Farms that create habitat key to food security and biodiversity

Re:Farms that create habitat key to food security and biodiv... by spiderfarmer on Tuesday September 05, 2023 @07:52AM (#37390483)

That farm would be unable to exist without making documentaries, cook books, seminars and guided tours. I'm way more interested in what policies and changes can be used to nudge traditional farming into more sustainable (both financially and ecologically) practices as we need farmers that are able to make a living without becoming a marketing project.

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Re:Farms that create habitat key to food security and biodiv... by Ekaros on Tuesday September 05, 2023 @08:11AM (#37390615)

I always wonder about things like scaling and sustainability with these movements. Do we need to move some labour back to agriculture with changes they want? And were will the pay for those jobs come from? As surely they should be well paid jobs, right? Right?

So what will be the affordability at the end for food in general?

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Re:Farms that create habitat key to food security and biodiv... by spiderfarmer on Tuesday September 05, 2023 @08:16AM (#37390650)

Fruits and vegetables will still be affordable, as long as you don't value your time and are willing to limit yourself to a handful of varieties.

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Re:Farms that create habitat key to food security and biodiv... by onlyrealcuzzo on Tuesday September 05, 2023 @09:45AM (#37391558)

In the 1950s, the average household spent ~30% of after-tax income on food. It's down to ~12%.

Housing costs just went up to capture the excess "savings".

https://www.google.com/search?q=percentage+of+gdp+that+goes+...

The vast majority of people would rather eat crap and buy another toaster they don't need and add another bathroom to their house they'll hardly ever use then spend more money on quality food.

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Re:Farms that create habitat key to food security and biodiv... by cryptonector on Tuesday September 05, 2023 @12:17PM (#37393893)

Small farms can be sustainable as a business model, and I know some (namely, the ones I buy from at farmers' markets), but it's rough going.

Then again, all the few homesteaders I know have a person employed in big tech or fintech who makes the investment possible, but that investment can yield a homestead farm that can eventually run with very low income once it's set up. I also know people in rural Texas who truly manage to live on small farm business income, but if you measure the quality of their lives by consumption, it's not very high, though to be fair they typically don't want to consume a lot.

Anyways, I'm also interested in how to nudge big ag to do better with less pesticide and herbicide use. It's hard to scale up good small farm practices to large farms.

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