Food, Energy, and Society

Book Description

Economic assessment of sustainable agricultural practices has continued to mature and to add to our understanding of how we might design policies to ensure an adequate and diverse food supply. This volume presents some of the recent developments and applications in this field and is much more nearly self-contained than typical edited volumes. It provides a comprehensive treatment of topics, including a historical perspective leading to current developments in methods and policy. The introductory chapter presents an early history of research by entomologists and economists, tracing the concept of integrated pest management, the nascent organic food industry, and reviewing pesticide policy options debated over the last several decades. The remainder of the volume is divided into four sections focusing on the economic aspects of production, and related policy issues. These four sections encompass the range of advances in theoretical and applied economic analyses concerned with pesticides and sustainable food markets. Chapters present different methodological, ideological, and geographical perspectives from some of the environmental and agricultural economics concerned with pesticides and sustainable production. This volume includes unique contributions that incorporate international experiences and viewpoints concerning both methods and policy. This volume includes material valuable for students in agricultural economics and environmental science, and is essential reading for economists who conduct research in sustainable agriculture. It is also excellent reference for policy analysts.

Feeding the Ten Billion: Plants and Population Growth

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An excellent history of population and agriculture.

Feeding the Ten Billion: Plants and Population Growth
Lloyd T. Evans
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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The Sun, The Genome, and The Internet: Tools of Scientific Revolution (Nypl/Oup Lectures)
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Seeing the Forest and the Trees: Human-Environment Interactions in Forest Ecosystems

ASIN: 0521646855

Book Description

At the current rate of increase, the world's population is likely to reach ten billion by the middle of the twenty-first century. What will be the challenges posed by feeding this population and how can they be addressed? Written to mark the 200th anniversary of the publication of Malthus' seminal Essay on the Principle of Population, this fascinating book looks at the intimate links between population growth and agricultural innovation over the past 10,000 years, illustrating how the evolution of agriculture has both shaped and been shaped by the course of world population growth. This historical context serves to illuminate our present position and to aid understanding of possible future paths to food security for the planet. This volume is a unique and accessible account that will be of interest to a wide audience concerned with global population, food supply, agricultural development, environmental degradation and resource depletion.

Customer Reviews:

An excellent history of population and agriculture........1999-09-10

This work is an efficient survey of agriculture and its relation to population growth through history. The chapters are designed to focus on population growth through time. For example chapter 2 is: Reaching for 5 million ( to 8000BC); chapter 3 is: Towards 50 million ( 8000-2000BC); chapter 4 is: The first half-billion ( 2000BC-1500AD); chapter 5 is: Towards the first billion (1500-1825) etc. Under each heading is a discussion of the critical agricultural developments during that time period. The last chapter focuses on the problems of feeding 10 billion people in the future.The research is detailed and knowledgable. The sources are modern and uptodate. The writing is precise. It is an excellent book that covers a lot of ground in a small compass. Highly recommended.

Water For Food, Water For Life: A Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture

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Water For Food, Water For Life: A Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture

Manufacturer: Earthscan Publications Ltd.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Africa | History | Subjects | Books

Water Supply | Environment | Outdoors & Nature | Subjects | Books

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Water: A Shared Responsibilty (United Nations World Water Development Report)
The World's Water 2006-2007: The Biennial Report on Freshwater Resources (World's Water)
When the Rivers Run Dry: Water--The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-first Century
Water: The Fate of Our Most Precious Resource

ASIN: 1844073963

Book Description

** Tackles one of the most pressing challenges of our time–how to manage finite water resources to feed two billion extra people, eliminate poverty and reverse ecosystem degradation

** Brings together the work of over 700 researchers into the most comprehensive and authoritative assessment of water resources ever written

** Covers all aspects of water management in agriculture, poverty reduction, food security, biodiversity, irrigation, groundwater, river basins, inland fisheries, rice production and much more

** Hundreds of full-color figures, tables, and graphs present key information in easy-to-read format--a must-have reference for all professionals

This comprehensive assessment of the world’s water, written by experts with research from over 700 leading specialists, critically evaluates current thinking on water and its interplay with agriculture, charting the way forward with concrete actions from management to policy level across all countries and territories.

After framing the main issues and providing a comprehensive examination of trends and scenarios in world water management, the book critically examines the cross-cutting issues of reducing poverty, reforming institutions for sustainable water management, avoiding or mitigating ecosystem impacts, and improving water productivity. Thematic chapters follow, covering such key issues in water management as irrigation, groundwater use, inland fisheries, rice cultivation, land conservation, and river basin management and development.

Civic Agriculture: Reconnecting Farm, Food, and Community (Civil Society Series)

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Civic Agriculture: Reconnecting Farm, Food, and Community (Civil Society Series)
Thomas A. Lyson
Manufacturer: Tufts
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Changing Works: Visions of a Lost Agriculture
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The Essential Agrarian Reader: The Future of Culture, Community, and the Land
The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals
Hungry for Profit: The Agribusiness Threat to Farmers, Food, and the Environment

ASIN: 1584654147

Book Description

While the American agricultural and food systems follow a decades-old path of industrialization and globalization, a counter trend has appeared toward localizing some agricultural and food production. Thomas A. Lyson, a scholar-practitioner in the field of community-based food systems, calls this rebirth of locally based agriculture and food production civic agriculture because these activities are tightly linked to a community's social and economic development. Civic agriculture embraces innovative ways to produce, process, and distribute food, and it represents a sustainable alternative to the socially, economically, and environmentally destructive practices associated with conventional large-scale agriculture. Farmers' markets, community gardens, and community-supported agriculture are all forms of civic agriculture.

Lyson describes how, in the course of a hundred years, a small-scale, diversified system of farming became an industrialized system of production and also how this industrialized system has gone global. He argues that farming in the United States was modernized by employing the same techniques and strategies that transformed the manufacturing sector from a system of craft production to one of mass production. Viewing agriculture as just another industrial sector led to transformations in both the production and the processing of food. As small farmers and food processors were forced to expand, merge with larger operations, or go out of business, they became increasingly disconnected from the surrounding communities. Lyson enumerates the shortcomings of the current agriculture and food systems as they relate to social, economic, and environmental sustainability. He then introduces the concept of community problem solving and offers empirical evidence and concrete examples to show that a re-localization of the food production system is underway.

Biodiverity and the Ecosystem Approach in Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries

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Biodiverity and the Ecosystem Approach in Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries
Food and Agriculture Organization of the
Manufacturer: Food & Agriculture Organization of the UN (FA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Book Description

This document contains the proceedings of a meeting of the Food and Agricultural Organization's Inter-Departmental Working Group on Biological Diversity for Food and Agriculture, held in October 2002, in Rome. The meeting aimed to improve awareness of the importance of biological diversity and to support the ecosystem approach to all types of production systems. Presentations and discussions covered grasslands in South Africa, mahogany forests in Mexico, rice ecology in Asia and organic agriculture systems around the world.

Hungry for Profit: The Agribusiness Threat to Farmers, Food, and the Environment

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Hungry for Profit: The Agribusiness Threat to Farmers, Food, and the Environment
Fred Magdoff , John Bellamy Foster , and Frederick Buttel
Manufacturer: Monthly Review Press
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Binding: Paperback

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Civic Agriculture: Reconnecting Farm, Food, and Community (Civil Society Series)
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Stolen Harvest: The Hijacking of the Global Food Supply
First the Seed: The Political Economy of Plant Biotechnology (Science and Technology in Society)

ASIN: 1583670165
Release Date: 2000-09-01

Book Description

Millions go hungry every year in both poor and rich nations, yet hundreds of thousands of peasants and farmers continue to be pushed off the land. Applied in increasing volumes, chemical pesticides and synthetic fertilizers deplete the soil, pollute our food and water, and leave crops more vulnerable to pest outbreaks. The new and expanding use of genetically engineered seeds threatens species diversity.

Book Description

In recent years the media have reported, frequently with alarm, on the increasing use of genetically modified crops in agriculture. Some groups have expressed concern about consumer safety and the risks of large-scale ecosystem damage. Others have noted the resulting shift of power away from locally controlled farming operations toward large agribusiness and biotech companies, and the particular vulnerability of farmers in the developing world to this trend.

In Seeds of Contention: World Hunger and the Global Controversy over GM Crops, development specialists Per Pinstrup-Andersen and Ebbe Schiøler focus attention on the less discussed issues of the potential benefits and costs of genetically modified crops for developing countries. Pinstrup-Andersen and Schiøler review the basic issues and discuss the potential that such crops have for addressing the great needs of poor and undernourished peoples throughout the world. They explain how increased agricultural productivity is not enough in addressing the problem of famine. People in developing countries need crops that are disease-resistant, can fend off insect predators, and can withstand severe environmental conditions in order to produce larger crop yields.

Pinstrup-Andersen and Schiøler are sober in their assessment of these prospects, for they acknowledge that GM crops alone will not solve the world's food problem. They argue, however, that they may be one element in the solution and people in developing countries should have information about benefits and risks and the freedom to make their own decisions about whether or not to grow and consume GM crops.

Food for All: The Need for a New Agriculture

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Food for All: The Need for a New Agriculture
John Madeley
Manufacturer: Zed Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1842770195

Book Description

John Madeley offers a new approach to agricultural production and feeding the hungry. He outlines a low-external input approach, along with a re-integration of new farming practices like organic agriculture and permaculture, and a range of “green” technologies which would eventually make world agriculture a viable livelihood for farmers, providing enough food for the hungry, and safe and good-tasting for the rest of us—all without harming the environment.

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