One of the most serious ecological crises the planet today is our species near total depletion of natural aquifers and arable land. Mass agricultural operations owned by the few large agribusiness companies that now dominate the industry have become major producers of the staple crops that represent the majority of calories consumed worldwide, and though large-scale production of these crops has fueled rapid growth in the world’s population, the increased demand each year due to human reproduction has reached levels that are not sustainable. Soils that once were slowly replenished over time have been over-harvested, stripping them of nutrients that help plants flourish, and to compensate are now aggressively seeded with chemical fertilizers that offer only a limited array of sustenance to the crops that will be grown with them. Over time this pattern of rapid harvesting and replanting has become a cycle of soil degradation and a reduction in the nutritional quality of the foods we eat. Coupled with this, natural aquifers that are necessary for drinking water are now routinely over-depleted for use in irrigation of crops (at a much faster rate than at which they can be replenished). Taken together, these two major problems endanger our ability to produce enough food to sustain the global population and prevent mass hunger.
Stopping this trend is more difficult than simply finding a viable replacement for current methods of farming that can produce food at rate high enough to feed an ever-growing population: Due to the vast power large agriculture and chemical companies have in dictating agricultural policy, governments themselves are helping to fuel these environmentally reckless and economically predatory business practices. The recurring farm bill, for instance, provides subsidies for subsistence crop farming, the type of farming that companies like Dupont and Monsanto produce equipment, seeds, and chemicals for. Through industry lobbying, these large corporations and their peers have managed to divert 85% of the subsidies provided for agricultural operations to themselves. These companies have used their spoils to expand an agricultural empire that has seen the transition to primarily subsistence farming in various agriculture-reliant nations worldwide. Subsidies leave them with more funds to divert to expansion overseas in nations like Brazil, where one company, Monsanto, has grown to control 84% of all soybean farming operations. They support the unsustainable farming processes that degrade soil and destroy farmland, because they manufacture and supply the fertilizers marketed to farmers as the solution to their infertile soil, and thus control an agriculturally-centered self-sustaining process of environmental destruction that they profit from. This is compounded with their control of the global seed market: a small number of large agribusiness companies now control over 75% of the world’s seeds, limiting farmers’ options when it comes time to plant, and in many cases, dictating the practices they may use on their farms. Until this global agribusiness oligopoly is overturned, it seems dubious to me that progress can be made on reversing the damage of industrial farming.