UK - Diversity will 'maintain sustainable world farming system'
20 Jan 2010
PLANET Earth is perfectly capable of feeding the projected nine billion people that will inhabit it by 2050 – provided the correct environmental rules are obeyed.
That was basically the message at the rival Oxford Real Farming Conference – or Oxford Fringe – held in the Old Library of the University Church during the afternoon of the OFC's first day.
The controversial event was staged, without liaison with the OFC, by farming author Graham Harvey, from Exmoor and biologist and writer Colin Tudge, from Oxford. An audience of nearly 70 packed into the hall to hear the event's chairman, Sir Crispin Tickell, say the Fringe offered an alternative to the conventional wisdom offered by the OFC, though it should not be seen as a rebel meeting, but "telling the story in another way". Sir Crispin said: "We are not saying what the people over the road are saying is wrong – just that there are other ways of thinking about the issues."
Just as the core event began with three speakers, so too did the Fringe.
Everyone in the world could be fed to the highest standards of nutrition, insisted Mr Tudge, the first speaker.
"Over the last 30 years we have seen the dissolution of British agriculture, so we start from a very low base," he said.
"It ought to be quite straightforward, but the reason we have failed miserably is entirely about farming methods. And I don't think it's in the power of those over the road to be able to do anything."
As a founder of the Campaign for Real Farming he said he knew the issues came down to three questions: do we want to feed everyone well, or just some; what is the answer to feeding everyone; and how much food needs to be produced for other creatures?
"It's absolutely wicked if we don't try," he stressed. Natural polyculture translated into mixed farming, focusing on plants and leaving enough land for livestock. If you farm in that way you finish up with plenty of plants, not much meat, but lots of variety," he explained. "Farming well will be absolutely compatible with good nutrition and the finest gastronomy. And we could be self reliant on food in this country."
Mr Tudge spoke about an established system that promoted monocultures and insisted that "normal business models would allow people to farm in a proper way."
Professor Martin Wolfe, of the Organic Research Centre, said GM foods aided the monoculture system and because of a lack of evolution could harbour serious problems.
"The more diversity you have the better chance there is for a good, sustainable system," he stressed, going on to explain that in trials mixtures of three different varieties of winter wheat had provided a much steadier yield.
He said: "We need to re-integrate agriculture into the natural world."
Mankind could be facing a global food crisis if it did not take action soon, warned the third speaker, Patrick Holden, the director of the Soil Association. The threats to food security needed to be faced, with a return to the rotation of crops used by farms up to around 1950.
"Industrialisation and rationalisation of production systems are challenging small family farm businesses, but we are on the edge of an enormous journey of change," he asserted.
"Will it be possible to wake up all the people involved? Feeding people should be easy, but because of what has happened in farming in the past 60 years it won't be. We have failed to create an informed public debate about how extremely serious the situation really is – because we need those radical changes within 20 years
Source: westernmorningnews.co.uk
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