Sustainable Agriculture

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Sustainable Agriculture

• Bill Proebsting
• Department of Horticulture
• Oregon State University

2
Fire and Ice Robert Frost
Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in
ice. From what Ive tasted of desire I hold with
those who favor fire. But if it had to perish
twice,         I think I know enough of hate To
know that for destruction ice Is also great And
would suffice.
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Sustainable Agriculture

• Meeting the needs of the present without
  compromising the ability of future generations to
  meet their own needs

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Sustainable Agriculture An Oxymoron

• our farming has never been sustainable Wes
  Jackson
• agriculture represents the single most profound
  ecological change in the entire 3.5 billion year
  history of life Niles Eldredge
• the fact that we have not yet invented a truly
  sustainable agricultural system means that we
  have not yet achieved a truly sustainable
  civilization Ward Chesworth

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U.S. Agricultural Policy

• In actual fact, American agricultural policy
  distorts food prices, frustrates innovation,
  limits product diversity and subsidizes a select
  group of farmers at enormous public cost.
• National Cattlemens Beef Association

http//www.beefusa.org/NEWSUSFarmBill2002ItsImplic
ationsforWorldAgriculturalMarkets11148.aspx
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U.S. Industrial Agriculture

• System of crop production that results in
• Destruction of soil
• Overuse of energy, water, fertilizer, chemicals
• Wreckage of rural societies and economies
• Are these good things or bad things?
• Sustainable or unsustainable?

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Capitalism

• Market-driven system
• Some level of government involvement
• As currently practiced, the system is flawed

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Natural Capitalism

• Manufactured Capital infrastructure, machines,
  tools, factories
• Financial Capital cash, investments, monetary
  instruments
• Human Capital labor, intelligence, culture,
  organization
• Natural Capital resources, ecosystems

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Industrial Capitalism

• Fails to assign value to natural, social or
  cultural systems
• Thus, it fails to live by basic accounting
  principles and is not sustainable

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Industrial Capitalism, cont.

• Free enterprise and market forces will allocate
  people and resources to their highest and best
  uses
• Cant be true without accounting for natural
  capital

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Industrial Capitalism, cont.

• Resource shortages will elicit development of
  substitutes
• Substitutes for
• Soil
• Air
• Water
• Functional ecosystems

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Industrial Capitalism, cont.

• Concerns for a healthy environment are important
  but must be balanced against the requirements for
  economic growth if a high standard of living is
  to be maintained

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Current Social System
Environment
Social Justice
Economy
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Gross National Product
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http//www.rprogress.org/newprograms/sustIndi/gpi/
index.shtml
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• Why does the environment matter?

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Ecosystem Services Things that nature provides
for free

• Climate stability
• Weather moderation
• Clean air
• Clean water
• Flood control
• Nutrient cycling
• Waste removal

• Soil formation
• Insect control
• Pollination
• Seed dispersal
• Biodiversity

Value roughly 30 trillion (30 x 1012)
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Replicating Ecosystem Services
http//facultystaff.vwc.edu/gnoe/EES_ENVS/biosphe
re4a.jpg
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Ecosystem Services of Biosphere 2

• gt150 million
• 8 persons
• Produced 80 of food requirements
• Ecological collapse
• Atmospheric change
• 20 million x 6.5 billion people 13 x 1016

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Ecosystem Services Are Important Whats the
Problem?

• Are we really having a significant impact?

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Ecological Overshoot of the Human Economy
PNAS 99, 9266 (2002)
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• Ecosystem Services related to Agriculture

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Soil

• 2 billion tons of soil eroded per year from
  agricultural lands
• Costs 44 billion per year
• Lost productivity
• Water pollution
• Silting of reservoirs
• 90 of U.S. land eroding above replacement rates
• Growing a bushel of corn costs 2-5 bushels of top
  soil

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Soil Carbon
Science 277, 507 (1997)
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Nitrogen
Crop Yield
Nitrogen Efficiency
Nature 418, 671 (2002)
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Nitrogen Run-off

• Groundwater contamination
• Streams, lakes and wetlands

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Gulf of Mexico Dead Zone
http//www.ers.usda.gov/amberwaves/november03/find
ings/images/photo_deadzone.jpg
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Ocean Dead Zones
http//www.classzone.com/books/earth_science/terc/
content/investigations/es2206/es2206page04.cfm
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Water

• Ag accounts for 80 of water used in U.S.
• Depletion of stream flows, water quality, fish
  and wildlife
• Federal projects deliver water below cost
• Depletion of aquifers

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Ogallala Aquifer
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Aral Sea
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Energy

• Industrial agriculture is energy intensive
• Tilling, planting, spraying, harvesting
• Synthesizing fertilizer, irrigating
• Processing
• Transporting
• For each food calorie produced, 10 calories of
  oil are consumed
• "It costs 435 fossil fuel calories to fly a
  5-calorie strawberry from California to London."

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Energy in Agriculture

• Based on energy use alone, agriculture is about
  90 unsustainable
• Industrial agriculture can never be sustainable,
  because it relies on fossil fuels
• Only energy generation directly from sun,
  sun-driven wind and water can be sustainable

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Good News!

• We have many exciting challenges to devise a
  sustainable agriculture

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Towards Sustainable Agriculture

• Account for natural capital
• Remove or change subsidies
• Tax bads, instead of goods
• Emphasize ecological, rather than technological
  approaches to agriculture and other activities

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Science 309, 570 (2005)
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Characteristics of Sustainable Agriculture

• Energy generated on farm
• Mimic natural systems
• Use of perennial plants
• Locally-grown food
• A locally-grown meal requires about 6-10 of the
  energy use of a standard American meal

http//www.energybulletin.net/4492.html
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Natural Systems Agriculture

• Developing systems to, rely on the ecological
  benefits of natural ecosystems with no or minimal
  sacrifice in food production. Wes Jackson, The
  Land Institute
• Modeled on prairies
• Perennial plants
• Species diversity
• Powered by the sun

http//www.landinstitute.org/
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Major Questions

• Is there a trade-off between perennialism and
  seed yield?
• Can a perennial polyculture outyield a
  monoculture?
• Can perennial polycultures defend themselves?
• Can a perennial polyculture supply its own
  nitrogen?

http//www.landinstitute.org/
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Is There a Role for Biotechnology in Sustainable
Agriculture?

• Problems of agriculture are much bigger than
  genetic engineering
• Presently, biotechnology is, at best, basically
  irrelevant to developing sustainable agriculture
• At worst, it perpetuates a disastrous system

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Is There a Role for Biotechnology in Sustainable
Agriculture?

• Ethical questions, mostly narrow the debate about
  risk
• Natural?
• Toxic?
• Genetic pollution?
• Invasive?
• Risks vs. Benefits
• Industrial agriculture is unsustainable.

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Is There a Role for Biotechnology in Sustainable
Agriculture?

• Are single gene approaches suitable for
  addressing complex problems?
• Insect resistance
• Herbicide resistance
• May or may not have had some positive
  environmental effect, but very little effect on
  Sustainability

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Focus Questions

• What are the consequences of developing, or not
  developing, sustainable agriculture?
• What are some genetic traits that might have a
  major impact on developing sustainable
  agriculture?

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Fire and Ice Robert Frost
Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in
ice. From what Ive tasted of desire I hold with
those who favor fire. But if it had to perish
twice,         I think I know enough of hate To
know that for destruction ice Is also great And
would suffice.