Gigi Berardi

Energy efficiency of farming systems: Organic and conventional agriculture

Abstract An assessment was made of the energy efficiency, yield performance, and labor requirements for the production of corn, wheat, potatoes, and apples using organic (without synthetic chemical fertilizers and pesticides) and conventional farming technologies. Organic corn and wheat production was 29–70% more energy efficient than conventional production. However, conventional potato and apple production was 7–93% more energy efficient than organic production. For all four crops, the labor input per unit of yield was higher for organic systems compared with conventional production.

Organic and conventional wheat production: Examination of energy and economics

Abstract Small-scale wheat production by conventional farming methods averaged 48% higher energy inputs and only 29% higher yields per hectare than wheat produced by organic farming methods. Process analysis was used in evaluating the direct and indirect energy requirements of both production practices. The economic costs averaged 29% less per hectare for conventional wheat production than for organic wheat production, using a standard accounting procedure.

Commentary on the Challenge to Change: Participatory Research and Professional Realities

This commentary outlines traditions of participatory research, and what they imply for professional identity. Participatory methods are not meant to replace but to complement more formal research methodologies.

Rural participatory research in Alaska: The case of Tanakon village

Abstract The purpose of this paper is to illustrate how participatory research methodologies may be utilized to investigate the planning of improved sanitation services in rural Alaska. The village selected for this case study had a strong tribal and municipal government, and was in the process of designing research to determine the feasibility of various options for upgraded sanitation service. Establishing contacts early in the project ensured that a network of support was in place prior to the field visit to the village. This was critical to the successful and timely completion of the field visit. Key features of the participatory research methods included gaining permission from Native authorities and Elders to visit and conduct research, participating in group interviews, community activities, and transect walks, developing seasonal and historic timelines, and conducting a secondary source review of city and agency documents and school district archives. The findings of this study confirm that flexible and personalized research approaches can reveal a body of local knowledge that exists regarding how best to address sanitation issues. Such information can be utilized in developing efficient, cost-effective ways of providing environmentally sound waste disposal in rural communities.

Resilience in Agriculture: Small- and Medium-Sized Farms in Northwest Washington State

The research reported here uses resilience thinking in examining farmer responses to disturbance scenarios in the North Puget Sound region of Washington State. Through farmer resilience workshops based on plausible disturbance scenarios of climate change, seasonal flooding, energy price spikes, and rapid urbanization, farmers identified further threats to farm systems, possible thresholds of undesirable change in farm systems, and adaptive strategies useful in addressing the examined threats. It is clear that adaptive strategies become more complex at scales beyond the farm level. Further, individual commitment to a rural, farm lifestyle was an important component of whether a farm operation would thrive within larger nested systems. At the same time, farmers in the study recognized the need to re-frame agricultural policy in the United States away from emphasis on the stabilization of prices, and more towards farmer autonomy within agreed-upon guidelines.

Do global food systems have an Achilles heel? The potential for regional food systems to support resilience in regional disasters

Today’s domestic US food production is the result of an industry optimized for competitive, high yielding, and high-growth production for a globalized market. Yet, industry growth may weaken food system resilience to abrupt disruptions by reducing the diversity of food supply sources. In this paper, we first explore shifts in food consumption toward reliance upon complex and long-distance food distribution, food imports, and out-of-home eating. Second, we discuss how large-scale, rapid-onset hazards may affect food access for both food secure and insecure households. We then consider whether and how regional food production might support regional food resilience. To illustrate these issues, we examine the case of western Washington, a region not only rich in agricultural production but also threatened by a Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake and tsunami. Such an event is expected to disrupt transportation and energy systems on which the dominant food distribution system relies. Whether a regional food supply—for the purposes of this paper, defined as food production in one or adjacent watersheds—can support a broader goal of community food resilience during large-scale disruption is a key theme of our paper. The discussion that ensues is not meant to offer simplistic, localist solutions as the one answer to disaster food provision, but neither should regional food sources be dismissed in food planning processes. Our exploration of regional farm production, small in scale and flexible, suggests regional production can help support food security prior to the arrival of emergency relief and retail restocking. Yet in order to do so, we need to have in place a robust and regionally appropriate food resilience strategy. This strategy should address caloric need, storage, and distribution, and, in so doing, rebalance our dependence on food supplied through imports and complex, domestic supply chains. Clearly, diversity of food sourcing can add redundancy and flexibility, allowing more nimble food system adaptation in the face of disruption.

Pesticide Use in Italian Food Production

Since the mid-1930s, agricultural productivity has been increasing steadily in most developed countries. High productivity has been sustained by the mobilization of energy and material resources. In the United States, the large fossil energy subsidies needed to maintain yields have been the subject of much debate and research (e.g., see bibliography in Stout and Myers 1979). In Europe, where agricultural energy requirements are particularly high and supplies of liquid fuels scarce, researchers have been studying the energetics of agroecosystems since the early 1970s. Europes typically intensive cultivation system uses large amounts of chemical fertilizers. Research on these and other energy inputs takes place at such institutes as Centre de Recherches de Toulouse (Hutter 1980). Relatively little research, however, has been conducted in central Europe. Italy is of particular interest due to the rapid development of its agricultural sector, which includes the increasing use of large quantities of agricultural chemicals (Stracciari 1981). For example, from 1968 to 1979, the percentage of sugar-beet hectares on which herbicides were used increased from 3.5% to 65.1% (Eridania 1980). Comparable figures for 10 other European countries ranged from 50% to 95% in 1968 and 80% to 100% in 1979. The evolution of herbicide use in Italy has been particularly rapid, in part due to recent consolidation of land holdings and a reduction in manual cultivation of crops (Eridania 1980). From 1955 to 1975, consumption of total agricultural chemicals in Italy increased 500% (Volpi 1977). Mercier (1980) discusses the increase in direct (e.g , fuel) and indirect (e.g., fertilizer) fossil energy inputs as a result of the obsession to achieve maximum agricultural production, despite diminishing returns. The United States serves as a

Science and Environmental Education in Tribal Homelands

Science education and research ultimately have an effect on tribal homelands. It is well known in Indian country that the concepts and practices of the Western world have benefited industrialized nation states while significantly impacting the ecological and social systems of lands long occupied and nurtured by indigenous communities. The tribes in the United States have never accepted the conditions forced upon them, nor have they forgotten the solemn promises made when they granted rights to nonIndians in return for services.

Energy Use in Italian Agriculture: Alternatives to Mineral Fertilizers

ABSTRACT The productivity of industrialized agricultural systems is dependent upon fossil fuel energy subsidies. The high cost of fossil energy has prompted considerable research on conservation and alternative energy sources, primarily in the United States and Europe. Little research, however, has been conducted in Italy where the agricultural sector is developing rapidly and fuel costs are exceedingly high. The objectives of this research were l) to determine the regional energy input and efficiency of Italian agriculture, and 2) to suggest alternatives to high energy inputs, in particular, mineral fertilizers. Energy values were determined for each of the 20 regions in Italy using a process analysis approach. The results showed that agriculture in Italy was energy efficient due in part to geographic constraints. In the future, energy efficiency will decline and agricultural chemicals will play an increasingly important role in “modern” Italian agriculture. Not only does this represent a high pecuniary ...