How to establish balanced use of agricultural land and better ecological function?
Posted on August 3rd, 2009 Submitted by greengard Categorized as Biodiversity, Interdisciplinary, Social-Ecological Systems Tagged as ecosystems, food, land-use, market system 5 Agricultural land occupies about 10% of total land area, pastures not included. Its ecological influence (nutrient cycles, carbon storage, energy, water, biodiversity) is considerably larger. The sector is growing both in extent and intensity. The world needs good ecological function of this sector. The main task for agriculture is to produce food for mankind. The present main policy is that agricultural production like other “industries” shall be governed by market forces, in reality price competition on a global scale (within a very weak concept “Good Agricultural Practice). However, there is a contradiction. Factors favouring market competitiveness are specialization and adaptability ( we could say shortsightedness). Factors favouring ecological function are diversity and longterm consideration, exactly the
