Crisis and Conflict in Agriculture

Crisis and Conflict in Agriculture PDF Author: Rami Zurayk
Publisher: CABI
ISBN: 1786393646
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 318

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Book Description
This volume sets out to explore the dialectic relating agriculture, crisis and conflict, and attempts to expand the knowledge on these interactions. Part 1 of the volume (chapters 1-6) discusses thematic issues and methodological approaches to understanding the intersection of agriculture, crisis and conflict. Part 2 (chapters 7-20) provides case studies that take a detailed approach to understanding agricultural contexts facing crisis and conflict, or the role played by agriculture within crisis and conflict. Studies are selected from areas that might be expected to feature in such a volume (the Middle East and North Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, South and Southeast Asia, and Latin America) as well as less obvious regions where conflict within agriculture refers not to widespread violence or wars but rather latent or simmering crisis (Central Asia and Europe). Crises stemming from politically-driven violence, natural disasters and climate change are covered, as well as competition over resources.

Crisis and Conflict in Agriculture

Crisis and Conflict in Agriculture PDF Author: Rami Zurayk
Publisher: CABI
ISBN: 1786393646
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 318

Get Book Here

Book Description
This volume sets out to explore the dialectic relating agriculture, crisis and conflict, and attempts to expand the knowledge on these interactions. Part 1 of the volume (chapters 1-6) discusses thematic issues and methodological approaches to understanding the intersection of agriculture, crisis and conflict. Part 2 (chapters 7-20) provides case studies that take a detailed approach to understanding agricultural contexts facing crisis and conflict, or the role played by agriculture within crisis and conflict. Studies are selected from areas that might be expected to feature in such a volume (the Middle East and North Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, South and Southeast Asia, and Latin America) as well as less obvious regions where conflict within agriculture refers not to widespread violence or wars but rather latent or simmering crisis (Central Asia and Europe). Crises stemming from politically-driven violence, natural disasters and climate change are covered, as well as competition over resources.

Farming Systems of the African Savanna

Farming Systems of the African Savanna PDF Author: A. Ker
Publisher: IDRC
ISBN: 0889367930
Category : Agricultural systems
Languages : en
Pages : 177

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Book Description
Farming Systems of the African Savanna: A continent in crisis

Crisis and Opportunity

Crisis and Opportunity PDF Author: John E. Ikerd
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
ISBN: 0803217447
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 342

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Book Description
With the decline of family farms and rural communities and the rise of corporate farming and the resulting environmental degradation, American agriculture is in crisis. But this crisis offers the opportunity to rethink agriculture in sustainable terms. Here one of the most eloquent and influential proponents of sustainable agriculture explains what this means. These engaging essays describe what sustainable agriculture is, why it began, and how it can succeed. Together they constitute a clear and compelling vision for rebalancing the ecological, economic, and social dimensions of agriculture to meet the needs of the present without compromising the future. In Crisis and Opportunity, John E. Ikerd outlines the consequences of agricultural industrialization, then details the methods that can restore economic viability, ecological soundness, and social responsibility to our agricultural system and thus ensure sustainable agriculture as the foundation of a sustainable food system and a sustainable society.

A History of World Agriculture

A History of World Agriculture PDF Author: Marcel Mazoyer
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 1583674918
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 529

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Book Description
Only once we understand the long history of human efforts to draw sustenance from the land can we grasp the nature of the crisis that faces humankind today, as hundreds of millions of people are faced with famine or flight from the land. From Neolithic times through the earliest civilizations of the ancient Near East, in savannahs, river valleys and the terraces created by the Incas in the Andean mountains, an increasing range of agricultural techniques have developed in response to very different conditions. These developments are recounted in this book, with detailed attention to the ways in which plants, animals, soil, climate, and society have interacted. Mazoyer and Roudart’s A History of World Agriculture is a path-breaking and panoramic work, beginning with the emergence of agriculture after thousands of years in which human societies had depended on hunting and gathering, showing how agricultural techniques developed in the different regions of the world, and how this extraordinary wealth of knowledge, tradition and natural variety is endangered today by global capitialism, as it forces the unequal agrarian heritages of the world to conform to the norms of profit. During the twentieth century, mechanization, motorization and specialization have brought to a halt the pattern of cultural and environmental responses that characterized the global history of agriculture until then. Today a small number of corporations have the capacity to impose the farming methods on the planet that they find most profitable. Mazoyer and Roudart propose an alternative global strategy that can safegaurd the economies of the poor countries, reinvigorate the global economy, and create a livable future for mankind.

A Nation of Farmers

A Nation of Farmers PDF Author: Sharon Astyk
Publisher: New Society Publishers
ISBN: 1550924265
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 409

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Book Description
Once we could fill our grocery carts with cheap and plentiful food, but not anymore. Cheap food has gone the way of cheap oil. Climate change is already reducing crop yields worldwide. The cost of flying in food from far away and shipping it across the country in refrigerated trucks is rapidly becoming unviable. Cars and cows increasingly devour grain harvests, sending prices skyrocketing. More Americans than ever before require food stamps and food pantries just to get by, and a worldwide food crisis is unfolding, overseas and in our kitchens. We can keep hunger from stalking our families, but doing so will require a fundamental shift in our approach to field and table. A Nation of Farmers examines the limits and dangers of the globalized food system and how returning to basics is our best hope. The book includes in-depth guidelines for: Creating resilient local food systems Growing, cooking and eating sustainably and naturally Becoming part of the solution to the food crisis. The book argues that we need to make self-provisioning, once the most ordinary of human activities, central to our lives. The results will be better food, better health, better security and freedom from corporations that don't have our interests at heart. Critical reading for anyone who eats and cares about high-quality food and food sources.

Agricultural Commercialization, Economic Development, and Nutrition

Agricultural Commercialization, Economic Development, and Nutrition PDF Author: Joachim Von Braun
Publisher: International Food Policy Research Insitute
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 444

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Book Description
Subsistence production: a sign of market failure. Commercialization cannot be left to the market. Household effects of commercialization. Nutrition effects of commercialization. Policy action needed.

Eating Fossil Fuels

Eating Fossil Fuels PDF Author: Dale Allen Pfeiffer
Publisher: New Society Publishers
ISBN: 1550923765
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 145

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Book Description
A shocking outline of the interlinked crises in energy and agriculture — and appropriate responses The miracle of the Green Revolution was made possible by cheap fossil fuels to supply crops with artificial fertilizer, pesticides, and irrigation. Estimates of the net energy balance of agriculture in the US show that ten calories of hydrocarbon energy are required to produce one calorie of food. Such an imbalance cannot continue in a world of diminishing hydrocarbon resources. Eating Fossil Fuels examines the interlinked crises of energy and agriculture and highlights some startling findings: The world-wide expansion of agriculture has appropriated fully 40% of the photosynthetic capability of this planet. The Green Revolution provided abundant food sources for many, resulting in a population explosion well in excess of the planet's carrying capacity. Studies suggest that without fossil fuel based agriculture, the US could only sustain about two thirds of its present population. For the planet as a whole, the sustainable number is estimated to be about two billion. Concluding that the effect of energy depletion will be disastrous without a transition to a sustainable, relocalized agriculture, the book draws on the experiences of North Korea and Cuba to demonstrate stories of failure and success in the transition to non-hydrocarbon-based agriculture. It urges strong grassroots activism for sustainable, localized agriculture and a natural shrinking of the world's population. Dale Allen Pfeiffer is a novelist, freelance journalist and geologist who has been writing about energy depletion for a decade. The author of The End of the Oil Age, he is also widely known for his web project: www.survivingpeakoil.com.

Farming for Profit in a Hungry World

Farming for Profit in a Hungry World PDF Author: Michael Perelman
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 9780916672881
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 254

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Book Description


Perilous Bounty

Perilous Bounty PDF Author: Tom Philpott
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1635573149
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice An unsettling journey into the disaster-bound American food system, and an exploration of possible solutions, from leading food politics commentator and former farmer Tom Philpott. More than a decade after Michael Pollan's game-changing The Omnivore's Dilemma transformed the conversation about what we eat, a combination of global diet trends and corporate interests have put American agriculture into a state of "quiet emergency," from dangerous drought in California--which grows more than 50 percent of the fruits and vegetables we eat--to catastrophic topsoil loss in the "breadbasket" heartland of the United States. Whether or not we take heed, these urgent crises of industrial agriculture will define our future. In Perilous Bounty, veteran journalist and former farmer Tom Philpott explores and exposes the small handful of seed and pesticide corporations, investment funds, and magnates who benefit from the trends that imperil us, with on-the-ground dispatches featuring the scientists documenting the damage and the farmers and activists who are valiantly and inventively pushing back. Resource scarcity looms on the horizon, but rather than pointing us toward an inevitable doomsday, Philpott shows how the entire wayward ship of American agriculture could be routed away from its path to disaster. He profiles the farmers and communities in the nation's two key growing regions developing resilient, soil-building, water-smart farming practices, and readying for the climate shocks that are already upon us; and he explains how we can help move these methods from the margins to the mainstream.

Agrarian Crisis in India

Agrarian Crisis in India PDF Author: D. Narasimha Reddy
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199088306
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 251

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Book Description
This volume provides a comprehensive analysis of the macro- and micro-level issues associated with agrarian distress. It analyses structural, institutional, and policy changes, highlighting the failure of public support system in agriculture. The crisis manifests itself in the form of deceleration in growth and distress of farmers. The case studies from Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, and Punjab bring out the diversity of conditions prevalent in the states.