Landscapes Lost and Found - Agri-culture: Reconnecting People, Land and Nature - page 11

this relationship. We cannot suddenly act as if we are separate. If we do
so, we simply recreate the wasteland inside of ourselves.
The world we see, through our window, or from space above, is shaped
by us. From a distance, it is, of course, larger than any obvious shaping.
But this is not our scale. Our scale is more local, though the effects are
often greater. What we see around us has been shaped by us. Agricultural
landscapes are obviously created, whether rice terraces upon an Asian
hillside, or prairie farms in the North American plains, or rolling
European patchwork fields. But even most 'natural' or 'wild' landscapes
are also creations of this interaction. Few forests are truly pristine
wildernesses. Most arise from some human shaping, even the Amazon
rainforests and the northern tundra. Strangely, most contemporary debates
on human-nature interactions focus on how nature has been shaped by
us, without fully accepting the second part of the equation: that we, too,
must be shaped by this connection, by nature itself.
We are also shaped by our systems of food production, as they, in turn,
shape nature, and rely upon its resources for success. We are affected by
what we know about these systems - whether we approve or disapprove,
whether the food system is local or distant. We are, of course, fund-
amentally shaped by the food itself. Without food, we are clearly nothing.
It is not a lifestyle add-on or a fashion statement. The choices we make
about food affect both us, intrinsically, and nature, extrinsically. We make
one set of choices, and we end up with a diet-related disease and a
damaged environment. We make another set, and we eat healthily, and
sustain nature through sustainable systems of food production. In truth,
it is not such a simple dichotomy as this. But once we accept the idea of
the fundamental nature of this connection, then we start to see options
for personal, collective and global recovery.
The connection is philosophical, spiritual and physical. We are buying
a system of production when we purchase its food. In effect, we eat the
view and consume the landscape. Clearly, the more we consume of one
thing, the more it is likely to be produced. But if the system of production
has negative side effects, and cares not about the resources upon which it
relies, then we have taken a path leading, ultimately, to disaster. On the
other hand, if our choices mean more food comes from systems of
agricultural production that increase the stock of nature, that improve the
environment while at the same time producing the food, then this is a
different path - a path towards sustainability. We must now shape this new
path. We will, by walking it, also change ourselves. We will adapt and
evolve, and new connections will be established.
Nature is amended and reshaped through our connections - both for
the bad and for the good. But I am worried, too, as the worst kind of