Food Dialogues
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Small, biodiverse family farms have been well documented around the world to produce more total food per acre than large monocultures due to biological and ecological synergies and efficiencies. How can agricultural marketing and distribution channels be made more compatible with polyculture farming?
Author: Yi Wang
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Topic: Technology & Agriculture
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28
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The growing popularity of Farmers Markets is beginning to influence some chain retailers into carrying a bit of local produce. I think that as this pressure continues to grow, wholesalers will be increasingly forced to find ways to include more local produce in what they offer to retailers.
The author is correct in pointing out that monocultures of any type are inherently brittle and frail. The scale of modern agriculture is not compatible with the landscapes and systems it overtakes. The same is true for distribution and supply chains. As long as we are so dependent upon fossil fuels, not acknowledging the risk we take yet another brittle system, we are almost sure of inviting large scale disruption when resources/cost/stability of markets begin to destabilize.
Please cite your source. The September 12, 2008 issue of Time Magazine in an article entitled "Slow Food" stated that it would take 44,000,000 small farmers to equal modern production. While no doubt a lot of small family farms could produce enough food to feed the country, the diversity would be minimal and the total range of nutritional value dubious. Fresh foods contain the most nutritional value, next frozen foods, then canned foods, and lastly, dried foods. Americans have never had better access to a wider variety of fresh foods from a wider variety of sources. Depends on what balance you want in terms of nutrition, ideology (with or without dressing?), diversity and availability. Frankly, I prefer my food without ideology, it ruins the flavor.
total range of nutritional value dubious??? what does that really mean? Who cares how many small farmers it take to equal the unsustainable practices of large industrial farms? The feeding, drugging, waste disposal methods on large industrial operations is not only unsustainable but absolutely destructive of land, air and water. I live near industrial animal farms and see almost nothing but corn and soy in fields here in York County, PA. The soil is so destroyed that it wont support life without chemical fertilizers. This site is nothing more than another re-direction of what agriculture means. Take your industrial propaganda garbage and dump it elsewhere...
By operating as close to the local source point as possible:
facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/integrated-agriculture-modbox/251648883074
The solution is to create thousands of self-sufficient, sustainable Farmsteads in the rural fringes of cities and smaller communities. These farmsteads are modeled from lessons learned about Mondragon Cooperative Corporation, Spain. We call these farmsteads, "Eco-Campuses".