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The LA example is interesting, I'd be interested in seeing a more detailed breakdown of what exactly they grew because pounds of food aren't exactly fungible (a

The LA example is interesting, I'd be interested in seeing a more detailed breakdown of what exactly they grew because pounds of food aren't exactly fungible (a pound of lettuce has 77 calories, a pound of potatoes has ~350). From some back of the napkin math, it seems that current farming techniques yield about 50,000 pounds of potatoes per acre, so on the 1/10 acre scale in terms of vegetable matter they outpace the LA farm (though this will vary by crop. It might make more sense to compare calories per acre). I think you have a point, it's certainly worth looking into whether the gains from more labor-intensive farming are greater than the cost of labor when adopted en masse.

msandford 12y ago
It might also make sense to look at it from a gallons of fuel per acre too. Even if you only break even in terms of production, if you can eliminate the reliance on diesel and all the compromises that must be made there might be substantial wins nonetheless. For example as farming gets more labor intensive you can do things like cut steps into a hill to stop erosion or to till and plant always perpendicular to the slope of the hill so that there aren't any easy channels for runoff to head downhill. I've read that in the US there are 9 calories of fuel in every 1 calorie of food delivered to the table. In other places around the world, it's more like 1 calorie of fuel to every 1 calorie of food. In other words, many places are turning fuel directly into food on a 1:1 basis. It takes us 9 times as much fuel to make food, which is pretty friggin awful. If you don't mind that he's an outspoken, right-wing, traditional Christian kinda guy Joel Salatin has some very interesting ideas about getting a lot of use out of land with very, very little fuel and not much feed input. Here's one video but there are tons more in the sidebar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13i1ZUovj6Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13i1ZUovj6Y

msandford 12y ago

It might also make sense to look at it from a gallons of fuel per acre too. Even if you only break even in terms of production, if you can eliminate the reliance on diesel and all the compromises that must be made there might be substantial wins nonetheless. For example as farming gets more labor intensive you can do things like cut steps into a hill to stop erosion or to till and plant always perpendicular to the slope of the hill so that there aren't any easy channels for runoff to head downhill. I've read that in the US there are 9 calories of fuel in every 1 calorie of food delivered to the table. In other places around the world, it's more like 1 calorie of fuel to every 1 calorie of food. In other words, many places are turning fuel directly into food on a 1:1 basis. It takes us 9 times as much fuel to make food, which is pretty friggin awful. If you don't mind that he's an outspoken, right-wing, traditional Christian kinda guy Joel Salatin has some very interesting ideas about getting a lot of use out of land with very, very little fuel and not much feed input. Here's one video but there are tons more in the sidebar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13i1ZUovj6Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13i1ZUovj6Y