The Earthscan Reader in Sustainable Agriculture The Earthscan Reader in Sustainable Agriculture Edited by Jules Pretty London • Sterling, VA First published by Earthscan in the UK and USA in 2005 Copyright © Jules Pretty All rights reserved ISBN-13: 978-1-844072-36-1 paperback ISBN-10: 1-84407-236-3 paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-844072-35-4 hardback ISBN-10: 1-84407-235-5 hardback Typesetting by Composition and Design Services Printed and bound in the UK by Bath Press, Bath Cover design by Andrew Corbett For a full list of publications please contact: Earthscan 8–12 Camden High Street London, NW1 0JH, UK Tel: +44 (0)20 7387 8558 Fax: +44 (0)20 7387 8998 Email: [email protected] Web: www.earthscan.co.uk 22883 Quicksilver Drive, Sterling, VA 20166-2012, USA Earthscan is an imprint of James & James (Science Publishers) Ltd and publishes in association with the International Institute for Environment and Development A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The Earthscan reader in sustainable agriculture / edited by Jules Pretty. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 1-84407-235-5 (pbk.) – ISBN 1-84 407-236-3 (hardback) 1. Sustainable agriculture. 2. Agriculture–Social aspects. 3. Agricultural ecology. I. Pretty, Jules N. S494.5.S86E27 2005 631.5’8–dc22 2005011046 Printed on elemental chlorine-free paper Contents About the Authors viii Chapter Sources xvii List of Acronyms and Abbreviations xx Part 1 Agrarian and Rural Perspectives Introduction to Part 1: Agrarian and Rural Perspectives Jules Pretty 3 1 The Post-War Task Albert Howard 7 2 Thinking Like a Mountain Aldo Leopold 10 3 The Unsettling of America Wendell Berry 12 4 Ecological Literacy David Orr 21 5 An Amish Perspective David Kline 30 6 Becoming Native to this Place Wes Jackson 35 7 Creating Social Capital Cornelia Butler Flora and Jan L. Flora 39 Part 2 Agroecological Perspectives Introduction to Part 2: Agroecological Perspectives Jules Pretty 49 8 Reality Cheques Jules Pretty 51 9 The External Costs of Agricultural Production in the United States Erin M. Tegtmeier and Michael D. Duffy 64 vi The Earthscan Reader in Sustainable Agriculture 10 From Pesticides to People: Improving Ecosystem Health in the Northern Andes Stephen Sherwood, Donald Cole, Charles Crissman and Myriam Paredes 90 11 Agroecology and Agroecosystems Stephen R. Gliessman 104 12 The Doubly Green Revolution Gordon Conway 115 Part 3 Social Perspectives Introduction to Part 3: Social Perspectives Jules Pretty 131 13 Reversals, Institutions and Change Robert Chambers 135 14 The Hawkesbury Experience: Tales from a Road Less Travelled Richard Bawden 148 15 Social Capital and the Collective Management of Resources Jules Pretty 173 16 Gateway to the Global Garden: Beta/Gamma Science for Dealing with Ecological Rationality Niels Röling 179 17 Ecological Basis for Low-toxicity Integrated Pest Management (IPM) in Rice Kevin Gallagher, Peter Ooi, Tom Mew, Emer Borromeo, Peter Kenmore and Jan-Willem Ketelaar 206 Part 4 Perspectives from Industrialized Countries Introduction to Part 4: Perspectives from Industrialized Countries Jules Pretty 223 18 Landscapes Lost and Found Jules Pretty 225 19 The Farm as Natural Habitat Dana L. Jackson 249 20 Diet and Health: Diseases and Food Tim Lang and Michael Heasman 261 21 Coming in to the Foodshed Jack Kloppenburg, Jr, John Hendrickson and G. W. Stevenson 304 Part 5 Perspectives from Developing Countries Introduction to Part 5: Perspectives from Developing Countries Jules Pretty 317 22 Rethinking Agriculture For New Opportunities Erick Fernandes, Alice Pell and Norman Uphoff 321 Contents vii 23 Soil Recuperation in Central America: How Innovation was Sustained after Project Intervention Roland Bunch and Gabinò López 341 24 Sustainable Rural Life and Agroecology, Santa Catarina State, Brazil Sergio Pinheiro 352 25 Lessons of Cuban Resistance Peter Rosset and Martin Bourque 362 26 Benefits from Agroforestry in Africa, with Examples from Kenya and Zambia Pedro A. Sanchez 368 27 Reducing Food Poverty by Increasing Agricultural Sustainability in Developing Countries Jules Pretty, James Morison and Rachel Hine 375 Index 399 About the Authors Richard Bawden is currently a visiting distinguished university professor at Michigan State University; a position he assumed in 2000 following a long career at the University of Western Sydney Hawkesbury and earlier positions at the University of New England, with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in Uruguay, and in the research divi- sion of Boots Pure Drug Company in England. He was Dean of Agriculture and Rural Development at Hawkesbury from 1978–1994, was appointed professor of Systemic Development in 1988 and was foundation director of the Centre for Systemic Develop- ment there from 1996 until his retirement in 1999. He has been a visiting professor at Cornell and Rutgers universities in the US, the Open University in England and Natal University in South Africa. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Wendell Berry is the author of more than 40 books of essays, poetry and novels. He has worked a farm in Henry County, Kentucky since 1965. He is a former professor of Eng- lish at the University of Kentucky, and a past fellow of both the Guggenheim Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation. He has received numerous awards for his work, includ- ing an award from the National Institute and Academy of Arts and Letters in 1971, and most recently, the T. S. Eliot Award. ‘My work has been motivated’, Wendell Berry has written, ‘by a desire to make myself responsibly at home in this world and in my native and chosen place’. Wendell Berry’s books of essays include: The Unsettling of America: Culture and Agriculture; The Gift of Good Land: Further Essays Cultural and Agricultural; Home Economics; Another Turn of the Crank; Citizenship Papers, Life is a Miracle: An Essay Against Modern Superstition; A Continuous Harmony: Essays Cultural and Agricultural; The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays of Wendell Berry; A Place on Earth; Sex, Economy, Freedom and Community: Eight Essays; and What Are People For? Emer Borromeo is at the Philippine Rice Research Institute, and formerly was of the Plant Protection Department, International Rice Research Institute, Los Banos, the Phil- ippines. Martin Bourque is executive director of the Ecology Center in Berkeley, California, and at the time he wrote Chapter 25 he was programme coordinator at the Institute for Food and Development Policy Oakland, California, also known as Food First. He has an MA in Latin American Studies from the University of California at Berkeley. Roland Bunch has worked at the grass roots in agricultural development for 37 years. He has been a pioneer in participatory technology development, farmer-to-farmer About the Authors ix extension and the use of green manure/cover crops, which were described in his book, Two Ears of Corn. The book has now been published in ten languages, with multiple printings in five of them. He is presently the Coordinator for Sustainable Agriculture for World Neighbors and a member of the United Nation’s Hunger Task Force, which was commissioned by Kofi Annan to plan how the world can reach the Millennium Devel- opment Goal of halving the number of hungry people in the world by the year 2015. Robert Chambers is a research associate of the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex, UK. His development work has been mainly in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, in rural administration, training, research, consultancy and writing. His areas of interest have included management, professionalism, perceptions and realities of poverty and livelihoods, and scientific and participatory procedures and methodolo- gies. He is currently working on ideas for use in development, on power and participa- tory approaches and methods, and on personal and institutional learning and change. Donald Cole trained as a physician at the University of Toronto (1978). He then prac- tised primary care, public health, occupational health and environmental health in a vari- ety of settings in Canada and developing countries. In a community medicine residency at McMaster University he completed a Masters in Design, Measurement and Evalua- tion of Health Services (1991), and went on to quality as a Royal College fellow in Occu- pational Medicine (1990) and Community Medicine (1992). A Tri-Council Eco-Research fellowship in environmental epidemiology and the role of Interim Director of Research followed by senior scientist at the Institute for Work and Health fostered his focus on research. As a tenured associate professor of Public Health Sciences at the University of Toronto and Associate Programme Director for the Community Health and Epidemiol- ogy field of the Masters in Health Science Programme, he currently teaches, mentors, does research and contributes research evidence to public health practice both in Canada and internationally. Gordon Conway was appointed Chief Scientific Adviser to the Department for Inter- national Development at the end of 2004. He also holds the title of professor of Inter- national Development at Imperial College, London. Prior to that he was President of The Rockefeller Foundation from 1998–2004. He was Vice-Chancellor of the Univer- sity of Sussex and Chair of the Institute for Development Studies from 1992–1998, and Representative of the Ford Foundation in New Delhi from 1988–1992. He has authored The Doubly Green Revolution: Food for all in the 21st Century (Penguin and University Press, Cornell) and Islamophobia: A Challenge for us All (The Runnymede Trust). Charles Crissman is an agricultural economist with 20 years experience in farm level research in Asia, Africa and Latin America. During the time of the research reported here, he was head of the International Potato Center (CIP) office in Ecuador and the coordi- nator of the pesticide research programme.