Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Developing countries
• Extensive, dispersed
• Undeveloped
• Unconfined housing
Developed countries
• Intensive, concentrated
• Developed, industrial
• Confined housing
Continuum of
mixed crop - animal
systems
- - > - - > - - >
Sustained biodiversity
<- - < - - < - -
2013
2050
2013
Fig. 18.3.
Convergence of the continuum of future sustainable mixed crop-animal farming systems with
appropriate development and implementation dependent on local resources and objectives in developing
and developed countries.
to more sustainable mixed plant-animal agro-
ecosystems during the next 50 years will require
enormous resolve, commitment and work. The
report by the NRC (2010) expert committee,
Toward Sustainable Agricultural Systems in the 21st
Century
, provides an analysis and conceptual
framework for a determinative set of objectives
and processes for re-orientation of agriculture in
the USA and other developed countries, and for
developing countries such as those in sub-Saharan
Africa. Transformational development will require
major investments of both social and economic/
financial resources by both the public and private
sectors, throughout the value chains of produc-
tion agriculture and the food industry.
The challenges and opportunities for ani-
mal agriculture particularly are emphasized in
the present chapter. The NRC (2010) report
emphasizes that agriculture and societies can
benefit greatly from major shifts in thinking and
practices towards extensive application of the
principles of sustainable agriculture. As noted in
the introduction of this chapter the committee
named four key imperatives that must be adopted
and actively pursued for an acceptable degree
of agriculture sustainability to be approached
and achieved in the future. In short, these four
imperatives are to provide a secure, safe supply
of food for people, to protect and enhance the
quality of the environment of the planet, to fos-
ter and support the economic viability, vitality
and profit of agriculture, and to enrich the qual-
ity of lives of people. The adoption of potentially
sustainable farming practices and (sub-) systems
must be assessed by how well they satisfy these
imperatives and other relevant societal objectives.
To be sustainable a practice or (sub-) system
must be sufficiently productive, robust (e.g. be
able to continue to meet sustainability goals
under various challenges), use resources effi-
ciently and effectively balance the four impera-
tives in socially acceptable ways. Doubtless,
progress toward sustainability of animal agri-
culture as part of mixed plant-animal systems
will require substantial shift in the visions
among most participants directly and indirectly
involved in agriculture and from society.
Significant intentional redirection and redeploy-
ment of investments in research, education and
outreach will be necessary. Also, as part of the
transformation process transparent communi-
cation and participation among farmers and all
in agriculture, the public and private sectors in
evaluation and demonstration of a variety of
potentially sustainable practices and farming
systems will be necessary and crucial.
The committee report advanced and dis-
cussed two main approaches to enhance pros-
pects for continuous improvement towards
sustainable performance of agriculture, includ-
ing animal agriculture: (i) incremental work to
find successive improvements of varying magni-
tudes, to increase quantity or enlarge value; and
(ii) a transformative approach for a major para-
digm shift (NRC, 2010). The incremental approach
(currently the main approach employed by
most federally and state-funded programmes
and projects, for example in the USA) focuses
