Well, as long as the top soil doesn't run out (we are blessed in that regard), and the fuel and chemical stay cheap, and the bugs don't become resistant to our pesticides... then, yes: for us - for the foreseeable future - it's more productive and cost effective.
But, there are some big assumptions underlying that conclusion:
1) Cheap oil and chemical feedstocks. Absent that, the economics of the operation change drastically.
2) Subsidies. Without the massive taxpayer-paid subsidies of commodity crops in the US, Europe, etc.... then more land becomes 'economically marginal' under the current regime... profits thinner (the cost of fuel more of a factor, etc.)
3) Effectiveness of pesticides. If pests become resistant (as they always are), or new chemically-derived pesticides/herbicides are not permitted because of down-stream' harm to the environment, then one leg of the tripod that supports our farming practices weakens... and loses a little of it's economic edge. (Such a fight is being fought out now over a chlorinated Bromine pesticide - which, like freon, depletes the ozone layer for hundreds of years, but growers maintain there is no commercial substitute for.)
4) Biotechnology. Gene-engineered crops may fix their own nitrogen (needing less application of fertilizers)... resist pests through natural pesticides or repellants incorporated into the crop's phenotype... require less water... grow more uniformly, etc., and these developments seem clearly to reduce the traditional need for heavy applications of fertilizers & pesticides - dramatically reducing the inherent economic advantage of highly-mechanized agriculture, too.
And I would say that example #4 above is something that is clearly in the "foreseeable future".... |
