Conventional Ag is Energy Intensive

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Conventional Ag is Energy Intensive
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Fossil Fuel to Food
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Crops
Livestock
Food processing
Food distribution and preparation
17 of total commercial energy use !!!
Food production
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How Much Energy for Our Food
Food Type
Kilocalories of fossil fuel input per kilocalorie
of protein output
Feed lot beef
20-78
Pigs
35
Broiler chicken
22
Rangeland Beef
10
Sheep
10
Vegetables
2-4
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How Much Energy for Our Food
Food Type
Kilocalories of fossil fuel input per kilocalorie
of protein output
Feed lot beef
20-78
Pigs
35
Broiler chicken
22
Rangeland Beef
10
Sheep
10
Vegetables
2-4
7
Monocropped soybeans
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Pesticides applied to crops
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Outline for Today
Pests Pesticides
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Pesticides applied to soil

• Consider impact of erosion following spraying
• Check out the farm worker near the plane

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Bare fields
Bare fields w/ no windbreaks no buffers on
edges are the norm in corporate Industrial
Agriculture
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Biomagnification
Fat-soluble compounds remain in organism are
not excreted As food moves up the food chain,
the compounds are increasingly concentrated Reach
levels toxic to higher organisms Even if not
toxic to organisms low on food chain
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Pesticide Resistance leads to Pesticide Treadmill

• Increase tolerance, increase in resistance
• What does this mean?
• Need this amount of pesticide
• to Kill 50 x
• to Kill 90 10x
• to Kill 99 100x
• to Kill 99.9 1000x

- hardiest ones live - next generations
very resistant - increase dosage or find new
pesticide -time-consuming -costly
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2nd generation
Most major pests are resistant to many
pesticides that were originally very effective!
Number of Species Resistant
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2nd generation
Rachel Carson
discredited by other scientists chem companies
as an alarmist radical woman scientist?

• persevered convinced public Congress - DDT
  ban
• championed concept of there is no away people
  couldnt fathom the idea that a pesticide would
  go into water, travel up food chain, be
  concentrated at top

power of good writing humanist viewpoint, not
technical
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Irrigation
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Outline for Today
Farmers are losing their most important asset!!
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Outline for Today
Sheet erosion from bare-field runoff during storms
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Outline for Today
? Chocolate rivers choked in sediment
Which plant nutrient tends to stick to sediments?
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Why NP?
Nutrient inputs to large rivers from agriculture
very high
What type of stream pollution results from
nutrient overload?
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Fertilizer Use
N, P important plant nutrients Add
nutrients Increase Plant Growth (why arent
native levels of soil N and P sufficient for high
plant growth?)
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Gulf Hypoxia Dead Zone

• N, P added to water
• Increase algae growth
• Algae die
• Bacteria consume dead algae
• What happens to oxygen levels in water?
• What happens to fish?

http//www.fws.gov/midwest/EcosystemConservation/h
ypoxia_map.gif
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Strip Cropping

• Prevents Erosion
• Reduces Pest infestations

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Strip Cropping

• Note the diversity of crops planted in one field

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Per capita calorie intake
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Vertical Integration
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Summary Industrialized Agriculture

• Characterized by
• Mechanization, Monocropping, Hybrids
• High Inputs
• Commercialization
• Vertical Integration
• Globalization
• Increased food production, cheap food prices, but
  greater costs

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Organic Foods

• No pesticides
• Natural pesticide control
• Reduced fertilizer use
• Use natural means N-fixing plants
• More costly, but
• Compare Price v. Cost

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Buy Local

• Check out the Meadville Market House
• Peruse the Meadville Area Local Growers webpage