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>we don't have enough land as it is Small farms are more productive per acre [1] even before considering the increased fossil footprint of 'efficient' farms.

>we don't have enough land as it is Small farms are more productive per acre [1] even before considering the increased fossil footprint of 'efficient' farms. >we can't pay for the additional labor small farms need, or food inflation will explode. Additional unskilled jobs might well be worth the tradeoff, particularly for the most vulnerable members of society. >This hopeless romanticism of small organic mom-and-pop farming is misguided. Russia's Dacha model produces something like 60% of the country's food through hobby 'farms' that regular people mostly go to on the weekends. It's not a hard model to replicate, I'm planting a food shrubland in my suburban home. It won't produce a large part of my food budget but it'll certainly be resource-positive as opposed to a lawn. My labour inputs I'd spend at a gym otherwise. As work-from-home becomes more normalized, the average garden size will probably increase. The problem isn't economic but cultural. >huge, highly efficient, automated, but also highly regulated farms. That, and veganism. There seems to be a correlation between belief in factory farming and veganism. Those stances align on pathos but diverge on logos and ethos. [1]1https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0304387896004129 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03043...

mantas 4y ago
> Russia's Dacha model Well, the hard part to replicate is destroying economy to force people to use those collective gardens. Shops were next to empty. Commercial variety was non existent. The rigid command economy didn't allow enterprise to address needs. Thus you had 2 ways to have good food - relatives in countryside or your own collective garden lot. It's both economy in culture. Here in Lithuania those gardens survived well into 90s. During the transition, many people went on to do substance farming in addition to day job. Or, if they were unemployed, in exchange of it. But now people work cushy jobs and less and less people do that. It's down to gardening enthusiasts in the young generation. And even then the pattern is completely different. More about trying out exotic stuff for shit and giggles. Rather than aiming for good amount of food and then conserving it for the winter. Energy costs probably make it cheaper to buy jam rather than cook it too...
rmah 4y ago
The linked study uses data from peasant farms in developing economies (Madagascar, India, etc.) from half a century ago or earlier. From the point of view of the west, that it would be measuring the productivity of very very small farms vs very small farms where the vast majority of labor is done by hand. Skimming over the article it seems that it concludes that under pre-mechanized conditions, larger farms have less available labor per unit land area. And that labor per unit land area is an important factor in agricultural productivity. This is hardly a surprise. This is very much not like how farming is done in developed nations or even most developing nations today. And unless you want to force people to live like dirt poor peasants of the past, hopefully won't ever be done again.

mantas 4y ago

> Russia's Dacha model Well, the hard part to replicate is destroying economy to force people to use those collective gardens. Shops were next to empty. Commercial variety was non existent. The rigid command economy didn't allow enterprise to address needs. Thus you had 2 ways to have good food - relatives in countryside or your own collective garden lot. It's both economy in culture. Here in Lithuania those gardens survived well into 90s. During the transition, many people went on to do substance farming in addition to day job. Or, if they were unemployed, in exchange of it. But now people work cushy jobs and less and less people do that. It's down to gardening enthusiasts in the young generation. And even then the pattern is completely different. More about trying out exotic stuff for shit and giggles. Rather than aiming for good amount of food and then conserving it for the winter. Energy costs probably make it cheaper to buy jam rather than cook it too...

rmah 4y ago

The linked study uses data from peasant farms in developing economies (Madagascar, India, etc.) from half a century ago or earlier. From the point of view of the west, that it would be measuring the productivity of very very small farms vs very small farms where the vast majority of labor is done by hand. Skimming over the article it seems that it concludes that under pre-mechanized conditions, larger farms have less available labor per unit land area. And that labor per unit land area is an important factor in agricultural productivity. This is hardly a surprise. This is very much not like how farming is done in developed nations or even most developing nations today. And unless you want to force people to live like dirt poor peasants of the past, hopefully won't ever be done again.