BIAG, The New Agriculture
I created the new blog, BIAG, early today, 11 April 2016, dedicated to, of course, The New Agriculture. (But I have uploaded to it some of my earlier essays that are pertinent to my concept of The New Agriculture.)
Before I tell you what it is, first, let me tell you what it is not.
The term The New Agriculture is in fact not new; it is at least 52 years old, dating from the 1963 talk of Earl Coke at the 12th Annual Meeting, Agricultural Research Institute in 1963; he was then Vice President of Bank of America (books.google.com). But The New Agriculture I'm thinking of is not as Cooke put it:
What is The New Agriculture? It is the agriculture in which a few produce for the many. It is that relatively small proportion of our farms that produce most of the agricultural products sold in our markets. It is the agriculture that reduces the numerical number of farms by melting them into larger, more efficient farms which are managed by men highly trained and skilled in the art and technology of agriculture.
"It is the agriculture in which a few produce for the many." That is industrial agriculture. This is what we have in the US and in Europe and other developed countries. This is not The New Agriculture I want to talk about. I'm thinking of an agriculture where the many produce for the many, and the many all become rich farmers. Is that too much to ask? Yes, but to aim for less is to deny justice to others. In this new agriculture, the many farms may be managed by a few for the many, but the owners are represented in the governing board of the corporation, which has absolute powers, not the President or CEO.
The New Agriculture I'm thinking of cannot simply be equated to The Ideal Soil as the soils experts know and practice it (soil.minerals.com). It has something to do with the soil but not The Ideal Soil that these guys are talking about, which they describe as "the perfect mineral prescription for your soil." Their slogan seems to be this: "A well-fed soil leads to well-fed crops and well-fed people and animals." The Ideal Soil is all about soil amendments, fertilizers. The claim is that of "the secrets of soil mineral balance that create ideal soil, plant and animal health," and that the "amazing results can be achieved by balancing the major cation minerals calcium, magnesium, potassium and sodium in the soil" that they say is "according to the teachings of Dr William Albrecht and Dr Carey Reams (that) have changed the world of agriculture." Medical doctor and chemist Reams came up with his Theory of Biological Ionization, which has something to do with the production of energy, but it's too complicated for me.
What I'm thinking as The New Agriculture has nothing to do with adding chemicals to the soil, or manually balancing them. I will leave it to Mother Nature.
In "A Manifesto for a New Agriculture," Graham Harvey & Colin Tudge plead for "sustained fertility, self-sufficiency, and flexibility" for British agriculture (August 2014, orfc.org.uk). They issued their "Manifesto" on the occasion of the 5th Anniversary of the Oxford Real Farming Conference on 06 January 2014; the Conference was launched in 2010 by Harvey, Tudge and Ruth West. I like it simpler.
And no, The New Agriculture I'm thinking of is not "carbon farming" as John Challen describes "the new agriculture" himself (futureag.info):
Carbon farming as a process that takes carbon dioxide out of the air though sustainable land management practices and transfers it into the soil’s organic matter pool in a form that doesn’t allow carbon to escape back into the atmosphere. Biomass-based no-till farming could be essential to our future.
I don't want to be discussing biomass in The New Agriculture I'm thinking of; it does touch on the carbon footprint of farmers but does not consider carbon dioxide as the major greenhouse gas. I'll tell you about it next time.
John Ikerd talks of "The New American Agricultural Revolution" (undated, web.missouri.edu). He says:
We are in the midst of crisis in American agriculture. The crisis, like the revolution, has been a quiet one. Thousands of farm families are being forced off the land, and we are being told that it is an inevitable consequence of technological progress. The only alternatives farmers are being offered is to get bigger, give in to corporate control, or get out.
This is the industrialization of agriculture. "But," says Ikerd, "industrialization is not inevitable, nor is it progress." He is clear:
There’s a better way to farm, a better way to produce food and fiber, and a better way to live. We are here to celebrate the birth and nurture the growth of that new kind of farming.
And he describes sustainable agriculture. The New Agriculture I'm thinking of is sustainable, but that's not where I start to explain it. It's much simpler. Actually, I already have given you the clue: Biag. Life is where I will begin to explain my new agriculture. Where does life begin in agriculture: seed, soil, or water? That's where I'm going to begin.
"The New Agriculture," says Allan Savory, "will need to embrace the best of the old (organic) and the modern (technological) ideas" (09 July 2010, Managing Wholes, managingwholes.com). Savory is the founder of the Center for Holistic Management in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA; he was the keynote speaker at the "The Agriculture Vision 2000 Conference – Sustaining the Agricultural Community in the New Millennium" on January 11, 2000 in Great Bend, Kansas.
In the end, Allan argues for carbon farming, which complicates my kind of agriculture. I don't want to be measuring my carbon footprint. I want my agriculture to be simpler.
But I like the idea of managing wholes (the name of the website I just cited) – that is holistic, and if anything, The New Agriculture I'm thinking of is holistic. You don't manage parts; instead you manage the whole, because the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
Allan says also, "While civilization is city-based by definition, it was made possible by the development of agriculture and can only be sustained by agriculture." That is how important agriculture is. Except that industrial agriculture has hijacked our agriculture and is now mainly sustaining itself, enriching the rich at the expense of the poor.
In my Bible of Agriculture, The New Agriculture must enrich the poor. So that the poor we will not always have with us!
(More in the next essay.)
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