[MalcolmV]

Thank you for your post Phebagirl.

Your concerns are valid. I share the philosophies of alternative agriculture but something about articles like this really get my goat. I distrust any fundamentalist dogma. Is it just me or does anyone else take issue with their self satisfied, holier than thou attitude?

I was one of the first members of the organic club at U of G, I've worked on organic farms. The people I know who are farming organically are great and don't proselytize. But this article helps me understand the people who say organic agriculture is evil.

Conventional farms could feed the world today. It's a distribution problem, there is enough food in the world. It's poverty that causes hunger, not lack of production. We will need to make massive changes as we powerdown, we should use what works. The realities of a market economy and a government cheap food policy have caused the industry to develop the way it has. Good small farmers are forced out of business because of the pressure to get big or get out.

If organic farms can have higher yields in the developed world why don't they? If they have higher economic yields conventional farmers would adopt those methods.

Organic farmers often choose lower yields, their economics favour a lower input/output model, and they don't want to push the biological system. Too many organic farms are "chicken manure" farms, really a conventional approach to agriculture with a different set of rules. They truck in their nitrogen. It's not sustainable and they are dependent on conventional chicken farms.

To say that organic methods could triple sub-Sahara African yields is unfair. Any farming system would increase yield. Traditional methods have been lost and the conventional system has broken down. Low international commodity prices make it impossible for these farmers to purchase the inputs they once did. Yields are between 17 bu./ac (Sacks) and 25 bu./ac. IITA US now averages 150 bu./ac.

The best organic farms are dairy farms. They produce their nitrogen with the alfalfa crop and market it through the cows. Organic cash cropping is a more difficult proposition, although interesting work is being done with living mulches. You don't have to be an organic farmer to recycle on-farm nutrients. The University of Manitoba is doing work on low input agriculture, optimizing plant protection products and fertilizers for sustainability.

What does recycling nutrients in integrated agriculture systems have to do with not growing GMOs? Having corn and potato produce their own BT seems the low input way to go. I guess I object to having this bundle of technologies tied up with a piece of ribbon and held up as the be all to end all.

One reference to Jevons give his yields with bio-intensive methods as; 2 100 ft.sq. beds produce one loaf of bread per week. That works out to 140 bu./ac. or 100 bu./ac if we subtract the walkways. That is an excellent yield, 60 to 80 bu./ac would be a very good crop in Canada. In Holland average yields are 120 bu./ac., but that is with heavy N applications.

There is no magic bullet here, fu-fu dust doesn't increase yield. It's a matter of input/output. I'm assuming Jevons is irrigating and using alot of compost fertilizer. Sure, we could increase inputs and increase yields but irrigating corn isn't economic at $4.00 /bu. Being organic isn't going to solve the water crisis in the American SW. Trucking in chicken litter isn't sustainable.

I get tired of this "organic good", "conventional bad" assumption. Many consumers are choosing organic for the food safety issue. This seems self-centered to me. Organic agriculture was originally a biological design approach to the farm as organism, integrated into the biome and society. People who buy organic only because "our food is contaminated" are willing to buy at Wal-Mart and that is not sustainable.

We need good farmers who are moving toward sustainability. Whether they are conventional, organic, biodynamic or use permaculture is less important. Conventional agriculture talks about sustainability and stewardship, you don’t have to be organic to be a good farmer.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MalcolmV', 'C')onventional agriculture talks about sustainability and stewardship, you don’t have to be organic to be a good farmer.

[oswald622]

In the book Deep Economy, Bill McKibben cites research that claims that, yes, organic farming does produce greater yields per acre - because so much detailed care goes into tending the crops - but it requires much more human labor than industrial farming.

The argument that 'we're all gonna starve!' is a little overblown, in my opinion, for it relies on the argument that 'those lazy Americans, they'll never get their hands dirty!' Come on, that's transparent nonsense. There are plenty of people who do 'back-breaking' labor in other working class jobs, every day; and assuming that TSHTF, people are going to be without jobs and without anything better to do than to work on the farm.

Ever been to a farmer's market, where ordinary, non-professional farmers can put their produce on display? Those are places of abundance, and that's just a tiny percentage of the population getting involved.

Moreover, regarding the 'backbreaking' part, and the 'misery' that comes from sustained contact with nature - you are simply projecting your own morbid and unhappy psychology onto others. I come from an agricultural community and I know lots of people who've worked from sun-up to sun-down, in intense heat, since they were kids. And you know what? They are some of the happiest, best-adjusted people I have ever met.

Anecdotal evidence, yes - but do you suppose that mankind was profoundly unhappy before the tractor was invented, before we moved from the barnyard to Best Buy? Give me a break. All the evidence from anthropology, and from your own common sense, suggests that life was much more pleasant for the average person before we had to deal with all the psychic traumas of the industrialized world.

The only way these arguments hold any water, is if there is an overnight petrocollapse.

[NEOPO]

Good people with good intentions yet nonetheless brainwashed sheeple...

Ancient raised bed gardens

Ahh for one simple single second to believe that the way IT IS is not the way TPTB want it to be and that the way most people think is also not a product of the same system...

Totalitarian agriculture is not sustainable...

I believe the quote was something like "America's farmland is nothing more then a sponge we pour chemicals on"...

[denverdave]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('oswald622', '
')Anecdotal evidence, yes - but do you suppose that mankind was profoundly unhappy before the tractor was invented, before we moved from the barnyard to Best Buy? Give me a break. All the evidence from anthropology, and from your own common sense, suggests that life was much more pleasant for the average person before we had to deal with all the psychic traumas of the industrialized world.

[MalcolmV]

Ludi I thought I was going to take some flak for that post

I hear what you're saying, I think because you're doing it. It's the armchair Organic proponents that I have trouble listening to.

I was taking to agronomist at the co-op and he said he has seen conventionally managed soils in this area with soil organic matter from 6 to 0.8%. Organically managed soil do tend to have higher OM. That helps hold soil moisture. Organic crops do better in drought. We were just on the edge of drought here and you could see the soil variation across the fields in how twisted the corn was.

Nitrogen is going to be a big issue. I keep coming back to the traditional small farm model, with cattle to market the alfalfa through. Even Fukuoka brought in duck manure. When you grow green manure crops for biointensive compost doesn't that area have to be added in and lower yield /sq.ft.?

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MalcolmV', '.') When you grow green manure crops for biointensive compost doesn't that area have to be added in and lower yield /sq.ft.?

[killJOY]

Pheba, ludi, Heineken, etc.

I could weep that you're not my neighbors/

[Ludi]

Thank you, I wish we could be neighbors too! But, I might not work hard enough.... I still haven't figured out what is the "backbreaking" part of gardening.....

[Sys1]

This is the title from an article claiming that we don t need oil and gaz to feed the world. Anyone can argue about it please
Organic farming can feed the world

[Ludi]

http://peakoil.com/fortopic30659-0.html

[frankthetank]

I wonder how many years of current fertilizer use and oil used for transportation, planting, etc we have left? 100 years?

I guess a lot of it depend on us continuing to use gasoline to drive to our mailboxes.

[BastardSquad]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', '.')... I still haven't figured out what is the "backbreaking" part of gardening.....

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Omnitir', 'T')his makes me question the die-off mantra that PO will result in mass starvation as synthetic pesticides, herbicides, fertilisers and feed additives become unaffordable.

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('BastardSquad', ' ')I trueley believe "IF" Americans were to devote a large percentage of their lawn space to the production of biofuels there would be no impending crisis.

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Phebagirl', ' ')There is farmland in Iowa that is producing 200 bushels of corn per acre. That is phenomenal, and there is no way on earth that any organic farmer can get even 100 bushels per acre. (average corn yield before the green revolution was about 60 bushels per acre)

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Phebagirl', ' ')There is farmland in Iowa that is producing 200 bushels of corn per acre. That is phenomenal, and there is no way on earth that any organic farmer can get even 100 bushels per acre. (average corn yield before the green revolution was about 60 bushels per acre)

[MonteQuest]

EU, either you cannot read or you are being a troll.

I live in Arizona. I own a farm in Misssuori. I rent the farm to another farmer who works the land.

No-till minimizes top soil loss.

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SpringCreekFarm', 'I')'d like to start off by saying that I appreciate your intellectual ability Montequest, and your desire to share your knowledge here on the board. I cannot even begin to think of jumping in with my opinion. Having said that......

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', 'E')U, either you cannot read or you are being a troll.