Reality Cheques - Agri-culture: Reconnecting People, Land and Nature - page 55

assets on which it relies for success. Agricultural systems at all levels rely
for their success on the value of services that flow from the total stock
of assets that they control, and five types of assets (natural, social, human,
physical and financial capital) are now recognized as being important. 4
Natural capital produces nature's goods and services, and comprises food
(both farmed and harvested or caught from the wild), wood and fibre;
water supply and regulation; treatment, assimilation and decomposition
of wastes; nutrient cycling and fixation; soil formation; biological control
of pests; climate regulation; wildlife habitats; storm protection and flood
control; carbon sequestration ; pollination; and recreation and leisure. Social
capital yields a flow of mutually beneficial collective action that contributes
to the cohesiveness of people in their societies. The social assets that
comprise social capital include norms, values and attitudes that predispose
people to cooperate; relations of trust, reciprocity and obligations; and
common rules and sanctions that are mutually agreed upon or handed
down. These are connected and structured in networks and groups.
Human capital is the total capability that resides in individuals, based
upon their stock of knowledge skills, health and nutrition. It is enhanced
by access to services that provide these, such as schools, medical services
and adult training. People's productivity is increased by their capacity to
interact with productive technologies and with other people. Leadership
and organizational skills are particularly important in making other
resources more valuable. Physical capital is the store of human-made material
resources, and comprises buildings, such as housing and factories, market
infrastructure, irrigation works, roads and bridges, tools and tractors,
communications, and energy and transportation systems. All of these
resources make labour more productive. Financial capital is more of an
accounting concept: it serves as a facilitating role, rather than as a source
of productivity in and of itself. It represents accumulated claims on goods
and services, built up through financial systems that gather savings and
issue credit, such as pensions, remittances, welfare payments, grants and
subsidies.
As agricultural systems shape the very assets upon which they rely for
inputs, a vital feedback loop occurs from outcomes to inputs. Donald
Worster's three principles for good farming capture this idea. Good
farming makes people healthier, promotes a more just society, and
preserves the Earth and its networks of life. He says: 'the need for a new
agriculture does not absolve us from the moral duty and common-sense advice to farm in
an ecologically rational way. Good farming protects the land, even when it uses it'. 5 Thus,
sustainable agricultural systems tend to have a positive effect on natural,
social and human capital, while unsustainable ones feed back to deplete
these assets, leaving less for future generations. For example, an agricultural