Secure Food Supplies, Community Demands, And Life In 2020

Is it possible to paint a picture of our world in 2020, a world that is successfully addressing climate change issues and achieving a balanced triple bottom line for business, social concerns AND the environment?

Academics draw complex matters together into one abstract – wouldn’t an abstract/picture of how a 2020 world could function help deal with today’s constant stream of doom and gloom issues?

The Need To NOT View Issues In Isolation

The range of community demands on farmers and food production addressed by the NSW Farmers’ Association this week issues a challenge to all of us.

Speaking at the Annual Conference in Sydney, President Jock Laurie said agricultural inflation has hit 14% and farmers are facing input costs increasing faster than the CPI. There are many issues affecting the way they do business and we need to find a way to ensure community demands don’t continue to affect food production.

What Are The Demands?

• The increased demand from the mining and forestry sectors for agricultural land
• Water uncertainty issues in the irrigation industry
• Animal welfare demands

Community Expectations And Policy Development

In an ideal world we would like to see:

• Sustainable environmental practices
• Sustainable food production levels

AND

• Prosperous rural communities

BUT

Demands from all parts of the community are “forcing policy development that interferes with food production in Australia” says Jock.

“Most of the time farmers are price-takers not price-makers – however, if the cost of production is too great, then we are facing a situation that it will become unviable for some farmers to continue…

While farmers must be able to increase production levels over the next 10 years to meet predicted demands, we also need to balance the issue of reduced carbon emissions…

We need research and development programs to find new technologies to allow farmers to face the challenges before them..

Agriculture in this country can have a bright future, but if costly community demand continues, then it must take responsibility for finding a viable way forward for food production.”

Some Future Thinking

‘Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things is a 2002 book by German chemist Michael Braungart and US architect William McDonough… (whose) vision is based on a system of ‘lifecycle development’…

Their main point is that we can be ‘wasteful’ if the products we produce go completely back into nature or are completely reborn as new products. Using a cherry tree as an example, they note how ‘wasteful’ it is. Each year it dumps a great pile of fruit and leaves on the ground to rot. But all of this waste goes back into nature to be reborn as new trees, bacteria, birds and other parts of the natural ecosystem. According to the authors, we should try to emulate this natural system instead of trying to do more with less.”

DOES a description of a ‘sustainable’ 2020 world exist?