Source: Dahlberg, K.A. 1991. Sustainable agriculture -- fad or harbinger? BioScience 41:337-339.

"Sustainable agriculture" was a new buzzword with agricultural developers at the time this paper was written, but it seemed that many organizations such as the World Bank and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) adopted the phrase without fully recognizing the depth of its meaning. In fact, many organizations using the term "sustainable agriculture" have very different approaches and goals, leading to much confusion as to what the term really means and how it affects the future direction of agriculture. In "Sustainable Agriculture--Fad or Harbinger?" Kenneth Dahlberg first defines sustainability and then comments on the issues that this definition raises for economics, ecology, ethics, and equity. Dahlberg's intent is to stimulate consideration of these issues as well as to deliberate on how agriculture must respond to changes in population, climate, and resource availability. Change in current agricultural practices are necessary. The recent failure of large-scale, centralized, industrial farming systems such as those in the Soviet Union or Eastern Europe are clear indicators that agricultural systems dependent on fossil fuels with high social and environmental costs are at a high risk of collapse. According to Dahlberg, for a system to be sustainable, not only must it reduce the farmer's costs and the environmental effects of high-input practices, but also the system must have the following three qualities: (1) it must be ecologically based and not destroy its natural resource base, (2) it must incorporate humankind's relationship to future generations and to other species, (3) and it must be equitable. For agriculture to progress within this definition, both farmers and the bureaucracies that govern them need to change many of their policies and attitudes. Subsidies, tax codes, and cheap food policies that favor an industrial approach to agriculture will need to be altered, as will present attitudes about humankind's relationship with nature. It is important to note the fact that Dahlberg's definition of a sustainable system incorporates not only agricultural factors, but economic, social, and cultural factors as well. He concludes that sustainability emphasizes "the need for smaller-scale social and technological systems built around healthy local communities and agroecosystems."

Abstract Author: Katie Granger, 25 October 1995.

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