THURSDAY, JAN 26, 2023: NOTE TO FILE
Module 3-8
Whole Systems Approach
3.1. Systems of Sustainable Agriculture
Having provided the context and rationale for a regenerative form of agriculture, this section introduces (in no specific ranking order) the mainstream whole systems approaches to sustainable agriculture in order to appreciate the valuable contributions to this sector, some of which are subsequently expanded with examples:
- Permaculture: the application of design principles for a permanent (sustainable) form of agriculture, hence the word “perma-culture”, which is built upon a sound ethical foundation that considers the earth, people and distribution of resources.
- Organic Farming: an agricultural approach that does not do harm to an environment by avoiding chemical fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, fungicides in the manner that crops are cultivated, processed and packaged for consumers.
- Natural Farming: also known as “do nothing farming” is a closed loop system with minimal human input and that mimics nature with no fertilizers, no pesticides, no tillage and no weeding.
- Biodynamic: appreciates the farm terrain as a living membrane which breathes with the seasons, and which functioning can be enhanced by homeopathic-type dosages of unique plant preparations applied to the landscape and in compost making.
- Holistic Management: looks at the farm enterprise as a whole system and plans the integration of cultivation and grazing by mimicking how nature behaves, in particular, the herd and predator relationship.
- Agro-ecology: a term which embraces several approaches to sustainable agriculture which mimics the ecological processes in nature for application to agricultural production processes.
- Yeomans Scale of Permanence or the Keyline System: this approach outlines the sequence of design leading to a regenerative farm design.
- Regenerative Agriculture: this combines Permaculture design principles with Holistic Management to enhance a whole systems thinking approach for taking on a design process led by Yeomans Scale of Permanence.
- Syntropic Agriculture is an approach which focuses on establishing agroforestry in a rapid process that mimics nature’s growth by selecting specific mutually supporting plant guilds and through extensive initial pruning.
- Limited Till Farming: an approach that avoids the turning of soil such as tilling in order to minimize soil compaction, thereby enhancing the aeration, moisture penetration and humus building in soils.
- Conservation Agriculture: a form of agriculture that minimizes the disturbance of soils and uses some of nature’s elements to embed sustainability.
- Agroforestry: a land use management system in which trees or shrubs are grown around or among crops or pastureland in order to create more diverse, productive, ecologically sound and sustainable land-use systems.
- Carbon Farming: a regenerative approach to agriculture that reduces GHG emissions or captures and holds carbon in vegetation and soils through the design and management of landscape-based rainwater harvesting, plant guilds and livestock.
The above list is not exhaustive, but it does highlight the many initiatives to have evolved as sustainable solutions against the challenges of industrial systems of agriculture. It is beyond the scope of this Module to explore all of the above, but some of the most noteworthy approaches to sustainable agriculture are explored in more detail under this section and in later sections by way of examples and case studies.
[Critically assessing all claims by above would be exhasuting and as any points I might make if I did so would be dismissed (e.g. Alternative Farming), I would suggest anyone who might rather know than believe start with the Odum brothers as viewed by an historian of science. "'Potatoes Made of Oil': Eugene and Howard Odum and the Origins and Limits of American Agroecology." Telling stories that selectively cite 'science' as authority is not science.]
Module 3, lesson 9
