6 ms·

The romantic view people have of peasant farms is ruining all discourse about agriculture. I blame the books people read to toddlers. Peasant farms were labor

The romantic view people have of peasant farms is ruining all discourse about agriculture. I blame the books people read to toddlers. Peasant farms were labor intensive, disease ridden, high risk, low reward businesses that shortened lives and ruined families. But somehow for a lot of people this episode in the history of farming is seen as the optimal blueprint for sustainable farming. They ignore the fact that all "successful" examples of small scale circular farming are making their revenue from donations, venues and from "selling" the model. Not from produce.

imtringued 5y ago
Well a lot of conventional farms that are hyperoptimized barely make enough money to get by. It is quite weird how we can't maintain something as basic as food security with a market based economy.
- lobocinza 5y ago
  Farming is an efficient market due to the sheer number of competing agents, that drives the price to be close to the cost. Markets are cyclic. When demand is higher than supply, prices go up, companies profit more and there's incentive for investment. Within time supply exceeds demand and prices go down, so companies barely make enough to pay off and those which are inefficient go broken and are sold, hopefully, to better managers. This is generally a good thing but, of course, food/farming is of public interest. If prices go up those with lower income might struggle to feed themselves. And if prices go down poor farmers might struggle to survive and be forced into selling their land. Thus government intervenes.
  - Retric 5y ago
    What separates poor farmers from say poor food truck owners? The issue with farm subsidies is they don’t actually change profitability long term, they simply result in over production. It’s vastly more efficient to build up a long term storage of surplus say 2 years of corn per American stored at -40C which should last ~100 years. Then let huge swaths of American farmers go bankrupt as you scale back production. This was the basic model hundreds of years ago, they still had famines. Alternatively you can push productivity while paying pay farmers not to produce anything on their land. This keeps them from going bankrupt and requires fewer resources than excess production. We used to do this, it reduces the risk of famine because productivity can be scaled up quickly. Finally you can just massively subsidize production and dump the excess on foreign markets, this is really bad for other countries and costs insane amounts of money and still results in excess production even as everyone gets fat. This is where bio fuels come in. PS: There are also secondary effects as subsidizing farm insurance etc, keeps incompetent farmers in business.
    - giantg2 5y ago
      "There are also secondary effects as subsidizing farm insurance etc, keeps incompetent farmers in business." Any data to back that up? If you're incompetent and your crops repeatedly, then you're not going to be reimbursed enough to make it. "It’s vastly more efficient to build up a long term storage of surplus say 2 years of corn per American stored at -40C which should last ~100 years." Any data to back this up? This is a huge volume. Freezers capable of those temperatures are expensive and consume a lot of energy. "The issue with farm subsidies is they don’t actually change profitability long term, they simply result in over production." I think farm subsidies need to be changed or reduced, but for a slightly different reason. We are basically subsidizing other countries. A lot of our grains get exported, basically sending the fruits of those tax dollars overseas.
      - Retric 5y ago
        > incompetence It’s not that people are completely incompetent it’s that some people are better at getting subsidies vs growing food. Essentially subsidies add a parallel skill set which becomes valuable but reduces the impact of being an inefficient farmer. I don’t have hard data, but have been told about people who are better at one side or the other. > Any data to back this up. The freezing thing was actually from a study I read. Ultra large freezers are very energy efficient via classic square vs cube scaling. The freezer loses energy on the surface and needs insulation along the surface while it and stores inside the volume. Energy costs of shipping vs colder climate etc. The idea was a FIFO system along a circular storage system, but I don’t recall all the details.
        freeqaz 5y ago
        Re: Freezers, yeah, I agree with this. Volume to surface area doesn't scale linearly[0], so you can build something like a giant sphere or cylinder and lose a relatively small amount of energy. Commercial freezers are also frequently built with vacuum-insulated panels[1] which have very low thermal conductivity. It's not crazy to build something very large, like a grain silo, to hold dried grain at a low temperature. That seems fairly plausible as a way to reliably "turn off" subsidies over time. It sort of reminds me of the strategic oil reserve[2] in the US. Similar idea (boring holes in the earth cheaply via using water to etch into giant salt deposits) 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface-area-to-volume_ratio https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface-area-to-volume_ratio 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_insulated_panel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_insulated_panel 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Petroleum_Reserve_(United_States) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Petroleum_Reserve_(U...
- FpUser 5y ago
  >"It is quite weird how we can't maintain something as basic as food security with a market based economy." Because people at the top need other people making them money rather than revolting.
- fennecfoxen 5y ago
  > It is quite weird how we can't maintain something as basic as food security with a market based economy We can't? Where's the famine? News to me. Last I checked we still have way more food than we know what to do with (massive worldwide fertilizer shortages and inflation notwithstanding).
- Aunche 5y ago
  Depends on what you mean by food security. We're guarenteed to have enough food without crop subsidies. We would just import a lot more than we export. The government seems that as a national security risk.
  - spiderfarmer 5y ago
    And rightly so. You can't immediately switch to domestic supply in case of supply issues and utter chaos is just 2 meals away.
leethargo 5y ago
Similar with the artificial battle front between organic vs conventional/industrial, where each side claims the solution to sustainable food production, but no common ground is allowed. By the way, not all children's books are equally naive. We've recently found a nice one [1] (in German) which shows small- and large-scale farms side-by-side, in a brutally honest way (including butchering). [1] https://www.amazon.com/Wo-kommt-unser-Essen-her/dp/3407758162 https://www.amazon.com/Wo-kommt-unser-Essen-her/dp/340775816...
- dillonkp 5y ago
  This looks like a great book! Getting back to refreshing my dormant German, have any other good books like this? - Thanks!
  - leethargo 5y ago
    If you're looking for similar books with realistic depictions of agriculture: No, that was a lucky find in the library. In case you just want to practice German with media for children, I always recommend "Die Sendung mit der Maus" [1]. It's a mix of short animated stories with "how it's made" features, where they go filming in factories etc. [1] https://www.wdrmaus.de/aktuelle-sendung/ https://www.wdrmaus.de/aktuelle-sendung/
    - dillonkp 5y ago
      Thanks for the resource! I will definitely check it out.
giantg2 5y ago
What was that one on Netflix that sold organic specialty produce to restaurants in Chicago? I thought that one was profitable without any sort of assistance. Either way, we have several examples of local "peasant" farms, some organic, that do well.
- spiderfarmer 5y ago
  They got a lot of exposure, even before Netflix. Now their model is to milk the brand they built. That's not traditional farming, that's marketing wrapped in farming.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    Yeah, but if I remember correctly, actual farm operations were profitable, right? The marketing is just extra, or what it evolved into. Don't get me wrong - small farms are a lot of work. For the most part, at least one member of the family has to have an outside job with benefits just due to healthcare costs. But it can make some money. I hope to have a small farm as a "retirement" plan. It would mostly be an apiary for the commercial portion, maybe with some log and block grown mushrooms. Then the rest would likely be for personal use. Obviously the major costs like the initial land and health insurance would come from savings, so it would be mostly supplemental income to an already solid retirement plan. I don't think it will happen though. I assume the biggest draw is the lifestyle ideals. It seems a common dream on this community. Maybe because we're tired of building some intangible thing or some app that nobody really needs, and want to have a physical job with meaningful produce.
    - dahfizz 5y ago
      > I assume the biggest draw is the lifestyle ideals. A lot of people who have never physically worked a day in their life like the idea of hard labor. After a week of hard labor, they would decide to take up woodworking instead.
      - giantg2 5y ago
AniseAbyss 5y ago
My country is one of the biggest agricultural exporters in the world yet less than 1% of the population works in the farming industry. Farming is what drives all the mechanization and robotics research.
- otikik 5y ago
  > Farming is what drives all the mechanization and robotics research I don't doubt it is a big drive, but wouldn't the military take the biggest portion of that cake?

imtringued 5y ago

Well a lot of conventional farms that are hyperoptimized barely make enough money to get by. It is quite weird how we can't maintain something as basic as food security with a market based economy.

lobocinza 5y ago
Farming is an efficient market due to the sheer number of competing agents, that drives the price to be close to the cost. Markets are cyclic. When demand is higher than supply, prices go up, companies profit more and there's incentive for investment. Within time supply exceeds demand and prices go down, so companies barely make enough to pay off and those which are inefficient go broken and are sold, hopefully, to better managers. This is generally a good thing but, of course, food/farming is of public interest. If prices go up those with lower income might struggle to feed themselves. And if prices go down poor farmers might struggle to survive and be forced into selling their land. Thus government intervenes.
- Retric 5y ago
  What separates poor farmers from say poor food truck owners? The issue with farm subsidies is they don’t actually change profitability long term, they simply result in over production. It’s vastly more efficient to build up a long term storage of surplus say 2 years of corn per American stored at -40C which should last ~100 years. Then let huge swaths of American farmers go bankrupt as you scale back production. This was the basic model hundreds of years ago, they still had famines. Alternatively you can push productivity while paying pay farmers not to produce anything on their land. This keeps them from going bankrupt and requires fewer resources than excess production. We used to do this, it reduces the risk of famine because productivity can be scaled up quickly. Finally you can just massively subsidize production and dump the excess on foreign markets, this is really bad for other countries and costs insane amounts of money and still results in excess production even as everyone gets fat. This is where bio fuels come in. PS: There are also secondary effects as subsidizing farm insurance etc, keeps incompetent farmers in business.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    "There are also secondary effects as subsidizing farm insurance etc, keeps incompetent farmers in business." Any data to back that up? If you're incompetent and your crops repeatedly, then you're not going to be reimbursed enough to make it. "It’s vastly more efficient to build up a long term storage of surplus say 2 years of corn per American stored at -40C which should last ~100 years." Any data to back this up? This is a huge volume. Freezers capable of those temperatures are expensive and consume a lot of energy. "The issue with farm subsidies is they don’t actually change profitability long term, they simply result in over production." I think farm subsidies need to be changed or reduced, but for a slightly different reason. We are basically subsidizing other countries. A lot of our grains get exported, basically sending the fruits of those tax dollars overseas.
    - Retric 5y ago
      > incompetence It’s not that people are completely incompetent it’s that some people are better at getting subsidies vs growing food. Essentially subsidies add a parallel skill set which becomes valuable but reduces the impact of being an inefficient farmer. I don’t have hard data, but have been told about people who are better at one side or the other. > Any data to back this up. The freezing thing was actually from a study I read. Ultra large freezers are very energy efficient via classic square vs cube scaling. The freezer loses energy on the surface and needs insulation along the surface while it and stores inside the volume. Energy costs of shipping vs colder climate etc. The idea was a FIFO system along a circular storage system, but I don’t recall all the details.
      - freeqaz 5y ago
        Re: Freezers, yeah, I agree with this. Volume to surface area doesn't scale linearly[0], so you can build something like a giant sphere or cylinder and lose a relatively small amount of energy. Commercial freezers are also frequently built with vacuum-insulated panels[1] which have very low thermal conductivity. It's not crazy to build something very large, like a grain silo, to hold dried grain at a low temperature. That seems fairly plausible as a way to reliably "turn off" subsidies over time. It sort of reminds me of the strategic oil reserve[2] in the US. Similar idea (boring holes in the earth cheaply via using water to etch into giant salt deposits) 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface-area-to-volume_ratio https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface-area-to-volume_ratio 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_insulated_panel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_insulated_panel 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Petroleum_Reserve_(United_States) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_Petroleum_Reserve_(U...
FpUser 5y ago
>"It is quite weird how we can't maintain something as basic as food security with a market based economy." Because people at the top need other people making them money rather than revolting.
fennecfoxen 5y ago
> It is quite weird how we can't maintain something as basic as food security with a market based economy We can't? Where's the famine? News to me. Last I checked we still have way more food than we know what to do with (massive worldwide fertilizer shortages and inflation notwithstanding).
Aunche 5y ago
Depends on what you mean by food security. We're guarenteed to have enough food without crop subsidies. We would just import a lot more than we export. The government seems that as a national security risk.
- spiderfarmer 5y ago
  And rightly so. You can't immediately switch to domestic supply in case of supply issues and utter chaos is just 2 meals away.

leethargo 5y ago

Similar with the artificial battle front between organic vs conventional/industrial, where each side claims the solution to sustainable food production, but no common ground is allowed. By the way, not all children's books are equally naive. We've recently found a nice one [1] (in German) which shows small- and large-scale farms side-by-side, in a brutally honest way (including butchering). [1] https://www.amazon.com/Wo-kommt-unser-Essen-her/dp/3407758162 https://www.amazon.com/Wo-kommt-unser-Essen-her/dp/340775816...

dillonkp 5y ago
This looks like a great book! Getting back to refreshing my dormant German, have any other good books like this? - Thanks!
- leethargo 5y ago
  If you're looking for similar books with realistic depictions of agriculture: No, that was a lucky find in the library. In case you just want to practice German with media for children, I always recommend "Die Sendung mit der Maus" [1]. It's a mix of short animated stories with "how it's made" features, where they go filming in factories etc. [1] https://www.wdrmaus.de/aktuelle-sendung/ https://www.wdrmaus.de/aktuelle-sendung/
  - dillonkp 5y ago
    Thanks for the resource! I will definitely check it out.

giantg2 5y ago

What was that one on Netflix that sold organic specialty produce to restaurants in Chicago? I thought that one was profitable without any sort of assistance. Either way, we have several examples of local "peasant" farms, some organic, that do well.

spiderfarmer 5y ago
They got a lot of exposure, even before Netflix. Now their model is to milk the brand they built. That's not traditional farming, that's marketing wrapped in farming.
- giantg2 5y ago
  Yeah, but if I remember correctly, actual farm operations were profitable, right? The marketing is just extra, or what it evolved into. Don't get me wrong - small farms are a lot of work. For the most part, at least one member of the family has to have an outside job with benefits just due to healthcare costs. But it can make some money. I hope to have a small farm as a "retirement" plan. It would mostly be an apiary for the commercial portion, maybe with some log and block grown mushrooms. Then the rest would likely be for personal use. Obviously the major costs like the initial land and health insurance would come from savings, so it would be mostly supplemental income to an already solid retirement plan. I don't think it will happen though. I assume the biggest draw is the lifestyle ideals. It seems a common dream on this community. Maybe because we're tired of building some intangible thing or some app that nobody really needs, and want to have a physical job with meaningful produce.
  - dahfizz 5y ago
    > I assume the biggest draw is the lifestyle ideals. A lot of people who have never physically worked a day in their life like the idea of hard labor. After a week of hard labor, they would decide to take up woodworking instead.
    - giantg2 5y ago

AniseAbyss 5y ago

My country is one of the biggest agricultural exporters in the world yet less than 1% of the population works in the farming industry. Farming is what drives all the mechanization and robotics research.

otikik 5y ago
> Farming is what drives all the mechanization and robotics research I don't doubt it is a big drive, but wouldn't the military take the biggest portion of that cake?