Economic Associations
Around the world, approximately 70% of people rely directly or indirectly on agriculture as a form of employment. This is anywhere from subsistence farming, distributing, selling, modifying or marketing grown goods or produce. However, with an increase use of monocultures, we are putting more people in a vulnerable position. Monocultures, as mentioned before, are more susceptible to disease and pest disasters, and less viable to adapt to inconsistent weather patterns (likely to become more common with the rise of global warming).
As GMO’s become more common, and we lose plant diversity on farms themselves, and the ecosystem that the agricultural land inhabits changes. With new forms of technology, and the search to strengthen specific traits in crops (most notably yields) even place genetic diversity under threat. This means that as we deal with an increasingly unpredictable climate in the future, we are narrowing options by selective breeding, and losing traditional strains of fruits and vegetables. These new strains require high ‘synthetic fertilizer inputs’ and do not implement crop rotation. Crop rotation is critical to maintaining the quality of the topsoil, as some plants take certain elements and nutrients from the soil, and others replace them. And although synthetic fertilizers can help buffer that to a certain extent, it cannot replace organic matter. This homogenized system that continues to take hold is stripping land quality, which is essential to sustainable production, as well as maintaining what is left after this process of biodiversity.
As GMO’s become more common, and we lose plant diversity on farms themselves, and the ecosystem that the agricultural land inhabits changes. With new forms of technology, and the search to strengthen specific traits in crops (most notably yields) even place genetic diversity under threat. This means that as we deal with an increasingly unpredictable climate in the future, we are narrowing options by selective breeding, and losing traditional strains of fruits and vegetables. These new strains require high ‘synthetic fertilizer inputs’ and do not implement crop rotation. Crop rotation is critical to maintaining the quality of the topsoil, as some plants take certain elements and nutrients from the soil, and others replace them. And although synthetic fertilizers can help buffer that to a certain extent, it cannot replace organic matter. This homogenized system that continues to take hold is stripping land quality, which is essential to sustainable production, as well as maintaining what is left after this process of biodiversity.
We continue to lose valuable biodiversity in the Amazon and other diverse regions of the world, and can no longer allow wetlands to be drained, and land degradation to continue at the present rate in the name of profits through agricultural expansion. A large majority of the world relies on agriculture for their livelihood, and the rest of the growing population depend upon it on for survival. It is essential that we take the loss of biodiversity as serious natural resource depletion, and change our practices, and policies accordingly.