest and wilderness. This means agriculture needs to be as productive as possible.

Food production has increased at 32 million tonnes a year for 50 years. This now has to be increased to 44 billion. It's not gunna happen mate.

http://www.abc.net.au/landline/content/2010/s3253782.htm



Every time some new yield increase comes out in agriculture, farmers don't benefit. it's consumers who benefit. For 100 years food production has increased faster than demand for it. That's why it got so cheap. Will that continue? I suspect not.

As I said way back at the start of this thread, ban GM foods, ban fertilizer, ban herbicides. I can still grow food, but only about a quarter of what I can now. Bring it on. This food I produce will be worth 20 times as much, so I will win, and every other farmer wins too, and everyone whos not a farmer loses.

I just get fed up with people criticising what I do, when it's obvious there is no other way to feed the world. And I get fed up with all the lies and crap that gets spread by people who probably know nothing except what they read on the net. And the stupidity of it all, when it's obvious that organic agriculture could never ever have a hope in hell of feeding everyone, especially when it depends so much on straw and manure from conventional high yield farming of today.


Cheers.