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Calling modern farmers most competent , intelligent, sustainable is an interesting point of view. Agreed it's very hard to blame the farmers because few would s

Calling modern farmers most competent , intelligent, sustainable is an interesting point of view. Agreed it's very hard to blame the farmers because few would survive not scaling out in the current system. Farming tech is far from sustainable. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topsoil#Erosion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topsoil#Erosion And vertical farming, hydroponics is cool tech and RGB LED's are cool to increase size, weight etc for increased profits. None of that has a positive influence on sustainability. There a new phenomenon btw called Herenboeren, http://www.herenboeren.nl/ http://www.herenboeren.nl/, basically crowdfunding, for farmers. This is getting quite some attention. This at least gives me the impression that there's a bigger part of our country starting to see otherwise.

spiderfarmer 9y ago
You are misquoting me. On purpose? Compare our farmers to the rest of the world. Study it. Please tell me in detail how they are not among the most intelligent, competent and sustainable.
- kuschku 9y ago
  Having the lowest standards on raising chickens in western Europe? Check. Far longer allowed caged chicken raising than even Germany? Check. No control at all over the raising process, leading to over a year of time before the fibronil scandal became public? Check. They’re good farmers, but they’re not any better than the industry in other parts of western Europe.
  - spiderfarmer 9y ago
    If Photoshop has a couple of bugs, does that mean Microsoft is better than Adobe when it comes to photo editing software?
gpvos 9y ago
That Herenboeren initiative looks to me like feel-good rubbish, while at WUR issues like sustainability, erosion, etc. seem to me to be addressed in a much more thorough way.
ricardobeat 9y ago
> And vertical farming, hydroponics is cool tech and RGB LED's are cool to increase size, weight etc for increased profits. None of that has a positive influence on sustainability. Did you even bother to read the article? That has massive implications on the amount of water, energy and chemicals used.
- raugustinus 9y ago
  Yeah read the article, and worked with hydroponics for a while. I choose not to eat food grown like this. Squeezing nature for yields is a sure way of depleting your resources. Factory farming like this in reality reduces nutrient levels. But hey I don't believe science is going to save the food chain. Which is why I'm taking my money elsewhere. Regarding the story of feeding the world. How about the West changes their diet? We don't need to go all out right now on farming, we could fix obesity levels, healthcare cost, excess levels of waste before we need that. But that's not cool science, and there's a lot less profit to be made. So I guess that's not what's going to happen.

spiderfarmer 9y ago

You are misquoting me. On purpose? Compare our farmers to the rest of the world. Study it. Please tell me in detail how they are not among the most intelligent, competent and sustainable.

kuschku 9y ago
Having the lowest standards on raising chickens in western Europe? Check. Far longer allowed caged chicken raising than even Germany? Check. No control at all over the raising process, leading to over a year of time before the fibronil scandal became public? Check. They’re good farmers, but they’re not any better than the industry in other parts of western Europe.
- spiderfarmer 9y ago
  If Photoshop has a couple of bugs, does that mean Microsoft is better than Adobe when it comes to photo editing software?

gpvos 9y ago

That Herenboeren initiative looks to me like feel-good rubbish, while at WUR issues like sustainability, erosion, etc. seem to me to be addressed in a much more thorough way.

ricardobeat 9y ago

> And vertical farming, hydroponics is cool tech and RGB LED's are cool to increase size, weight etc for increased profits. None of that has a positive influence on sustainability. Did you even bother to read the article? That has massive implications on the amount of water, energy and chemicals used.

raugustinus 9y ago
Yeah read the article, and worked with hydroponics for a while. I choose not to eat food grown like this. Squeezing nature for yields is a sure way of depleting your resources. Factory farming like this in reality reduces nutrient levels. But hey I don't believe science is going to save the food chain. Which is why I'm taking my money elsewhere. Regarding the story of feeding the world. How about the West changes their diet? We don't need to go all out right now on farming, we could fix obesity levels, healthcare cost, excess levels of waste before we need that. But that's not cool science, and there's a lot less profit to be made. So I guess that's not what's going to happen.