Quiz Review - Food Production & Distribution Flashcards
List examples illustrating the connection between ecosystem health and human health
Ex. ecosystem goods and services, diet and nutrition factors
Ex. Good soils produce nutritious crops which make humans healthy when consumed.
Define the dimensions of sustainability and provide an example of how the dimensions depend on one another in the “food problem”
Economy: In the past, we have given greater importance to the economic implications of food production but in a healthy ecosystem, the cost of food will include externalities on the community and environment
Environment: How food is produced greatly impacts the environment. In a healthy ecosystem, crops are rotated and soil doesn’t erode. Use of pesticides and fertilizer also damage the environment.
Community: When foods are produced using pesticides, these chemicals end up in the blood streams of humans. This can cause medical concerns down the road. These cost money, and therefore, relate to “economy”.
What was the ‘post-war’ task, the root problem, and its relationship to today?
The “post-war” task was an initiative to produce more food to feed growing populations. The problem was that in doing so, soils were abused and over-farmed. Today, this misuse of soil is why we have rampant soil erosion and increased difficulty in agriculture.
Describe the epiphany Aldo Leopold had after his experience on the mountain … and how it links to environmental and even human health.
He was on a mountain to kill the wolves. Had an epiphany while looking into the eyes of a dieing wolf. Wolves eat deer so when the population of wolves decreased, the populations of deer would dramatically increase. This would cause their food supply (plants) to be all eaten. This would cause root decay and thus soil erosion. A lot of soil erosion would cause the mountains to become bare.
What was significant about Howard and “Post-war Task”?
Howard was one of the first who saw the root cause of poor health as the poor treatment and undernourishment of soils. He suggested that to nourish the soil, increased gardens, compost, and a balance of plants and animals were needed
Who was Malthus and what was his ‘nightmare’?
He believed that growth in human populations will exceed the food supply growth, thus leading to global starvation.
Why have past societies collapsed?
- Deforestation
- Soil Erosion
- Climate Change
- Overpopulation
What is carrying capacity? Ecological footprints?
Carrying capacity is the size of the population that an area can hold.
What is Ecological footprints? How does footprint size change as a function of population transitions, or, total population?
Measure of human demand on the Earth’s ecosystems. Using this assessment, it is possible to estimate how much of the Earth (or how many planet Earths) it would take to support humanity if everybody followed a given lifestyle.
As populations moves from developing to developed, the amount of resources consumed increases dramatically. This increases the number of planets required should everyone in the world have that same lifestyle.
Define what a food system is?
A food system is the processes and infrastructure involved in feeding a population (Growing, harvesting, processing, packaging, transporting, marketing, consumption, and disposal). Includes the inputs needed and outputs generated at each step.
List the earth’s major ecosystems, especially agroecosystems and freshwater systems.
Grasslands Forests Lakes and ponds Rivers, streams and springs Wetlands
Define agroecology.
The study of ecological processes that operate in agricultural production systems. Often referred to as:
- A science
- A movement
- A collection of practices
What is ecological literacy?
It is the ability to understand the natural systems that make life on earth possible. To be ecoliterate means understanding the principles of organization of ecosystems and using those principles for creating sustainable human communities.
What are ecosystem goods? Services?
Definition: the benefits arising from the ecological functions of healthy ecosystems. Such benefits accrue to all living organisms, including animals and plants, rather than to humans alone
Ecological Goods: clean air, and abundant fresh water.
Ecological Services: purification of air and water, maintenance of biodiversity, decomposition of wastes, soil and vegetation generation and renewal, pollination of crops and natural vegetation, groundwater recharge through wetlands, seed dispersal, greenhouse gas mitigation, and aesthetically pleasing landscapes.
What is ecosystem resilience or resistance? How are these different?
Resistance: is the ability of the ecosystem to work with change present
Resilience: is the ability of the ecosystem to rebound after a large change occurs
Using your ecological literacy, explain how some action in an ecosystem is a tradeoff: dam a river, apply a herbicide, fertilizer on a lawn.
Dam a River: Flooding kills plants and removes any animal life once present. Slowing of river might reduce water depth and kill of fish downstream.
Apply a Herbicide: Fewer songbirds because the bugs attracted to these plants will no longer come. Also, soil erosion due to root depletion.
Fertilize a Lawn: More winter fish kills because fertilizer gets into sewer systems and flows into water sources. When surface water freezes in winter, this fertilizer concentrated water becomes toxic for fish.
Why are resources like land, soil and water particularly important in agroecosystems?
Land: Provide protection from pests. Brings pollinators and insectivores. Provide humus to re-nourish soils. Nitrogen storage
Soils: Provide water storage, air delivery, mineral delivery, support to plants
Water: Nutrients flow into plant through water. Hydrates plants. Water availability controls stomates which control CO2 collection
What factors are driving ecological footprints of people in developed countries? Developing?
Developed: Transportation , food, shelter and goods
Developing: Shelter drives ecological footprint
What did Wendell Berry mean when he wrote we “unsettled America”? How does a food producer who is an ‘extractor’ behave differently from another who is a ‘nurturer’? What does he suggest is a main solution to this problem?
When the colonists settled America, they were exploiters of the resources and the land. “Culture was changed much faster then the change could be adjusted to” and therefore, it unsettled the natural way in which things were.
Extractors: goal is money, profit; earn as much with as little as possible; typically serves an institution/organization; things in terms of numbers and quantities
Nurture: goal is health (land, own, family, community); Expects to work hard for living; thinks in terms of “character, condition, quality, kind”;
Solution: Avoid governments who promise affluence, comfort, and leisure indefinitely; Seek “Domestic permanence” of the land by shared ownership and being connected to local farmers.
Why are we ecologically illiterate?
- Narrow Disciplines, specialization
- Too much education indoors
- Low capacity for aesthetic appreciation
- Political suicide for challenging status quo
For a specific sustainability issue, like soil loss or deforestation, demonstrate your ecological literacy by explaining something of the speed or magnitude or trend of the issue
In 50 years,
- 20% of topsoil lost
- 20% of agricultural land lost
- 1/3 of forests lost
What is sustainable agriculture, how might it apply differently to industrialized agriculture as opposed to the ideas of agroecology?
Sustainable Agriculture: integrates three main goals:
1) Environment Stewardship
2) Farm Profitability
3) Prosperous Farming Communities
Industrialized Agriculture: Use of methods to reduce soil erosion, increase water use efficiency, increase nitrogen use efficiency, and introduce integrated pest management (IPM) systems
Agroecology: Taking ecological principles and applying them to the design and management of sustainable agroecosystems. Modeling farm like an ecosystem (forest, plain, etc.)
What are externalized costs? Internalized (direct) costs? Why are they important?
Externalized Costs: the side-effect costs of economic activity that are not accounted in market price of a product/process.
Internalized Costs: Costs directly attributable to a product, such as transportation, labor, materials/raw ingredients, and the land necessary to produce.
Important because they are real and yet, often forgotten. Properly attributing external costs to the price of food could incentive behavior change in food production.
How do subsidies (incentives) relate to externalized costs?
If we properly attribute externalized costs of food to the actual purchase price of food, then we would change our food purchasing habits and the very system used to produce food.
Ex. Pay for increased Nitrogen use, subsidize on water use efficiency
