In my mind the beauty of a farming enterprise is that we can, with some cultivation and manipulation, use a natural process that accumulates organic material and energy in to a biological community that we then can access to meet our needs. The natural relationships that exist between sun, soil, plant, and biological organisms, are the basis for a sustainable farm. There is some transportation and loss of biomass and energy, but the natural process is the ultimate example of efficiency.
Problems arise for us as we tend not to see ourselves fitting into the food web that is available in a particular region, or if considering commercial endeavor the need to produce salable products for viable markets, we institute a system that breaks up the natural relationships, and is designed to deliver products to outside consumers.
There is an assumption that as farmers we should be thinking about the rest of our culture, and their needs for the items that we can produce, but I see this as a bill of goods we have been sold to get us to mine the energy and nutrients out of our ecosystems. The reality is that even when you are grazing beef to sell, you are in fact managing an ecosystem that supports the flow of energy to those beeves. Energy will flow to the animals regardless of the residual balance of productivity asset.
The challenge that we face is learning how the manage our demand on the ecosystem so that we can accumulate biomass and energy into a site in surplus of our need to harvest. This is a really huge challenge in the face of incredibly depleted soil systems, and the largest demand from human consumers that the Earth has ever had to meet.
Agriculture is a bundle of land-use and animal husbandry practices that are not limited in their validity by scale, or commercial intent. Although there is a certain efficiency with the use of large tracts, it by no means is the defining measure of effectiveness of producing food.
I’m not sure what we can do to reverse the trend to subdivide land into smaller lots, but I do know that people who find themselves trying to respond to their need for good food by farming small tracts of land are going to be a big part of any successful future. Community scale composting will be a great way for groups of people to recapture nutrients and energy and return them to the soil to support community food production systems.
I understand the drive for people to cast themselves as farmers, those hardy individuals who wake early and engage in the activities of working earth and animals all day, every day, but this image can be, and probably will be, an impediment to growing a vital food system.
We are losing parcels that can be used for large-scale production. In some areas like Vermont, our landscape doesn’t offer much opportunity for such farms. And we have a populace with varied life experiences, and career interests. So opening our definition of “farming” to include all facets of the experience is, in my mind, one of the first steps to reclaiming our farming culture.
Probably a big turning point will be when prices are more dramatic, but I also know that people are beginning to understand that food is not a widget, produced by a mindless mechanical process. People are realizing that they yearn for the relationships that real food represents, to people (family who share it, and community that desires it, or produces it), to living organisms, to Earth, and to personal satisfaction from sensory experience.
There is a lot of talk about lowering energy consumption, reducing carbon foot prints, etc., but the real sea-change will occur, in my mind, when people reclaim a human relationship to food, and realize that there is only a limited number of ways to get that. A major component to that will be a revival of the agricultural community, in other words everyone in the community realizing the role they play in our food web, from the way they use their land, to the way they manage their nutrient stream, to the food products they consume.
I don’t mean that I think it will happen any time soon. I do see seeds of hope though. There is a growing consciousness, and I think that it is the basis for a successful future.
I also think that we are at an end to the reflex application of agriculture. We have run the gambit from scratching the soil to grow a few grains to the mechanical production of food widgets. We are faced with the realization that growing food does work simply by repeating customs, but without thought, or understanding, it can turn into devastation and depletion. I really think that we are headed for a new cultural understanding of farming, not only because I think we need to, but because it is a logical adaptation of a failing system.
Not to over emphasize my own point, I really believe after years of practice, that “farming”, is a bundle of land-use and animal husbandry practices that are not dependent on scale to be validated.
If you want to use those practices to make commercial, or economic profit then so be it, but I have been farming between pasture, hay, gardens, and woodland, nearly 200 acres for twenty-two years with as much emphasis on developing a functional land-base and infrastructure as any inclination toward financial profit.
I take my profit in the early morning twilight watching the ravens tumble in the sky over my barn, in the smell and feel of soil on my hands, in the bright eyes and smiling faces of my kids and wife when they are there working with me, and in the notion that I have been accruing significant assets in material, equipment, skill, and in productivity that I can pass on to those who will need that more than any money I could have saved in the bank. I keep as much of my “surplus” as possible by rolling it back into the operation. Our farmers marketing, and milk, egg, and meat sales are really only ways for us to engage with our community.
People are always saying, “but you and Lisa both make incomes from off the farm”, and that is true. So what, we still are supported in our off farm work by the on farm work we do to feed and provide for ourselves, and it is our own decision how we want to use our land as a farm. I see no reason to off-load energy and nutrients, plus my own ingenuity and physical effort, to an unappreciative public, losing money, just to say, “I’m farming”.
Farming like the future mattered, I see my farm feeding five families. Not only will it feed them, but it will employ a good portion of them, and it will give them a safe place to live, play, and learn. Farming is not an economic process unless you chose it to be. As long as we perpetuate that concept we will limit the degree to which we reclaim an agricultural community, and we will continue to under-utilize and under-value our land and environment.
Carl
I watch each horse bob their head,