"Gary and Jos Kimlin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
<snip>
>My wife is studying for a master in Sustainable Agriculture, I'm a little
>selective in what I read on the subject and so we often argue about such
>matters.
>I tutor OS students in critical reading (many are trained to believe
>everything that they read and suffer real trauma when presented with varying
>opinions in a lit. review) so I discard papers that do not have a stand
>alone logical development that fits the pattern I use for students.
>(I wouldn't read much of my own ravings)
Are you sure that's why you don't read things? I'm very sceptical.
<snip>
>Do you seriously believe that alternative agriculture can match the
>production of the industrialised systems and then increase production to
>meet increasing global demand? ( I allow the same level of subsidy that you
>demonstrate for the Brits).
No need for subsidies. I think I gave you these before, but maybe
they didn't stand up to your critical reading criteria:
One 15-year study found that organic farming is not only kinder to
the environment than "conventional", intensive agriculture but has
comparable yields of both products and profits. The study showed that
yields of organic maize are identical to yields of maize grown with
fertilisers and pesticides, while soil quality in the organic fields
dramatically improves. (Drinkwater, L.E., Wagoner, P. & Sarrantonio,
M. Legume-based cropping systems have reduced carbon and nitrogen
losses. Nature 396, 262-265.)
A Rodale study found that organic farm yields equal factory farm
yields after four years using organic techniques.
"In the USA, for example, the top quarter sustainable agriculture
farmers now have higher yields than conventional farmers, as well as
a much lower negative impact on the environment," says Jules Pretty,
Director of the Centre for Environment and Society at the University
of Essex ("Feeding the world?", SPLICE, August/September 1998, Volume
4 Issue 6).
http://members.tripod.com/~ngin/article2.htm
"The truth, so effectively suppressed that it is now almost
impossible to believe, is that organic farming is the key to feeding
the world." -- The Guardian, August 24, 2000
http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4054683,00.html
"Organic farming can 'feed the world'" -- BBC Science, September 14, 1999
http://www.purefood.org/Organic/orgfeedworld.cfm
"Feeding the world?" Quietly, slowly and very significantly,
sustainable agriculture is sweeping the farming systems of the world.
http://members.tripod.com/~ngin/article2.htm
<snip>
>Note that I once held the view that a series of "natural" population crashes
>should be allowed to reduce human population to a level from which we could
>"rebuild" sustainably. Without the ongoing "green revolution" this may have
>happened, but there was always going to be a maximum population size beyond
>which the ecological damage associated with population crashes could be
>tolerated.
Yeah, well, we've been through all that before, at least once, but
you take no notice and trundle it all out all over again. That's why
I'm not continuing with this any longer beyond this. I'd change what
your students wrote: "It's useless arguing with Harry because he
doesn't hear anything that disagrees with him." Do you seriously
believe that the Green Revolution helps feed people instead of
starves them, helps to sustain the environment rather than ruining
it? Who've you been reading, Normal Borlaug or the World Bank?
You talk of land shortages? - Australia could support the same
population as China or India. So could the US, or Argentina.
http://soilandhealth.org/01aglibrary/010122king/ffcc.html
F. H. King: Farmers of Forty Centuries
Keith Addison
Journey to Forever
Handmade Projects
Tokyo
http://journeytoforever.org/
Biofuel at Journey to Forever:
http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html
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