From: lucky (216.18.0.155)
Subject: ok
Date: April 13, 2001 at 4:25 pm PST

In Reply to: lucky posted by danielle on April 12, 2001 at 8:00 pm:

thank you.

I've tried to explain it. the problem is land consumption, it takes huge amounts of land to raise food, most of it's for livestock, about a third of it's for human food. Crop growth deplete alot of nutrients from the ground. Within the next 2 centuries the soil will be depleted in the midwest. I learned that from an agronomy professor who teaches ag students,(I interviewed him for one of my classes). Yes, chemicals add into this too and are harmful and it's also acknowledged by agriculture and yes people have forced certain chemicals to be banned. Living in the midwest I see alot of barren streams that used to contain fish and other living things and don't because of many ag factors including chemicals. I will also say chemicals are bad for the underground streams too. Production techniques have been developed though that can change all of this and the best approach to fixing the problem is to push for crops to be grown in skysraper sized buildings as an example, and to push industry towards this. I understand your concern about corporate grown food completely, but our image of organic farms is merely just an image, it is merely less destructive then putting chemicals and gmo crops, but all in all it's displacing large amounts of natural life. Food is currently grown in greenhouses with nothing but water, and it uses water more efficiently then any farms. Centralized food production in buildings would cut energy usage drastically and would encourage high tech jobs for food. Each field that grows crops has tractors going over it at least 3 or 4 times during the year, etc, etc. We can push for new efficient techniques and try and help businesses that want to do this. It sounds far out and like a lost cause, but it is our only chance, it may take decades, but any technique that continues to use land in current form, will only hurt the wildlife and future generations of humans. I hate chemical usage and many other things about agriculture, but honestly the farmers hate it too and don't want to be working around them, but they want the money and jobs. If people will put themselves around this deadly stuff and destroy their own land and people continue to buy it knowing this, then it's not going to do me any good to protest about it. The people making the stuff know how destructive it is, but do it for money too, after all we know how bad nukes are, but we keep making them. I don't praise farmers when I'm around them and if I'm talking to them I don't hold back on my opinions, but they honestly think very similarly to me and much of the stuff on these site, they just want the money. So we aren't going to stop any of that, we can only undercut it by encouraging techniques that completely replace the current and outdated ag techiques we practice. My hope is that by at least encouraging it, someone in the right place will realize people want a different way for food to be grown and act on it. I hope this helps : )