Food

[Henry Krinkle]

Yes, I would recognise most of British farming as intensive. Most of Western Europe’s farming, for that matter - and increasingly the farming of former Soviet bloc countries such as Poland.

This is intensive farming regardless of the size of the farm. Small farms want to maximise yields as much as big farms. As far as arable is concerned, there are probably few exceptions.

Livestock farming for grazing animals is ‘traditional’ as far as I can tell - animals in the fields, rotated from one pasture to the next. Some is subsidised, such as hill farmers raising sheep. It’s considered important to preserve it for socio-cultural reasons. I have sheep pasture at the end of my garden and the farmer’s practices look entirely traditional. I’ve never seen chemical fertiliser applied to the grass. I’d probably recognise if it was because I once helped apply tons of the stuff to barley fields...

Intensive farming has certainly had an effect on wildlife over the years. Fewer insects, fewer birds. There’s also no doubt that some of the Nitram I applied to barley fields ran off into streams. Slurry from the dairy farm I worked on will also have leached into streams.

The good news is that things are less bad than they were. From WWII up to the 90s ‘intensive’ was virtually synonymous with ‘efficient’, and efficient was good in a densely populated island. I don’t follow these things closely, but know that most farmers are open to less intensive methods - and that there’s some evidence of that in wildlife diversity. The bad news round here is that you’re more likely to have May Bugs fizzing at your head like erratic bullets. They’re definitely on the increase and it’s directly related to the reduced use of pesticides.

I have no problem with intensive farming, as long as there are suitable controls in place. We probably need it to feed ourselves, especially as the world’s fertile acreage is likely to decline.

I am quite sure I don't know what you mean by arable farming. In Canada it simply means any field suitable for ploughing and growing crops. That is not what I mean by factory farming or intensive farming.
Without a doubt we have too great a population on earth to support itself by traditional farming methods. If we accept that the earth should support 7 or 8 billion of us there is an absolute need for intensive farming and all that goes with it: fertilizers and pesticides for both organic and non-organic intensive farming. It also means the continued need for GMOs. I simply prefer my food grown locally, by people I know and trust.