1. Boserup, Malthus, and the Green Revolution

2. Von Thunen Model
Spoilage
Weight
Distance
Costs!!! $$$$

4. Boserup: Subsistence Agriculture and Population
“Necessity is the mother of invention”
man/UnitVAgricultural/esterboserup.htm
Intensification of Food Production 4 ways:
Forest Fallow (20 yrs)
Bush Fallow (10 yrs)
Short/ Field Fallow (2 yrs)
Multicropping (never fallow)
Annual Cropping
(fallow for a few months)

5. Does Boserup seem related to another theory?
Population determines agricultural methods.
People will find a way (inventions) to produce more food… this is called intensification.
High population can be an advantage… forces people to invent/ adjust.
Can’t change lifestyle, so we need to change subsistence methods.
Malthus
Agriculture determines population.
People will begin to die off when the food supply can’t keep up.
High population a problem, agriculture can’t keep up.
Deals with food supply and population, not just subsistence agriculture like Boserup.

6. The Green Revolution in Agriculture

7. The Green Revolution in Agriculture
The term green revolution refers to the development and adoption of high yielding cereal grains in the less developed world during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s.
Very large short term gains in grain output have allowed food supplies to grow faster than populations, until very recently.
Green Revolution History
Acreage and Yield Trends
Technical Problems
Ethical Issues

8. History of Green Revolution
1960s Hybrid strains of rice, wheat, and corn show great success in S.E. Asia, and Latin America.
1970 Head of Mexican corn program, Borlaug, wins Nobel Peace Prize
1990s Growth in food supply continues, but slows to below the rate of population growth, as the results of unsustainable farming practices take effect.

12. Acreage and Yield Trends: Gains
Dwarf varieties: plants are bred to allocate more of their photosynthetic output to grain and less to vegetative parts.
Planting in closer rows, allowed by herbicides, increases yields.
Bred to be less sensitive to day length, thus double- cropping is more plausible.
Very sensitive to inputs of fertilizer and water so you don’t need as much of either.

13. Problems with the Green Revolution
Heavy Use of Fresh Water > Less available for human consumption.
Dependent on technology and machinery from MDC’s
Heavy Use of Pesticides and Fertilizer
Reduced Genetic Diversity / Increased Blight Vulnerability (plants are “weaker”)
Questionable Overall Sustainability

14. Case Study: India

15. Ethical Issues
Starvation of many prevented, but extra food may lead to higher birth rates.
Life expectancy in less developed countries increased by 10 years in less than two decades (43 in 1950’s to 53 in 1970’s).
Dependency on core countries increased (chemicals and equipment); rich-poor gap increased.
Wealthy farmers and multinational companies do well, small farmers can’t afford to keep up.
U.S. spends $10,000,000,000 year on farm subsidies, damaging farmers and markets in LDCs.

16. Genetically Modified Foods (GMO’s) ****DNA is actually altered.
Read page 354 in text.
Ways foods are “modified”
Taste change.
Resistant to disease.
Resistant to pests.
More product/grow larger.
A GMO is different from a hybrid.
Harvest of Fear
(click on What’s for Dinner and Engineer a Crop)

17. Do we have a right to know?

18. Agricultural ‘Success’?
“Our incredible successes as a species are largely derived from this choice: agriculture, but the biggest threats to our existence also stem from the same decision.” Jared Diamond, 1999
Emergence of new human diseases from animal diseases (i.e. smallpox, measles)‏
Dense urban populations allow spread/persistence of disease
Lower standard of living for many people.
Archaeological evidence of serious mal-nourishment among early farmers.
Many modern impoverished and malnourished farmers.
Famine virtually non-existent in hunter-gatherer societies.
Increased susceptibility to plant blights and increased dependence on complex economic systems.
Environmental degradation
topsoil erosion (75% in U.S.), desertification,
PCBs (chlorine compounds) in fish, DDT and other pesticides