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Who Sucks Energy: Conventional or Organic Farming?
Samuel Fromartz, Chews Wise
The London Telegraph dutifully reported the results of a study by the Manchester Business School, comparing energy use in organic and conventional farming systems. In a life cycle assessment – farm to fork – it found that many organic crops use more energy.
The energy needed to grow organic tomatoes is 1.9 times that of conventional methods, the study found. Organic milk requires 80 per cent more land to produce than conventional milk and creates 20 per cent more carbon dioxide, it says.
One note of caution: this was a government commissioned study, not one published in a peer reviewed journal. One of the longest-running studies comparing conventional and organic ag methods was published in Science in 2002. This Swiss study compared organic and conventional farming systems over 22 years and it found that organic farming used dramatically less energy. Why? Because one-third of the energy in agriculture goes into the production of pesticides and fertilzers.
(20 Feb 2007)
The Social Cost of Monoculture
Agroblogger
Monoculture is often attacked from an ecological perspective: it causes the buildup of pests and diseases, it depletes the soil, it requires intensive chemical inputs. Granted, these realities have serious social consequences, but monoculture has a more immediate and often unrecognized impact on labor relations, particularly in the Third World.
(16 Feb 2007)
Winter Harvesting
Bruce Darrell, Food Urbanism
…Establishing year round local food systems in Toronto would be difficult, though possible, but in Dublin I have found it to be much easier. I am still amazed at the diversity of vegetables that I can harvest fresh from my allotment every month of the year.
Of course parsnips are the king of winter vegetables, becoming sweeter after a few hard frosts, and providing the ground is not frozen or waterlogged, they are content to stay in the ground until needed. Celeriac, winter radish, scorzonera and salsify, though not traditionally part of the Irish diet, will easily wait out the Irish winter in the place where they grew. It is also best to leave Jerusalem artichoke, or more accurately the sunroot, buried until needed. Add the roots and tubers traditionally stored in the shed or cellar, including potatoes (the staple of the Irish diet), swedes (referred to as rutabaga in North America but which the Irish insist on calling turnips), beetroot (the most noble of all vegetables) and the humble soup carrots, and you have a feast readily available throughout the cold months and into the spring.
(25 Feb 2007)
Healthy Life from Healthy Soil
Scott A. Meister, Permaculture Visions
When we enter debates on human health, it’s easy to get caught up in discussions of diet, excercise, sleeping habits, modern medicine and lifestyle, but few people stop to consider or realise how our good health is dependent upon the very ground that lies underneath our feet. Furthermore, few people have stopped to ponder the life cycles that interact with each other both above and below the ground.
…There are many things that contribute to the productivity of a soil. Age, place, climate, topography, physical and chemical structure, existing biota and plant-life, pH, etc.
To understand how all the pieces fit together would take a book the size of my Grandmother’s ancient German Bible, and quite frankly, there have been many complicated books written on the subject already, as well as whole university courses taught on the subject. Therefore, I will not go into all the gruesome details here, however, I will go into the basics, so that we, the people involved with permaculture, can design a landscape around us to get the most out of our environment and our soil.
(25 Feb 2007)
