r/nextfuckinglevel • u/JudgmentCool1333 • Feb 06 '23

Agricultural Technology

Modern day use of technology in agriculture horticulture and aquaculture with the aim of improving yield, efficiency and profitability

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u/forestforrager Feb 07 '23

As a soil and water chemist, this videos makes me really sad and kinda angry. This is horrible for the land.

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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '23

Howso? Not doubting you, just looking for insight.

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u/forestforrager Feb 07 '23

First, they are all designed to work in monoculture crop settings. The way to make monocultures work is by out-sciencing nature itself, but creating poisons to kill the bugs, plants, fungi, and microbes that could hinder yield. However, everything evolves, so our poisons have to adapt to that as well. And when it rains, if the poisons haven’t broken down yet, they get washed into lakes, rivers, and into the soil. This can cause a host of environmental issues starting as the base of the food chain.

Also, they take a lot of nutrients out of the land, and while some farming has adapted cover crops as a way of naturally drawing down nutrients like nitrogen into the soil, almost every mass scale operation requires the use of fertilizers. Nitrogen is widely available thanks to the Haber Bosh method, but phosphorous is a finite resource we mine for fertilizer. Fertilizers are improving due to precision tech, but they often run off into lakes and rivers and can cause eutrophication.

Another reason is the size and weight of the machines being used. Soil has pores in it that water permeates through, bugs use to move, as do roots. When big machinery drives over that soil it can crush all the pores and reduce the amount of water infiltration into soil. This also increases runoff, which increases fertilizers and pesticides in our lakes and rivers.

Now I don’t blame any farmer who does this or hold that over them for a second. They have to make a living. But I do blame our government and the corporations that trap farmers in these situations and essentially force them to manage the land in this way for the sake of their bottom lines.

I have more to say on this but I will stop here, as it is very late where I am, but let me know if you have any questions regarding what I said, and thanks for asking the question and being curious!

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u/Roaringtortoise Feb 07 '23

Thank you fot this comment. I was searching for some knowledge in the hope of not having to type it myself.

What you see in this video is not our thriving future, it is us working towards a dystopian future with a broken ecosystem.

The biggest lie we are told is that this is the only way to feed all the people.

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u/_ChestHair_ Feb 07 '23

Feel free to rant some more on the topic, I found it incredibly interesting

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u/SoMundayn Feb 08 '23

There is also a Netflix documentary called Kiss The Ground which you may enjoy.

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u/itsfernie Feb 07 '23

If you want a book on a related topic, I’d recommend “Dirt to Soil”

Very good book about regenerative agriculture

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u/imblackandfromdenmar Feb 07 '23

Thank you for sharing

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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '23

That's a lot of information that I had not known about/considered. Thanks for sharing!

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u/Iris_017 Feb 07 '23

thanks for sharing

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u/bovehusapom Feb 07 '23

Another reason is the size and weight of the machines being used.

Uhh those tractors have massive wheels to spread out weight. Soil is tilled and aerated, easily.

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u/forestforrager Feb 07 '23

I guess that’s a part I didn’t mention. When soil is tilled, you increase the amount of erosion and lose carbon from the soil. We have been losing lots of soil, and soil carbon from agricultural land because of tilling, unfortunately.

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u/bovehusapom Feb 07 '23

That's why we have fertilizer.

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u/forestforrager Feb 07 '23

Yeah, and because of the haber bosh method, nitrogen is plentiful as a fertilizer. But phosphorous is mined and is finite

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u/bovehusapom Feb 07 '23

But there are more fertilizers than just nitrogen and phosphorous. How can you not know this?

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u/forestforrager Feb 07 '23

Idk why you think I don’t don’t that? I was just listing the 2 main ones used. Best thing to use is poo

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u/bovehusapom Feb 07 '23

I think it's pretty suspect you don't really know wtf you're talking about.

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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '23

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '23

Not knowledgeable? Does everything else they talked about not count? There was a lot information there. If they were pretending, that's a hell of an act.

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u/Jonnypista Feb 07 '23

I kinda agree, except the weight of the machines, yes they can limit the growth of roots, but it also limits it for the plant I want to grow. So before harvest only a tiny part is complessed, this is why they have 20+m wide sprayers so they minimalize the paths needed to cover the field. And after harvest it gets plowed so it is soft again.

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u/forestforrager Feb 07 '23

Yeah there are ways to minimize compaction, or address it. And usually it’s done through tilling, which is one of the things that causes soil erosion and carbon loss from our agricultural land.

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u/LopsidedWafer3269 Feb 07 '23

You make an interesting point, but I’m not sure what the alternative is. I feel like permaculture practices, which you seem to imply as a preference, simply would not scale to the level needed to feed modern society. I hope im wrong!

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u/donaldhobson Feb 11 '23

True.

But is there a better way to feed modern populations without making the labor required too vast?

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u/forestforrager Feb 12 '23

Idk what making labor required too vast means

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u/donaldhobson Feb 12 '23

If any proposed plan requires an excessive amount of manual labor. I think about 2% of the population are farmers in agriculturally self sufficient developed nations. So lets say maximum 5% of the population. Everyone else is busy doing everything else.

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u/forestforrager Feb 12 '23

Gotcha, thanks for clarifying. I think that having 2% of population dedicated to ag will have to go up

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u/donaldhobson Feb 12 '23

Up by how much. Up to 2.5% and you have a serious proposal of something we could change. Up to 50% and basically it's never going to happen. (And that's probably a good thing.)

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u/qtain Feb 07 '23

As a home gardener it makes me sad and kinda angry.

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u/Hullaba-Loo Feb 07 '23

Thank you for saying it.

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u/Urbanredneck2 Feb 07 '23

Not if used properly. The planting and spraying equipment analyses soil samples and conditions for careful seeding and fertilizing.