Browsing by Subject "Sustainable agriculture"

Now showing 1 - 4 of 4

Cultivation ridges in theory and practice : cultural ecological insights from Ireland
(1998) Myers, Michael David, 1963-; Doolittle, William Emery
This study involves historical, ethnographic, and experimental investigations of agricultural ridged fields and associated farming practices in grassland environments. The literature review was global. Fieldwork was in Ireland, but implications pertain to similar features elsewhere. For theoretical purposes, the study considers rational decision-making pivotal to the temporal and spatial distribution of ridged-fields relative to level-field alternatives. The goal of the study, therefore, was to compare efficiencies in the economy of scarce resources, including labor, land, manure, tools, seed, and yields, and to compare subsistence risk from crop disease. This required analyzing the movements of body, tools, and soils in the field, calculating the time involved, and measuring effects on field forms, soil quality, micro-climates, and yields. Fieldwork in 1994 and 1995 included observations and interviews at traditional plow and spade competitions. Test plot experiments compared ridged and level field production from primary tillage through the harvest seasons. The analyses established significant labor- and yield-related variables, such as the linear measure of sod cutting, number of sods turned, and seed-furrow forms and spacing. They also provided local, case-study examples of labor inputs and agronomic results. The data suggest that prevailing ideas about ridging are in need of revision. They confirm that ridging can increase yields, reduce erosion, increase soil organic matter and fertility, and suppress bacterial and fungal pathogens, relative to level fields. The data also demonstrate that ridging can require less labor than level field tillage and is not necessarily a more complex technological invention. These observations may help explain the early, independent, and varied origins of ridge forms in Ireland and elsewhere. The variables of population density, markets, technology, farm size, frequency of cultivation, fallow practices, crops, fertility inputs, and bio-physical environments all affect the comparative costs and benefits, and the rational choice, between ridged and level fields. These variables modify the results of the fieldwork in logical ways for different contexts. Discussion of the field results and qualifiers in concert, sheds new light on the global distribution and timing of ridged field origins, persistence, obsolescence, absence, and future prospects
Food in the floodplain? Exploring the potential to grow food and racial equity on Austin’s floodplain buyout lands
(2021-05-05) Albornoz, Sara Belén; Lieberknecht, Katherine E.
As climate change unfolds, municipal governments like the City of Austin, Texas are using voluntary floodplain buyouts—a form of planned retreat—as a strategy to move residents out of hazard-prone areas. As a result of buyouts, city governments become stewards of vacant, publicly owned lands that cannot be developed, and face decisions about how to use them. Governments have the opportunity to repurpose buyout lands into community amenities, such as sustainable agriculture projects, that can generate an array of social and ecological benefits. In deciding how to repurpose buyout lands, however, governments have a responsibility to pay special attention to the implications of their actions for racial equity. Racial equity matters in this context because communities of color are being disproportionately impacted by both climate change impacts and planned retreat, and because the creation of green amenities in historically disinvested neighborhoods has the potential to spur gentrification and displacement. This professional report explores the questions: 1) Are sustainable agriculture projects a viable use for public, urban floodplain buyout lands? and 2) How can municipal governments pursue such projects in a way that prioritizes racial equity? I address these questions through a case study of a specific prospective agriculture site on City of Austin-owned floodplain buyout land in the Lower Onion Creek buyout area, which is located in the historically Latinx, climate impacted Southeast Austin neighborhood of Dove Springs. Using an environmental justice framework and a mixed-methods approach, I evaluate the likelihood that the conditions that sustainable agriculture projects require for success can be met at the prospective site, in light of the site’s physical characteristics and propensity for flooding; safety considerations; and regulatory and environmental constraints. Drawing insights from Dove Springs community leaders and subject matter experts, I discuss how the planning and implementation of a sustainable agriculture project at the prospective site could be carried out in a way that advances racial equity and environmental justice. Finally, I present recommendations for concrete next steps the City of Austin can take to move this project forward while prioritizing equity and justice.
A new framework for African smallholder agriculture : harnessing innovation and the private sector to drive sustainable development
(2010-05) Kosoris, Justin Michael; Wilson, Robert Hines; Wilson, Patricia A.; Evans, Angela M.
This report will outline a new framework for improved yields and increased sustainability in Sub-Saharan African smallholder agriculture. Given the failures of agricultural development aid and policy in the past, cross-sector collaboration among local farmer networks, national governments, and private corporations could represent a new model to foster sustainable agricultural production and growth, as each has had past successes but have not traditionally come together to work as a collaborative unit. This paper will examine each sector to look at best practices and then develop a framework for such collaboration. After a normative case with a positive outlook as to the potential for implementing the framework to Senegal‘s groundnut sector, the paper concludes that the framework can work in a variety of settings as long as one is aware of and respects local conditions.
Retroactively rewriting the revolution : the discursive mobilization of sustainability in La Habana, Cuba
(2015-05) Law, Sara Elizabeth; Guridy, Frank Andre; Torres, Rebecca M.
The intent of my thesis is to demonstrate how the discourse of sustainability, specifically sustainable urban agriculture, has traversed borders. It is no longer the innovation of the United Nations. It has been adopted, manipulated, and exported to fit a variety of objectives. However, despite its vast travels, the discourse and praxis of sustainability privileges food production over food consumption especially in the Global South. In the process of consuming this idea, this mantra, this labor, many overlook, intentionally or not, the racialized, gendered and classed politics of consumption. I utilize Cuba as a case study to exemplify how sustainability has been adopted by other nations and provide grounded examples of the effects of this state-sponsored meta-narrative. My central argument is that the Cuban State's discourse and practice supports their politicized ideals of agricultural production by marginalizing food consumption. They accomplish this goal by creating a narrative of production at both the national and local level. The Cuban government supports sustainable production through speeches, local newspapers and sponsorship of particular agricultural organizations. On a local level, pamphlets, workshops and everyday conversations mirror the State's discourse and tout agricultural production as a panacea to Cuba's current state of low food security. I want to bring to light the complexities of Cuba's urban agricultural model. I do not intent to dispute the importance of their accomplishments in urban agriculture, however I also do not want to praise their impressive strides blindly. Despite their political leanings, like any nation, their relationship with food is raced, classed and gendered.