The Emergent Agriculture

Farming, Sustainability and the Return of the Local Economy

Gary Kleppel

• Publisher: New Society Publishers
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781550925777
• Topic: Technology & Engineering
• Subtopic: Sustainable Agriculture
• Index: Technology & Engineering

Long embraced by corporations who are driven only by the desire for profit, industrial agriculture wastes precious resources and spews millions of tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere each year, exacerbating climate change and threatening the very earth and water on which we depend. However, this dominant system, from which Americans obtain most of their food, is being slowly supplanted by a new paradigm.

The Emergent Agriculture is a collection of fourteen thematic essays on sustainability viewed through the lens of farming. Arguing that industrial food production is incompatible with the realities of nature, science, and ethics, this lyrical narrative makes the case for a locally based food system which is:

• Stable in the face of economic uncertainty
• Resilient in the face of environmental variability
• Grounded in stewardship of the land, on attaching value to food and the craft involved in producing it, and on respecting the dignity of farmers, consumer,s and livestock

A revolution in food production is underway. Written from the vantage point of an ecologist who is also a farmer, The Emergent Agriculture is essential reading for anyone interested in food security and the potential for growing local economies. Food for thought about the future of food.

Gary Kleppel is a professor of biology at the SUNY Albany, where he focuses on sustainable agriculture, conservation-based grazing, and the ecology of human-dominated landscapes. He and his wife Pam are owners of Longfield Farm, where they produce grass-fed lamb, wool, free range chickens and eggs, and artisanal breads.

PART II

Sustainability

MJ JESSEN

4

Toward a Sustainable Agriculture

SUSTAINABILITY MEANS, LITERALLY, THE CAPACITY TO ENDURE. To many, the word connotes environmental protection, conservation, or some approach to development that is environmentally benign. A former director of the Columbia, South Carolina Planning Department claimed that sustainable development is a contradiction in terms. “How can you develop and not cut down trees?” His lack of understanding is not atypical. The mistake is in equating conservation with sustainability. They are related, to be sure, but they are not the same thing. So what is sustainability? What gives one the capacity to endure?

Actually, sustainability implies behavior — that people behave in ways that ensure the capacity to endure. The 1987 Brundtland Commission Report on Sustainable Development to the UN proposed the following definition: Sustainability “…means that we meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”¹ The commission’s report provided guidance to governments on how to promote economic development without sacrificing the long term integrity of their natural resources. Emergent from the Brundtland Report is a set of principles that focus on three fundamental elements of durable societies. They are: environmental stewardship, economic viability, and ethical behavior. These elements, when taken together — and only when taken together — are prescriptive of the long term survival and wise use of the ecosystems and social systems upon which our species depends. Sustainability is a set of behaviors, a way of thinking about how the present affects the future that leads simultaneously to environmentally, economically, and socially desirable outcomes. While it is questionable whether governments have paid attention to the Brundtland Report, it is apparent that many others — from individuals to corporations — have.

The word sustainability is widely used today, so much so that some feel it has become a buzz-word, a marketing strategy, a form of green washing. As a supporter of the PBS News Hour, for instance, the Monsanto Corporation proclaims its dedication to sustainable agriculture. Make of that what you will. My take is that corporations such as Monsanto would not lay claim to sustainable practices if they felt that sustainability was unimportant or if they felt that the market was uninterested in the concept. The drive to survive, to endure, is in our DNA. In one way or another, it is in the DNA of all species. The difference between us and other species is that we can predict the end game. We have the capacity to understand where our lifestyles lead. The question is whether or not we will pay attention.

Nowhere are there better examples of sustainability, and unsustainability, than in agriculture. By examining sustainability through the lens of agriculture one gains a deeper appreciation of its meaning and of its critical importance.

A few years ago my friend Jim Hayes, from Sap Bush Hollow Farm, was talking to one of my classes about his concept of farming. “The industry,” he said, “has a single bottom line — profitability. I have three bottom lines: Profitability, for sure. My farm won’t survive if I’m not profitable. My second bottom line is to take care of the ecosystems — the streams, the grass, the soil — that provide the resources I need to farm the land. And my third bottom line is to treat my livestock ethically and with respect. When you, as a consumer, have to pay a little more to buy my meat, it’s because you are accepting my triple bottom line.” That phrase, the triple bottom line, has become synonymous with sustainable agriculture.

Farming in and of itself is not inherently sustainable. Throughout history, dozens of cultures, from the Mesopotamians to the Mayans, have collapsed as a result of their agricultural practices. In modern times, the unviability of so many small and medium-sized farms and the current insecurity of our nation’s food supply are testimonials to the unsustainable nature of current agricultural practices. When thousands of people are sickened by hamburgers and spinach, when livestock are routinely abused, when the genomes of our most important crops are removed from the public domain by a few multinational corporations, agriculture clearly has no inherent claim to sustainability.

While sustainability arises from the conscious decisions of the farmer to adopt the principles engendered by the triple bottom line, there is no prescription for how to achieve it. Gaining organic certification, pasturing poultry, putting up solar panels — these are all worthwhile, but they are not definitive of sustainability. Above all else, the process must start and end with ethics. Sustainability does not arise from stewardship of the land but from an understanding of one’s ethical responsibility to be a steward of the land. When our first commitment is to ethical behavior we realize a deeper reason for our actions. Installing solar panels, rotating livestock and resting grazed pastures, replacing tractors with draft horses, adopting organic practices, saving seeds, using low and no-till planting techniques, and myriad other procedures, all speak to our recognized responsibilities toward the earth, its systems, and its residents.

PAM KLEPPEL

The decision to seek organic certification does not make an operation more sustainable unless the farmer understands the underlying ethic of organic farming. Thousands of acres of industrially-managed vegetable monocultures owned by enormous corporations are officially designated “USDA Organic.” The very fact that they are monocultures, however, violates a fundamental ecological principle — that diversity creates stability. The fossil fuel intensive harvesting, packaging, and distribution of the crop suggests a commitment to a system that is not sustainable, regardless of the label. Such operations are focused on the positive financial impact that the USDA Organic designation brings to the bottom line while ignoring the environmental responsibilities engendered by that label and, therefore, also ignoring the ethical values that must be brought to any sustainable process. As a result, many USDA Certified Organic farms fail to meet any meaningful criterion for sustainability, and they may actually threaten the long term viability of the organic farming movement.

Sustainability, therefore, is determined not by some government designation or label, but by one’s behavior, and the “footprint” that behavior leaves behind. When corporations limit our access to the process of producing food, and when they control the information that we get about that process, it is easy to attach labels — organic, free-range, pasture-raised, all-natural — and appear to have a legitimate claim to the “high ground.” Nature, however, distinguishes between labels and content. Content, not labels, determines our durability. Nature responds to actions, not promotions. If we’re abusing the land, if we’re abusing our livestock, if we do not respect farm workers, and if we treat the food they produce like commodities, we will not endure for long, regardless of what we call it.

Sustainability is a journey, not a destination. We can always do better. How hard we work at meeting sustainability goals is as important as achieving those goals. I once mentioned to Mark Kimball of Essex Farm that his approach to farming was the most sustainable I have seen. Mark’s response was that he thought Essex Farm to be about five percent sustainable; his wife, Kristin, felt they were only one percent there. But they continue to strive to do better. Sustainability is defined by our adherence to the ethic of farming and our striving to do better. That striving to do better, I believe, is the universal thread in the fabric of sustainability.

An old African proverb, related to us by Wangari Maathai (1940-2011), who won the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize for what the committee cited as “her contributions to sustainable development, democracy and peace,” drives home the point of my essay. Maathai was the first Kenyan woman to earn a PhD and to serve on a university faculty in her country. She understood the relationship between environmental stewardship and social equity, and she turned those concepts into realities. Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement, which paid women to plant trees to reforest the land. The Green Belt Movement has planted more than 30 million trees across Africa. As they planted trees, the women of Kenya gained dignity, and as they gained dignity they demanded and eventually were granted their civil rights.

Wangari Maathai told a story about a hummingbird and a forest fire.² While all the other animals of the forest watched the fire consume their home, a hummingbird flew to the river and filled its tiny beak with water, and then rushing to the forest, sprayed the water on the fire. The other animals chided, “You can’t put out that fire! You’re just a tiny hummingbird!” “But”, said the hummingbird, “I have to do something. And I’m doing the best that I can.” If the other animals were inspired by the hummingbird, they would save the forest. If not, their home would surely burn. Ultimately, Wangari Maathai never saw herself as a Nobel laureate, or the leader of a movement that would plant 30 million trees and achieve civil rights for women in the bargain. She never expected to “save the forest”. But she knew that she had to do something. And she did the best that she could. We need to be inspired by Wangari Maathai and by her story of the hummingbird. And if we are, we will understand sustainability, and perhaps we will save our home.

PAM KLEPPEL

---

I dislike the thought that some animal has been made miserable to feed me. If I am going to eat meat, I want it to be from an animal that has lived a pleasant, uncrowded life outdoors, on bountiful pasture, with good water nearby and trees for shade.

— Wendell Berry, What are People For

---

5

Sustainable Meat — A Contradiction in Terms?

AMONG THE MOST COMPLEX AND CONTENTIOUS ISSUES surrounding the debate about what is sustainable and what is not, is the question of meat. Can it be produced sustainably? Should we eat it? As an overarching premise to guide this discussion, let me start with a simple statement: It’s about the process. The product we get from any agricultural system is a function of how it is produced. There seems to be a growing consensus that eating vegetables is a sustainable process and eating meat is not. I believe that this is incorrect. I will argue first, that no food — plant or animal — is in and of itself sustainable. Its connection to sustainability is a function of how it is produced, i.e. the degree to which the process is sustainable. My concern is that certain ideologues who abhor the consumption of meat, for any number of reasons — some of which are quite valid — have foisted on the public a suite of myths about meat production that is fundamentally wrong in its logic and does not move the debate forward in any positive way. I’ll address some of these myths with data later in this chapter. There are many good reasons why people should reduce and even eliminate meat from their diets. There is no need to make inaccurate arguments to promote that position.

Humans eat meat because we are omnivores. People in most cultures eat other animals — from insects to antelopes. We are designed to have some meat in our diets. However, a naked human running through the grass with a stick, 20,000 years ago, was not a great hunter. Even when hunting in groups, our ancestors rarely returned home with copious quantities of game. As such, meat became a special food — a communal food. Religious ritual frequently demanded a gift of meat to the deity. And in many societies, the violence associated with harvesting meat is redressed by some form of ethical or spiritual capitulation to the prey, the divinities, or both. To have meat — and a lot of it — was, and still is, a sign of social status. But, even today, most humans rarely get much meat on their plates. In 2012, global per capita meat consumption was less than four ounces per person per day.¹

Americans eat a lot more meat than that. In fact, at an estimated 276 pounds per person per year, we eat, on average, more meat per capita than the people of any other nation on earth except Luxembourg.² We consume three times more meat each day than the global average. Not only do we consume comparatively enormous amounts of meat, but, thanks to our industrial production system (which helps to make it abundant and cheap) much of the meat that Americans consume is not safe. For starters, meat produced from animals that spend the last four to six months of their lives in feedlots, where they are fattened on corn, are high in potentially artery-clogging, low density lipids (LDLs) and depleted of the more favorable high density lipids (HDLs).^{3, 4} Tissue levels of omega-3 fatty acids, the precursors of HDLs, decline exponentially over time when cattle in the industrial meat production system are moved from pasture to a feedlot.⁵ Ultimately, our culture of meat production and consumption is unethical to our livestock and unhealthy to ourselves. The public health and environmental consequences of such behaviors are well documented.

The processes of slaughtering livestock and butchering their carcasses are carefully regulated by state and federal governments (though the regulations are not always enforced). When “the kill” is performed properly, death comes quickly and with minimal pain. However, concern for the ethical treatment of farm animals at the moment of their death does not extend backward to their treatment while they are alive. In fact, the kill may be the most ethical part of the process. Economies of scale and the emphasis on maximizing yield allow the industry to justify sacrificing the humane treatment of livestock under the logic of efficiency.

It doesn’t take much to figure out when animals are stressed, however. It’s not rocket science. When hogs are packed so tightly in their pens that they are unable to lie down, they are not going to be happy. If the farmer is constantly administering antibiotics to his livestock, the animals are probably under pathogenic stress, and as the pathogens and parasites he seeks to control become resistant to those antibiotics, it is a certainty that the livestock will become stressed. If beak oblation is required to prevent the 250,000 “cage-free” bird...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Foreword
• Introduction — On the Cusp of a Revolution
• I. Farming: An Emerging Paradigm
• II. Sustainability
• III. The Local Economy
• IV. Conclusion
• Endnotes
• Index
• About the Author