As the world population balloons
over seven billion people, the food and energy demands across the world pose
fundamental questions regarding the use of the world’s finite resources. As a
result, two divergent camps in agriculture emerge: conventional
agriculturalists and alternative agriculturalists. Each side proposes different
opinions for food production and population growth reduction. Conventional agriculture
is usually characterized as capital intensive, large-scale, highly mechanized,
extensive use of fertilizers and pesticides, and little crop diversity. Many
view this intensification of agriculture as the only viable way to feed the
growing global population (Beus and Dunlap, 1990). However, the widespread use
of conventional agriculture has led to various criticism of the ability of
conventional agriculture to sustain food production without severe economic,
social, and environmental effects. With the reality of global climate change
and energy strains, conventional agriculture has been challenged by an
alternate agriculture movement that advocates a more “ecologically sustainable
agriculture” practice. The movement has produced a variety of other production
systems in an effort to improve the sustainability of agriculture, such as organic
agriculture, sustainable agriculture, natural farming, and low-input
agriculture (Beus and Dunlap, 1990). Collectively, these have been coined as
alternative agriculture. Alternative agriculturalists advocate smaller farms,
reduced energy use, conservation of finite resource, and reduction of chemical
use. Further, alternative agriculture yields greater crop diversity,
sustainable practices, and usually more nutritious product (Beus and Dunlap,
1990). However, with an increasing demand for food to follow the rising global
population, agriculturists must unite to a common ground and employ science and
technology to increase their agricultural output while maintaining sustainable
practices for the long term.
To combat the large population
growth, there are two ways to improve food production: extensification and
intensification. Extensification increases production by devoting larger amount
of area to food production. However, humans have occupied most of the world so
increasing the area for food production is extremely limited. Intensification
is characterized by the high use of inputs such as capital, labor, pesticides
and fertilizers to improve yield. Conventional
agriculturalists view this intensification as the only viable way to feed the
growing global population, as it allows for producing more food on the same
amount of land (Beus and Dunlap, 1990). Furthermore, global temperatures are projected to increase dramatically
in the next century. By 2100, seasonal temperatures are likely to exceed the
hottest season on record in temperature countries. These temperature increases
will threaten global food security as food deficits will exist in one region
while surpluses in another (Battisti and Naylor, 2009). As a result, conventional agriculturalists insist on utilizing
technology and science to best of its ability to improve crop yields.
Fundamentally, conventional agriculturalists believe in the continual
improvement of science and technology such that food production will meet the
needs of tomorrow (Beus and Dunlap, 1990).
However, alternative agriculturists accept the
concerns of feeding a growing world population, but continue advocating a more
ecologically sustainable agricultural practice. Alternative
agriculturalists are quick to point that the inputs to increasing crop yield
are based on heavy non-renewable resources (Beus and Dunlap, 1990). High
fertilizer use leads to increased emission of gases that play critical role to
air pollution (Matson, 1997). At the same time, the notion of alternative farming
is better for the environment has been challenged by many conventional
agriculturalists, but most famously by Norman Borlaug, the father of the “green
revolution” and winner of the Nobel peace prize. Borlaugh advocates the use of
synthetic fertilizers to increase crop yield. He claims that organic farming
produces lower yields and therefore requires more land to produce an equal
amount of food. Hence, the savings in land and energy through increased output
efficiency offsets the input of non-renewable resources (The Economist, 2006).
Alternative agriculturalists criticize conventionalists for not including the long
term effects of high input agriculture. More specifically, the use of these
dangerous chemicals often leads to soil erosion, pollution to water bodies, and
shortened lifespan of a farm (Berry, 1987) (Santucci, 2010). Furthermore, these
toxic inputs result in less nutritious product, which ultimately harms the
consumer (Beus and Dunlap, 1990). Hence, agriculturalists must unite against
the challenges of global population and climate change by utilizing
intensification to improve yield, while utilizing some alternative methods to
maintain sustainability.
In the quest of increasing crop
yields, the agricultural practices of farmers have direct, significant social implications. Through
widespread conventional agriculture, there is now a control of land, resources,
and capital by a small group of farmers. A large amount of capital is required
to maintain a farm; as a result, many potential farmers are left out, resulting
in enormous power in the hands of few. In addition to threatening the
democracy, fewer farmers results in immense plots with owners focusing on
quantity and profit, rather than quality and beauty. Inevitably, the land
suffers from lack of proper attention and care, which contribute to more
environmental impacts. Also, conventional agriculture is often highly
processed, resulting in a less nutritious product (Beus and Dunlap, 1990). With
an alarming obesity epidemic, agriculturalists must focus on the quality of
their product just as much as their quantity. Last, with the limitations of
extensification and the dangerous effects of intensification, societies across
the world must decide the balance between conventional and alternative
agriculture. While countries can return back to organic agriculture, the
decreased output will result in hunger and starvation for millions of people (Beus and Dunlap, 1990). Before
the effects of global climate change and population strain become irreversible,
agriculturalists must begin unite to solve these issues because of the large
social impacts of their food production.
With social implications for the
entire world, agriculturalists must address the fundamental issues of global
climate change, global population growth, and food production. The world faces
humongous challenges of global food security that cannot be addressed without
the cooperation and unity of all agriculturalists. Agriculturalists will need
to educate the masses of these alarming issues and bring discussion into the
political arena for serious reforms at state, national, or global levels.
Further, agriculturalist must continue utilizing science and technology to not
only improve yields, but also develop more ecologically friendly techniques of
efficient cultivation. In addition, there must be an equal emphasis to quality
and quantity for maintaining healthy human survival. But without any major
changes, the global food security is highly threatened.
Literature
Cited
Battisti, David S and Rosamond L. Naylor.
"Historical Warnings of Future Food Insecurity with Unprecedented Seasonal
Heat." Science 323 (2009): 240-244.
Berry, Wendell. "Six Agricultural Fallacies." Small
Farmer's Journal 11.1 (1987): 12-13.
Beus, Curtis E and Riley E Dunlap. "Conventional versus
Alternative Agriculture: The Paradigmatic Roots of the Debate." Rural
Sociology 55.4 (1990): 591-615.
Matson, P. A., et al. "Agricultural Intensification and
Ecosystem Properties." Science 277 (1997): 504-509.
Santucci, Fabio Maria. "Organic agriculture in Syria:
policy options." New Medit (2010): 47-53.
"Voting with your trolley." The Economist
(2006): 1-5.
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