How Long Can Modern Agriculture Feed Us? BTG 1994 article

[Guest guest]

Regarding running out of oil, devotees have been aware of this looming

problem since Srila Prabhupada gave us the first hints in the 1970s.

Here's an article I wrote for BTG ten years ago. At this point, I'm

thinking that my grandson, 3-year-old Ramacandra dasa, will probably see

a time before he gets old when petroleum powered tractors are no longer

economically feasible.

 

That will be a time when preaching Krsna consciousness will b really

good for all the ox-powered Hare Krsna farms around the world. I hope by

then there will be thousands, not just a dozen or so.

 

ys

hkdd

 

********************

 

(Back to Godhead, Summer 1994, Vol 28. No. 3)

 

How Long Can Modern Agriculture Feed Us?

By Hare Krsna dasi

 

 

Im writing this article just after the U.S. government has approved a

substance likely to send thousands of cows to the slaughterhouse, drive

thousands of family farms out of business, and expose thousands of

consumers to potentially dangerous antibiotics. Naturally, thats not

the way the U.S. government sees the substance. They see it as a

technological breakthrough that will boost profits for dairy farmers and

offer big payoffs for bio-tech investors.

 

Im talking about the U.S. Food and Drug Administrations approval of

bovine somatotropinBST for shorta genetically engineered drug that

increases cows milk production by ten to twenty-five percent.

 

Whats wrong with cows giving more milk? Ill explain that, but first a

few words about whats wrong with BST itself.

 

 

Drugs in your milk

 

Some people worry that BST could be carried by milk to milk drinkers,

though so far the evidence doesnt support that fear. A more important

health danger, explained in a report from the General Accounting Office

to the U.S. Congress,[1] is that higher milk production will lead to

more cases of cow mastitis, and the antibiotics used to treat the

mastitis might get into the milk.

 

One more problem with BST is that fear of milk contamination may keep

people from drinking milk, which is valuable for developing spiritual

intelligence. (See Is Milk for Everyone? Back to Godhead, Mar/Apr 1993.)

 

 

Adding to a surplus

 

Now for the problems caused by cows giving more milk.

 

The U.S. already has a surplus of milk. A drug that boosts production

will favor farmers with large herds, and squeeze farmers with smaller

herds out of business.

 

Lets say Im a Wisconsin farmer with 100 cows; using BST is like adding

20 cows to my herd. But Farmer Jones from California has 1000 cows, and

using BST is like adding 200 cows to his herd. Because his operating

costs per cow are smaller than mine, he can still make money when milk

prices drop. Ill be forced out of business.

 

Government price supports complicate things a bit, but this is the net

effect. Senator Russ Feingold of Wisconsin stated, I am deeply

concerned about the future of small family dairy farmers in Wisconsin

and around the country. This product is going to accelerate the process

that is already resulting in thousands of family farmers being forced

off their land.[2] Of course, when farmers are forced off the land,

their cows will be sent to slaughter. Its alarming to consider that

market competition could practically wipe out cows in some areas.

 

 

New taxes for agriculture?

 

BST is in many ways typical of a long list of challenges facing farming

that make me wonder just how much longer modern agriculture will be able

to feed us. In the case of BST, for example, lets follow its use a few

years down the road: Smaller herds like those in Wisconsin and New

England will be phased out, and larger herds, like those in California

and Texas, will grow. But both California and Texas have water

shortages. What will happen to cows if those states slap a hefty water

tax on farmers a few years from now? Cows cant produce milk without water.

 

Another impending tax problem for farmers is the carbon emission tax

likely to come. Modern agriculture gets about ninety percent of its

energy from fossil fuel. It also relies on fossil fuel to make

fertilizer and hundreds of miles of plastic-sheet mulch for vegetables.

And, of course, fossil fuel carries agricultural products over land,

air, and sea.

 

Not surprisingly, one economic model by the U.S.D.A.[3] shows that

anything that pushes up the price of fossil fuels will have a higher

impact on agriculture than on most other industries, which can switch to

nuclear power, hydro-power, and so on. So far, there are no wind-powered

or nuclear-powered tractors. A solar battery big enough to power a heavy

tractor would probably sink it into the mud.

 

 

And fewer subsidies and loans

 

Another problem for industrial agriculture is that it stands to lose the

money it was getting from the government when the government had money.

Several nations feel they can no longer afford large subsidies to

farmers, or they are entering trade agreements that prohibit them. For

example, in a Wall Street Journal editorial (5/26/93) entitled Deficit

Reduction Made Easy, Harvard economics professor Robert Barro

recommends fourteen cuts to balance the U.S. deficit. Heading the list

is Farm-income stabilization (various subsidies and credits to

farmers): $19.2 billion.

 

In October The New York Times ran a three-part series on large-scale

abuses to the U.S. government system that supports agricultural trade.

The Times followed the series with an editorial blasting a system that

enrich[es] a small group of wealthy growers . . . and multinational

corporations.

 

Most likely financial pressures will bring a dramatic shift for farmers

of industrialized countries. For example, the U. S. Department of

Agriculture is considering dropping the Farmers Home Administration

(FHA), its multi-billion-dollar lending arm.[4] That means farmers will

have to turn to their banks for the credit government used to provide.

But according to Hoards Dairyman (Nov. 1993), new banking reforms curb

agricultural lending: Record bank failures during the late 1980s

chilled the banking industry and led the Federal Reserve to enact

tougher banking regulations . . . Like it or not, credit is the

lifeblood of a thriving agriculture. But we dont like what we see going

on in agricultural lending.

 

 

Enough oil to float a battleship

 

U.S. agriculture faces other shortages besides water and money. The USDA

predicts that by the year 2000 the U.S. will be a net importer of

potash, phosphorus, and ammoniumthe three main ingredients in

commercial fertilizer.

 

And what about the petroleum we talked about before? Petroleum from the

U.S. stands to become more expensive. In a report submitted to the U.S.

Secretary of Energy, the National Petroleum Council says that the oil

industry could spend at least $166 billion over twenty years to comply

with existing and expected environmental regulations.[5]

 

So oil companies will focus on developing foreign oil fields. Though new

oil fields make more oil available, depending on someone elses

petroleum can present a government with unpredictable strategic

challenges. This was brought home to me lately when a friend commented,

Well, you dont have to worry about running out of oil nowtheyve got

enough oil in Kazakhstan to float a battleship.

 

His imagery sounded ominous to me. Its true many oil fields are being

developed around the world. Just read the headlines: Texaco Gets Aid to

Invest in Russia, Norwegian Production Predicted to Surge in 1994,

Oil Giants Skittish about China Field, Mobil Returns to Vietnam. But

if the food supply depends on these foreign resources, my question is,

Which battleship will my children be on to defend these investments

when international relationships turn sour? Even if our kids arent

directly fighting, oil wars can hurt us all by driving up oil prices,

which can cripple agriculture.

 

 

Environmental challenges

 

The carbon emissions taxes I mentioned are meant to reduce global

warming by so-called greenhouse gases. But global industry may still

send lots of those newly discovered oil reserves into the atmosphere.

Environmentalists say that global warming may cause weather shifts that

could make current agricultural patterns impossible. This has major

implications for commercial-scale agriculture.

 

Other environmental challenges for agriculture include soil erosion,

water shortages, and water pollution by manure, pesticides, and

fertilizers.

 

Besides natural pollution, technology causes social pollution by forcing

farmers off the land. In an article in The Calcutta Telegraph,

Suryatirtha Ray concludes, Having ruined both jobs and the soil,

industrial agriculture is fast becoming economically unviable.[6]

Ironically, agricultures technological advancement is contributing to

its own demise.

 

 

Politics and trade

 

Global politics and economic trade agreements present more challenges

for agriculture. For example, in todays paper I see a photo captioned,

Demonstrators trying to break barricades yesterday near the

headquarters of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade in Geneva.

Farmers from Europe, India and Japan protested the trade accord, saying

it would ruin hundreds of millions of farmers and uproot centuries-old

traditions.[7]

 

Three thousand farmers demonstrated against the GATT, and several

hundred of them fought with police. Protests like this point to

impending social disruption that even the farmers themselves are aware of.

 

 

Politics and technology

 

Dependence on modern technology, such as petroleum-powered tractors,

implies dependence on politics. Like trade, sophisticated technologies

exist within the context of complex international political relations.

People are at the mercy of those who control the flow of resources. If

international relations turn against a country, it may be impossible to

rely on tractors, manufactured and powered by resources coming from

several different countries. Cuba provides an example of this

vulnerability of technology.

 

Technology is at risk with national politics as well. If agriculture

depends on technology, we will be faced with massive food shortages when

the political structure collapses. The tractors wont keep going by

themselves without the political structure to make it possible to build,

trade, and power them. In the Srimad-Bhagavatam (4.8.7), Srila

Prabhupada writes, Eventually the state will not be able to collect

taxes and consequently will not be able to meet its huge military and

administrative expenses. Everything will collapse, and there will be

chaos and disturbance all over the state. Those remarks, which

Prabhupada wrote in 1974, are no longer just a possible prophecy. They

are coming to pass right now, starting with the former Soviet Union and

other countries.

 

Without society being organized on the principles given by Krsna in the

Bhagavad-gita, there is scarcely any alternative to things getting worse

and worse. And agriculture will be among the first and hardest hit

sectors of society.

 

 

The need for sacrifice

 

Why is modern agriculture in such a state of crisis? Because its

progress rests on materialistic principles, which are ultimately not

sustainable. In the Srimad-Bhagavatam (4.18.7), Srila Prabhupada writes,

A huge arrangement exists for the production of large-scale industrial

and agricultural products, but all these products are meant for sense

gratification. Therefore, despite such productive capacities there is

scarcity because the worlds population is full of thieves.

 

Prabhupada goes on to explain, One is mistaken if he thinks that by

applying modern machines such as tractors, grains can be produced. If

one goes to a desert and uses a tractor, there is still no possibility

of producing grains. We may adopt various means, but it is essential to

know that the planet earth will stop producing grains if sacrifices are

not performed.

 

The key to understanding the proper development of agriculture lies in

understanding the Lords purpose in putting the fallen souls in the

material world:

 

The material creation by the Lord . . . is a chance offered to the

conditioned souls to come back homeback to Godhead. . . . The Lord

created this material world to enable the conditioned souls to learn how

to perform yajnas (sacrifices) for the satisfaction of Visnu [the

Supreme Lord] so that while in the material world they can live very

comfortably without anxiety and after finishing the present material

body they can enter into the kingdom of God. (Bhagavad-gita As It Is

3.10, purport)

 

Krsna recommends three kinds of sacrifice: offering our food to Him

before we eat it, performing our daily work for His sake, and chanting

His holy names. In Bhagavad-gita (3.13), Krsna says, The devotees of

the Lord are released from all kinds of sins because they eat food which

is offered first for sacrifice. Others, who prepare food for personal

sense enjoyment, verily eat only sin.

 

Then He says, All living bodies subsist on food grains, which are

produced from rains. Rains are produced by performance of yajna

[sacrifice], and yajna is born of prescribed duties. Prabhupada

outlines the process:

 

Ultimately we have to depend on the production of the field and not on

the production of big factories. The field production is due to

sufficient rain from the sky, and such rains are controlled by demigods

like Indra, Sun, Moon, etc., and they are all servants of the Lord. The

Lord can be satisfied by sacrifices; therefore, one who cannot perform

them will find himself in scarcitythat is the law of nature. Yajna,

specifically the saìkirtana-yajna (chanting the names of the Lord)

prescribed for this age, must therefore be performed to save us at least

from scarcity of food supply. (Bhagavad-gita As It Is 3.14, purport)

 

 

Is Krsnas advice practical?

 

Some people may question whether these three sacrificesoffering our

food to Krsna, doing our work for His sake, and chanting His holy

namescan solve the problems faced by modern agriculture. The answer is

yes, if people perform the sacrifices in a genuine mood of humility,

with a sincere desire to carry out the will of the Lord.

 

Then theyll naturally do things that will solve the problems of

agriculture. For example, devotees of Krsna dont eat meat. This one act

stops violence, environmental damage, and agricultural overconsumption.

Since Krsna loves the cows, a society striving to please Him will offer

Him milk from protected cows, and grains produced and transported by

protected oxen.

 

Practically speaking, if all society adopted this standard, modern

commercial agriculture would end. Small family farms depending on ox

power would more easily lend themselves to sustainability and

conscientious stewardship of the land. Those farms would give young

people the chance to engage themselves productively and creatively in

work everyone would appreciate.

 

Millions of small farms dedicated to pleasing the Supreme Lord would end

the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few gambling stock

investors and ensure that everyone could produce food to offer the Lord.

Eating that food after it is offered to Krsna would mean the end of hunger.

 

How long can modern agriculture last? In contrast, the fatal flaw of

modern commercial agriculture is that it is based on materialistic

principles of sense gratification, with no reference to the desires of

the Supreme Lord. It is doomed to collapse sooner or later, annihilated

by its short-sighted, selfish policies. It is part of a culture with a

deathly attraction for technology and the thrill of speculative

investment profits.

 

The short-sighted, self-destructive mentality that creates and promotes

a product like BST is all too typical of commercial agriculture. So I

ask, how long can modern agriculture feed us? As long as farmers can get

their loans? As long as theres no major oil war? As long as modern

agriculture doesnt completely ruin the environment? As long as the

country were in stays politically powerful?

 

Can modern agriculture meet the growing challenges it faces? Will it

feed my children? My grandchildren? Possiblybut I dont want to bet

their lives on it.

 

Recently my eleven-year-old son told me he wants to learn to work the

oxen this summer. I see that as a better hope. Of course, someone could

ask, How long can Krsna conscious agriculture sustain him? The answer is

pretty simple: As long as he depends on Krsna.

 

 

References:

 

1. Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone: FDA Approval Should Be Withheld

Until the Mastitis Issue Is Resolved, GAO/PEMD-92-26, August 1992.

2. Press release from Senator Feingolds office, Nov. 5, 1993.

3. A Global Analysis of Energy Prices and Agriculture, by Bradley J.

McDonald, Stephen W. Martinez, Miranda Otradovsky, and James V. Stout,

Agriculture and Trade Analysis Division, Economic Research Service, U.S.

Department of Agriculture. Staff Report No. AGES 9148, Sept. 1991.

4. The Wall Street Journal, Sept. 1, 1993.

5. The Wall Street Journal, Aug. 2, 1993.

6. Black edge to a green revolution, July 29, 1993.

7. Compromises Edge GATT Nearer New Pact, The New York Times, Dec. 5,

1993.