Sustainable Agriculture

Sustainable Agriculture - National Geographic

Sun, 25 Sep 2011 16:54:00 -0400

Sustainable Agriculture - National Geographic:

Just want to share a basic short and sweet article on sustainable agriculture from National Geographic. (Click title)

Sustainable Development: Balancing Between Environment, Economy, and Society

Sun, 25 Sep 2011 16:47:00 -0400

Now, before I go into posting any more about agriculture, I would like to take a step back and share with you the definition of Sustainable Development (SD). The field of sustainable development can be conceptually broken into three constituent parts: environmental sustainability, economic sustainability and sociopolitical sustainability.

In 1987, the United Nations released the Brundtland Report, which included what is now one of the most widely recognized definitions:

“Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It contains within it two key concepts:

the concept of ‘needs’, in particular the essential needs of the world’s poor, to which overriding priority should be given; and
the idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social organization on the environment’s ability to meet present and future needs.”

Now we are ready to apply this practice to agriculture, and many other things. With agriculture though, the focus is more on ecology, the study of relationships between organisms and their environment. It’s not to say that we haven’t learned anything about agriculture and ecology, but I do believe there is a lot more to be discovered.

Who I am and why I believe in sustainable agriculture

Fri, 23 Sep 2011 23:30:00 -0400

Hello Everybody,

In my first blog post I would like to start off by expressing my thought’s and interests on Sustainable Agriculture.

To be honest, I’ve only recently gained an interest in agriculture. I’ve never had an interest in anything rural. So, I ran to the city looking for prosper. Here I am though, left feeling empty handed. There’s only so much I can do now, but I’ve come to a point in my life where I no longer wish to consume, and take. I realize what is important to me now, and how I wish to contribute.

I believe that it’s important for all of us to recognize what negative impacts we are leaving behind to our future generations. What we as a species are leaving behind. I feel like we can do much better, and I feel like they deserve more. I don’t want to see us become like ants. (No offense ants) Working towards being more self sufficient can be a great feeling. I’m finding it to be the key to my humanity.

I feel like the reason I got into Sustainable Agriculture is because food is the most basic human need - for us to start creating a better world for future generations, we need to start finding better, progressive ways of sustainable living. Which we already are: Solar power, wind power, wave power, bio ect. These are great things! We have it, we just need to work towards making the transition. Agriculture should do the same.

The industrialization of agriculture brought about many great things I’m sure you know, but slowly did we realize we were bleaching the hair of the land, annually contaminating soil and water. The good news is. Over the past two decades new sustainable farms have been growing, along with many making the transition.