Next to the fossil fuel industry, the agriculture sector has been the most resistant to scaling up new technologies and practices that mainstream sustainability. Various approaches have been experimented with in the past. Some have proven to be successful, while others have not met expectations.
No more shiny new objects. It’s time for the ag community to step up and take ownership. To this end, I’d like to see the local and state farm bureaus come together to develop regional sustainability plans that deal with:
- Overuse of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides.
- Reliance on antibiotics and hormones in livestock.
- Monoculture farming.
- Excessive tillage.
- Overusing land.
I would like to see goals, action steps, timelines, assigned responsibilities and performance metrics in each plan. Government, research institutions and consultants are not going to lead the revolution, but they can play supporting roles. It’s got to be a coordinated "bottom up" approach that has widespread buy-in. Otherwise, we'll just see more piecemeal efforts and slow adoption of more beneficial technologies and practices.
Ag needs a bottom-up approach to sustainability when the entire system is driven by top-down factors that reward maximum production regardless of the inherent drawbacks?
Government policy, subsidies, propped up demand, etc all reward maximum production which directly translates to higher usage of synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and soil degradation.
Widescale change will come in one of two ways: European style legislation on inputs, or financial incentives. We do a lot of work in the Chesapeake watershed which is subject to nutrient and pesticide restrictions. Guess what? Farmers have adapted.
The key is finding a way to drive behavioral changes. As long as farmers are incentivized to produce as much as possible with no restrictions on inputs they’ll continue to do so.
RecentWTF is up with this Clown... by Reacher
Total Members: 142