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2 Responses to Can our current farming techniques be sustained indefinitley?

1. Some of it can and some of it can’t. In countries like america most farming techniques can’t be sustained because the farmers are more worried about money than they are about sustainability. They quickly rip through an area and permanently damage the soil. I’m not saying all american farmers work like that, nor am I saying america is the only guilty country.

   In places like south africa or australia a lot of farmers come from a long line of farmers and therefore know a lot of techniques the “newbies” don’t. We mostly use strict guidelines that are in favour of sustainability. When we harvest we take special care to enrich the soil with natural substances and most of us give the fields some good resting time before we start planting again.

   If we could just get everyone to start using these techniques farming would become one of the most sustainable and most reliable resourses in the world.

   

   Piet
   October 31, 2013 at 7:42 am
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2. 1.
   No, we now understand that conventional agriculture practices are not sustainable. Consequently, we are adopting increasingly more sustainable agriculture practices to reduce our detrimental impact on the environment.

   To have a more sustainable food production system, we must follow the following principles:

   1. Reduce use/dependency on unsustainable energy sources (such as coal, gas, and petrol)
   2. Reduce emissions of GHG (greenhouse gases) such as CO2, CH4, and NO2.
   3. Reduce unsustainable agriculture practices such as pollution and deforestation which can lead to increased health risks and loss of biodiversity

   Consequently, some agriculture practices that are considered more sustainable are such as
   – zero burning (as a way to clear a land without burning all the trees)
   – minimal or zero tillage (to maintain soil fertility so reducing fertilizer use as well as save fuel because tractors are less needed)
   – intercropping or crop rotation (to reduce pesticides use and to maximize light and water use by plants for higher yields)
   – integrated pest management (use of organisms to control our pests and diseases to reduce pesticide use)
   – use of composts or mulches (to provide nutrients so to reduce synthetic fertilizers)
   – urban agriculture (food is grown in urban areas to reduce “food miles”, so save fuel)
   – burying the N fertilizer instead on leaving it on the surface (to reduce NO2 emission)
   – timing the N fertilization so that plants are ready to take up the supplied N (again, reduce NO2 emission and N loss)
   – use of less water in rice fields (practised ala SRI or System Rice Intensification) means less CH4 emission (as well as conserving water) and yet giving higher rice yields. Over-withdrawal of water supply is a major problem in some countries like in India.

   2.
   Cellulosic ethanol production is viewed so favorably because biofuel is obtained from non-edible parts of the crop or plants. Biofuel is currently in the first generation which obtains fuel from parts which we also eat. This creates a competition between crops grown for biofuel and that grown for food. So if we choose to grow for biofuel, this decreases our food supply. But if we grown crops for food, less is available for biofuel.

   Second generation biofuel eliminates this competition by obtaining the fuel from plants parts we do not eat such as corn stalks and leaves.

   

   cbsteh
   October 31, 2013 at 8:31 am
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