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Farming our way to starvation: Unsustainable food systems [1]

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Date: 2023-01-09  

Untenable food systems

Intense industrialization and resource extraction are found at every sector and level of our society, notably land and sea farming and land/sea management practices. These practices alone lead to dead soil and overfished seas; when combined with a warming planet, a potentially catastrophic mixture is made.

Over the past 20 years, as the world warmed, dust storms in the American West and Great Plains have become more prevalent, approaching the conditions of the 1920s that created the Dust Bowl. A study published by Advancing Earth and Space Science in Aug. 2020, “Dust Impacts of Rapid Agricultural Expansion on the Great Plains,” found that not only are dust storms increasing, but current agricultural practices and the expansion of the agriculture industry in the region contributed to this increase.

These practices are, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists (a national nonprofit of scientists advocating for a sustainable future), “monoculture (planting the same one or two crops over a large area year after year), raising crops and livestock in isolation from each other, and leaving farmland bare and vulnerable to erosion and nutrient loss between commercial crops.”

Ecosystem problems are global, not just local or regional. This past summer, English farmers faced massive crop failures. While the end-of-summer data hasn’t yet been released, in August, a report detailed an expectation of a 50% rate of crop failure. And Somalia, in the face of drought and conflict, is on the verge of famine due to the collapse of agriculture. 🧑‍🌾

RELATED STORY: Big environmental wins for 2022 prime the climate movement for even more success

Land farming isn’t the only food source where current unsustainable practices intersect with a warming planet to produce a collapsing system. The ocean ecosystem is experiencing increasing strain through a combination of overfishing and a warming ocean causing coral bleaching, seagrass die-off, and shrinking cold water habitats.

Global warming effects on the oceans

The heating of the ocean alone puts marine life at increasing risk of a mass extinction event. As oceans warm, oxygen is lost, and acidification increases as it stores more CO2. The largest mass extinction event in Earth's history, where 96% of ocean life and about 70% of land life was lost some 252 million years ago, was due to a naturally occurring global warming event that left an ocean where marine animals couldn’t breathe.

While we can still avoid that future, mass ocean life will die off, and overfishing leaves the ability of the ocean to be a dependable source of food in a precarious state. Oliver Milman, an environment reporter for The Guardian, reported that “At 2C of heating above the pre-industrial norm, which is forecast as likely even under current climate pledges by the world’s governments, around 4% of the roughly two million species in the oceans will be wiped out.”

Death by heat is happening to people and animals alike right now: in 2021 a heatwave killed an estimated 1 billion “sea creatures.” And just this year, a billion Alaskan snow crabs have disappeared due to warming oceans, shrinking their habitat. But warming weather isn’t the only reason for the billion missing snow crabs. The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have called for investigations into how overfishing and ocean floor raking of breeding grounds have affected snow crab populations.

RELATED STORY: COP27 talks leave us headed for a catastrophic temperature rise of 2.6-2.7 degrees C

A combination of overfishing of wild fish and unsustainable aquaculture or sea farming practices are putting additional strain on sea life, and when fish populations decrease in one place, countries move to other areas out of their territory to make up for it. Much has changed with seafood farming; today, most global seafood supply comes from aquaculture (aquaculture is the controlled farming of fish, sea plants, crustaceans, and other sea animals). Aaron McNevin, World Wild Fund for Nature’s (WWF) Global Network Lead for Aquaculture, spoke with Daily Kos about the state of aquaculture and fishing, saying that “Probably, 90% of aquaculture takes place in the developing or least-developed parts of the world and a large part of the wild-caught fishers that are lead by the developed world fleets. Aquaculture is really dominated by smallholder farmers across much of Asia, and Asia accounts for about 80% of aquaculture production.”

The international aspect of the industry makes it hard to regulate; because of this, McNevin notes the prevalence of chemicals and needing to make sure farms aren’t built “in the pathways of migratory species and marine mammals.”

Multinationals are the ones who run many of the wild captures, but also push aggressive fishing practices. Originating with whale hunting, industrial-level fishing rose throughout the 20th century, peaking in 1989. Now boats have to “fish down,” going deeper and deeper into the ocean, massively disrupting the ocean ecosystem. This removes fish that balance the ecosystem and destroys coral reefs and the ocean floor. This massive fishing also ends up ensnaring many other species into its nets, such as sharks, whales, and other endangered or threatened species. And these very same species are also losing sustenance because of overfishing, less algae, and fish in the sea are shrinking their habitats as much as warming oceans.

Regeneration is possible

But there is a solution to the land and sea farming practices currently ruining our environment, and this solution will help fight climate change, too. This solution is rooted in indigenous practices, not just with Native peoples in North America, but Mexico, South America, Australia, India, and more—a truly global practice—which we are now calling regenerative farming. Indigenous people are “less than 5% of the world's population,” yet they protect 80% of global biodiversity. It is more than a solution, it’s a change in how we engage ourselves as humans and with the environment around us.

Regenerative farming is a concept that has been increasingly popular; while a new practice to the United States and other Western nations, it’s an old practice that has the potential to transform Western nations. Richard Elm-Hill, a lead program officer from First Nations Development Institute, spoke with Daily Kos, saying that “modern regenerative farming practices are backing into this idea.” The idea that regenerative “is a term that has come to light as we look at farming in a more holistic way. But if you visit Native communities, they are rooted in this thinking; it's been in their worldview of why they do things. It’s not based on the best return, but you have whole societies built around food systems. Social wellbeing a lot of Native communities strive for, so their practices reflect that mindset.”

In effect, it is a transformation in how western societies engage with our food and food systems, and land by engaging in a practice humans have been doing for thousands of years. Regenerative practices can become a liberating force for all and a chance to reshape our societies radically. Sustainable agriculture and aquaculture might be similar in some of its technical practices with regenerative practices, but that’s where the similarities end.

Sustainable and regenerative intersections are in ending monoculture (where one crop is used on a plot of land) and instead adopting crop rotation methods, which keep the topsoil healthy. It’s embracing biodiversity and understanding these are interconnected systems—soil, water, animal life, and plant life. Sustainable farming, in fact, has a clear definition from the 1990 Farm Bill (Food, Agriculture, Conservation, and Trade Act of 1990): ”the term sustainable agriculture means an integrated system of plant and animal production practices having a site-specific application that will, over the long term:

satisfy human food and fiber needs;

enhance environmental quality and the natural resource base upon which the agricultural economy depends;

make the most efficient use of nonrenewable resources and on-farm resources and integrate, where appropriate, natural biological cycles and controls;

sustain the economic viability of farm operations; and

enhance the quality of life for farmers and society as a whole."

Janel Ohletz of the Durham County Center, which is part of the North Carolina Cooperative Extension, helping “transform science into everyday solutions,” distinguishes the differences between sustainable and regenerative agriculture. Sustainable agriculture “seeks to maintain and cease degradation of land, and regenerative agriculture seeks to restore land, promote soil health, and provide ecosystem services—the general principles are the same. Both focus on building resilience to climate change and bringing strength and vitality to the soil through soil health practices.”

The difference is subtle in concept but impactful in practice. Sustainable agriculture changes current practices to no longer be environmentally destructive but doesn’t aim to restore once flourishing ecosystems. It’s a more passive concept, where regenerative intentionally works to heal the ecosystem, not just to cease destroying the plot of land a farm is on.

Marco Hatch, an associate professor of Environmental Science at Western Washington University and a member of the Samish Indian Nation, works in the Pacific Northwest with regenerative clam gardens. He spoke about the systems at play in “eco-colonialism,” which highlights the interconnected ecosystem and why regenerative practices are so important. “Eco-colonialism is typically defined as extra territorial pollution impacting indigenous people in their practices. You can think of this as upstream from a tribal community there’s a large industrial facility dumping toxins into the water that are flowing to that reservation community.”

What does a regenerative sea garden look like? A focus on seagrass, clams, mussels, and oysters to start. McNevin notes that not only do seagrass gardens produce food and increase biodiversity, but it also sequesters carbon. How does oyster farming do this? According to Hatch, it’s all in how they’re constructed, saying, “A large rock wall is built with a low tide line that flattens out the beach, creating more habitat for clams.” The clams here also grow farther and denser per square mile.

Hatch notes the 3D structure of the wall, serving like a reef, with “little hidey holes for critters to live in. And a lot of those animals are also traditional food species. […] It’s a form of aquaculture that’s not targeting just one species, but diversity in the food system where we’re not shunning all the other species just to grow one individual species.” To accomplish this within the United States, it will take a change of mentality of American society.

Part two will explore what this mentality change must look like, and how these practices can be adopted.

This story was produced through the Daily Kos Emerging Fellows (DKEF) Program. Read more about DKEF (and meet the author, and other Emerging Fellows) here.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/1/9/2144826/-Farming-our-way-to-starvation-Unsustainable-food-systems

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