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While accurate on many of the recent developments, this article missed (as many precision ag/genetics editorials do) some of the key drawbacks to industrialized

While accurate on many of the recent developments, this article missed (as many precision ag/genetics editorials do) some of the key drawbacks to industrialized agriculture: 1. Herbicide resistance. We now have weeds that are simultaneously resistant to many different modes of action. Even if one were able to eliminate the impact of pesticides on the environment, it is impossible to develop new chemicals and stacked herbicides faster than evolution can find ways to work around them. 2. There are other drawbacks to monoculture ag, namely soil loss, lower quality of soil structure/microbiota, loss of ecosystem services such as habitat, etc. Increasing our yields per acre is great but we need to factor in all of the externalities. I was glad to see mention of finding new ways to associate rhizobia with cereals, but that's a long way off and for the time being no one has figured out how to have agriculture avoid massive imports (even in organic ag) of nutrients into the system. 3. Exclusive focus on the biggest staple crops, with far more emphasis on quantity than quality and producing food that is necessary for a well-rounded diet. 4. Nearly all of these solutions ignore the possibility of using ecological interactions, unique spatial designs, intercropping, perennials and other agroecological strategies to reduce weed pressure, increase nitrogen fixation etc. These other techniques are far harder and are more difficult to commercialize, but if one wants to tackle "hard" problems in agriculture, those would be the ones to address. Just to be clear, much good will come out of the technological developments, but for the moment they're primarily tinkering around the edges when really we need a whole-systems redesign for agriculture. I recently finished a PhD focused on optimizing decisions given all of the uncertainty/variability in precision ag systems, and what I ultimately concluded (at least for row crops) is we still have a long way to go.

dredmorbius 10y ago
The story of soil is a tremendously powerful one. Ken Burns The Dust Bowl is re-airing currently (it was originally broadcast in 2012). It tells the story of the combined impacts of: 1) massive immigration onto the high western prarie, 2) mechanised agriculture, 3) hitting a period of higher rainfall, initially, 4) a false belief that "rain follows the plow", 5) intensive crop development, 6) deep plowing of virgin prarie, 7) economic cycles and patterns, affecting lending, loan conditions, ag market conditions, 8) the response of farmers -- as crop prices fell, they planted more -- because this was their only source of income, and their pattern (or antipattern) was to try what hadn't worked, but harder. The results were staggering. From 1934-40 depending on the area, but most especially over the Oklahoma Panhandle and surrounding regions, crops were lost, families bankrupted, farms reposessed, banks failed, telephone companies failed. And up to 75% of topsoil, a one-time bounty that accumulates at the rate of a few inches per century, was lost. Only 25% of the lost land productivity was recovered. Human hubris in the face of humble dirt is a category error.
- JoeAltmaier 10y ago
  That said, in modern farming the topsoil is just a medium. Its nutritional properties are largely irrelevant with the advent of ammonia fertilizer. As my old Dad said, his best crop came from an eroded clay hillside.
nikdaheratik 10y ago
All good points, but I believe the goal of the article was to try and survey all the tech changes that have been happening in Ag the past 10-15 years and it was already pushing the word cap for a single magazine article. I suppose if they had skipped genetics, aquaculture, and maybe underground gardening they would have had more room to focus on soil and plants. But that may have been a different kind of article at that point.
- repliculture 10y ago
  I agree that they were going for more of a survey of recent developments approach, but my perception is that they consistently overemphasize the tech as a panacea. Unfortunately that occurs quite often when tech solutions are presented - proponents address one component of the greater agricultural sustainability question but ignore all other factors. In the case of agroecosystems, those factors are incredibly relevant. that said, I definitely acknowledge your point about the word count.
Jedd 10y ago
Yes, the article is very much about agriculture, and all its attendant woes. But we're not likely to see any story about a permaculture robot soon. Several years ago I started to (on paper) design a system to merely plan and track a permaculture-style farm/environment - and then abandoned it due to complexity beyond my capacity to model. Monocultures in comparison are painfully simple things to manage - part of why they're so successful (commercially, at least).
- repliculture 10y ago
  I agree completely. That said, even in row-crop systems there's an incredible amount that could be done to build in more functional ecological complexity. For example, see Matt liebman's work at Iowa State.
- TaylorAlexander 10y ago
  All I want to do is design robots for sustainable small and medium scale agriculture. I've been working on robotics my whole life, and am very interested in 3D printed robotics. I've designed a proof of concept 3D printed remote control car [1] and I think it could be possible to design a good robot for agricultural applications that people can build and repair themselves. I design open source electronics for robotics and think we'd all be better off if we owned shares in a community farm, and I want to make that kind of thing possible. 3.5 billion people on this Earth are poor farmers. If we can design functional open source agricultural robots that can be built by anyone with access to a $300 3D printer (and I think we can) we could have a bigger impact on the world than every new Silicon Valley startup from 2016. There is a serious issue with the fact that capitalists don't make things for poor people, because they can't afford to buy the solutions. [2] I don't want that to stop me though, so I'm working hard to figure out ways of funding this project that are functional even in our capitalist world. I think I spend more time thinking about economics and social systems than I do about robotics, since the technical solutions are trivial compared to the problem of getting people to fund valuable non-profitable work. But I think that is possible too. Right now I am working at a robotics startup and solving problems like 3D perception, behavior, team management, handling my own bullshit, etc. My 10 year plan is to have a functioning system for homesteading with robots. I'm really trying to make this happen. [1] http://makezine.com/projects/3d-print-badass-rc-race-car/ http://makezine.com/projects/3d-print-badass-rc-race-car/ [2] http://tlalexander.com/restless/ http://tlalexander.com/restless/
fanquake 10y ago
Could you expand a bit more on what you'd like to see in a whole-systems redesign? I'm currently trying to work out what is going to be the next "evolution" in our farms operation (~10000acres in Western Australia). In regards to your 4th point, our cropping systems in Australia are a bit different to the states. We already grow crops in a rotation, Wheat, Lupins (Nitrogen fixing) and Canola. Depending on where your farming your might also be growing cover/summer crops.
- repliculture 10y ago
  Great to see some folks from WA on here. I know that a university consortium (possibly spearheaded by CSIRO) advertised recently for a new precision ag initiative there. I know one person who applied, who, if he is awarded the project, will undoubtedly implement some interesting projects in your region. For a whole-systems re-design, I think that beyond just tailoring genetics, nutrition, and herbicides to site-specific conditions, we need to be thinking about all of the interspecific interactions, spatial designs, and other natural processes that we can be harnessing. For example, we're currently constrained to operate farm machinery in a grid, or perhaps on contours. One way to improve that would be to start adding complexity to the grid. On a simple level, you could have one row of grains and one row of pulses as a means of breaking up pest migration. Slightly more complex would be to use intercropping or to perhaps co-locate crops that provide pollination services, moisture storage, or other benefits to each other. More complex would be to start using trap crops more frequently or taking advantage of natural seed predators with interspersed natural vegetation. Even more would be to incorporate trees (agroforestry) not only on the edges of the field but also within the field. Finally, once machinery is sufficiently sophisticated and the logistical hurdles are surmounted, you could break away from the grid pattern and start experimenting with other configurations such as concencentric circles or other shapes - the possibilities are endless. We do grow crops in rotation in the states, although more in some locations than in others (about 15% of farmers where I'm from in Montana use pulses rotated with grains). Cover crops are a great option, though of course in dryland semi-arid regions early termination to prevent moisture losses is always an issue.
  - fanquake 10y ago
JulianMorrison 10y ago
Vertical farms don't need to worry about pests, weeds or blights and they put the crops right by the users, in the city outskirts. So that seems like a major part of the answer.
- JoeAltmaier 10y ago
  Don't follow. Pests, weeds and blight don't care where you put the crops. They can happen anywhere.
  - JulianMorrison 10y ago
    Weeds, pests and blight cannot penetrate a sealed enclosure with a filtered, positive pressure air supply. A vertical farm would be a clean room and quite possibly not operated by humans at all, but by robots that don't have to go in and out and be decontaminated.

dredmorbius 10y ago

The story of soil is a tremendously powerful one. Ken Burns The Dust Bowl is re-airing currently (it was originally broadcast in 2012). It tells the story of the combined impacts of: 1) massive immigration onto the high western prarie, 2) mechanised agriculture, 3) hitting a period of higher rainfall, initially, 4) a false belief that "rain follows the plow", 5) intensive crop development, 6) deep plowing of virgin prarie, 7) economic cycles and patterns, affecting lending, loan conditions, ag market conditions, 8) the response of farmers -- as crop prices fell, they planted more -- because this was their only source of income, and their pattern (or antipattern) was to try what hadn't worked, but harder. The results were staggering. From 1934-40 depending on the area, but most especially over the Oklahoma Panhandle and surrounding regions, crops were lost, families bankrupted, farms reposessed, banks failed, telephone companies failed. And up to 75% of topsoil, a one-time bounty that accumulates at the rate of a few inches per century, was lost. Only 25% of the lost land productivity was recovered. Human hubris in the face of humble dirt is a category error.

JoeAltmaier 10y ago
That said, in modern farming the topsoil is just a medium. Its nutritional properties are largely irrelevant with the advent of ammonia fertilizer. As my old Dad said, his best crop came from an eroded clay hillside.

nikdaheratik 10y ago

All good points, but I believe the goal of the article was to try and survey all the tech changes that have been happening in Ag the past 10-15 years and it was already pushing the word cap for a single magazine article. I suppose if they had skipped genetics, aquaculture, and maybe underground gardening they would have had more room to focus on soil and plants. But that may have been a different kind of article at that point.

repliculture 10y ago
I agree that they were going for more of a survey of recent developments approach, but my perception is that they consistently overemphasize the tech as a panacea. Unfortunately that occurs quite often when tech solutions are presented - proponents address one component of the greater agricultural sustainability question but ignore all other factors. In the case of agroecosystems, those factors are incredibly relevant. that said, I definitely acknowledge your point about the word count.

Jedd 10y ago

Yes, the article is very much about agriculture, and all its attendant woes. But we're not likely to see any story about a permaculture robot soon. Several years ago I started to (on paper) design a system to merely plan and track a permaculture-style farm/environment - and then abandoned it due to complexity beyond my capacity to model. Monocultures in comparison are painfully simple things to manage - part of why they're so successful (commercially, at least).

repliculture 10y ago
I agree completely. That said, even in row-crop systems there's an incredible amount that could be done to build in more functional ecological complexity. For example, see Matt liebman's work at Iowa State.
TaylorAlexander 10y ago
All I want to do is design robots for sustainable small and medium scale agriculture. I've been working on robotics my whole life, and am very interested in 3D printed robotics. I've designed a proof of concept 3D printed remote control car [1] and I think it could be possible to design a good robot for agricultural applications that people can build and repair themselves. I design open source electronics for robotics and think we'd all be better off if we owned shares in a community farm, and I want to make that kind of thing possible. 3.5 billion people on this Earth are poor farmers. If we can design functional open source agricultural robots that can be built by anyone with access to a $300 3D printer (and I think we can) we could have a bigger impact on the world than every new Silicon Valley startup from 2016. There is a serious issue with the fact that capitalists don't make things for poor people, because they can't afford to buy the solutions. [2] I don't want that to stop me though, so I'm working hard to figure out ways of funding this project that are functional even in our capitalist world. I think I spend more time thinking about economics and social systems than I do about robotics, since the technical solutions are trivial compared to the problem of getting people to fund valuable non-profitable work. But I think that is possible too. Right now I am working at a robotics startup and solving problems like 3D perception, behavior, team management, handling my own bullshit, etc. My 10 year plan is to have a functioning system for homesteading with robots. I'm really trying to make this happen. [1] http://makezine.com/projects/3d-print-badass-rc-race-car/ http://makezine.com/projects/3d-print-badass-rc-race-car/ [2] http://tlalexander.com/restless/ http://tlalexander.com/restless/

fanquake 10y ago

Could you expand a bit more on what you'd like to see in a whole-systems redesign? I'm currently trying to work out what is going to be the next "evolution" in our farms operation (~10000acres in Western Australia). In regards to your 4th point, our cropping systems in Australia are a bit different to the states. We already grow crops in a rotation, Wheat, Lupins (Nitrogen fixing) and Canola. Depending on where your farming your might also be growing cover/summer crops.

repliculture 10y ago
Great to see some folks from WA on here. I know that a university consortium (possibly spearheaded by CSIRO) advertised recently for a new precision ag initiative there. I know one person who applied, who, if he is awarded the project, will undoubtedly implement some interesting projects in your region. For a whole-systems re-design, I think that beyond just tailoring genetics, nutrition, and herbicides to site-specific conditions, we need to be thinking about all of the interspecific interactions, spatial designs, and other natural processes that we can be harnessing. For example, we're currently constrained to operate farm machinery in a grid, or perhaps on contours. One way to improve that would be to start adding complexity to the grid. On a simple level, you could have one row of grains and one row of pulses as a means of breaking up pest migration. Slightly more complex would be to use intercropping or to perhaps co-locate crops that provide pollination services, moisture storage, or other benefits to each other. More complex would be to start using trap crops more frequently or taking advantage of natural seed predators with interspersed natural vegetation. Even more would be to incorporate trees (agroforestry) not only on the edges of the field but also within the field. Finally, once machinery is sufficiently sophisticated and the logistical hurdles are surmounted, you could break away from the grid pattern and start experimenting with other configurations such as concencentric circles or other shapes - the possibilities are endless. We do grow crops in rotation in the states, although more in some locations than in others (about 15% of farmers where I'm from in Montana use pulses rotated with grains). Cover crops are a great option, though of course in dryland semi-arid regions early termination to prevent moisture losses is always an issue.
- fanquake 10y ago

JulianMorrison 10y ago

Vertical farms don't need to worry about pests, weeds or blights and they put the crops right by the users, in the city outskirts. So that seems like a major part of the answer.

JoeAltmaier 10y ago
Don't follow. Pests, weeds and blight don't care where you put the crops. They can happen anywhere.
- JulianMorrison 10y ago
  Weeds, pests and blight cannot penetrate a sealed enclosure with a filtered, positive pressure air supply. A vertical farm would be a clean room and quite possibly not operated by humans at all, but by robots that don't have to go in and out and be decontaminated.