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The Forum > Article Comments > Getting more bang from our crops > Comments

Getting more bang from our crops : Comments

By Tony Fischer, published 21/8/2007

Wheat yields have improved dramatically in the last century: it is imperative to maintain this progress both in Australia and developing countries.

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Rather than wasting time trying to use gene modification to improve crop yields, we need to focus our minds on the fact that we are now past the peak of high grade rock phosphate extraction. A Hubbert linearisation analysis (a method for predicting future extraction of a mineral resource) shows quite clearly that we have now extracted 75% of all the rock phosphate that we will ever extract and that phosphate production levels will be only a minor fraction of current levels within 20 years! See:

http://www.energybulletin.net/33164.html

and

http://www.energybulletin.net/28720.html

This means that we can soon expect declining crop productivity and rapidly escalating food costs (as if steadily uptrending oil prices are not enough). To cope, we need to relocalise agriculture and recycle human and other wastes back to the soil where the food came from. This is not compatible with our current agricultural system.

Remember - there is no substitute for phosphate. Once the rock phosphate has been dispersed (spread on fields, harvested in crops and then flushed down toilets in cities) it is gone forever.

Summary - Modern industrial agriculture - especially cereal production - is doomed within decades due to phosphate and energy shortages and no amount of genetics daydreaming is going solve this problem.
Posted by michael_in_adelaide, Tuesday, 21 August 2007 11:13:21 AM
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Getting more bang from our crops?

Wanna bet? Not without fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides and high tech machinery, all of which are totally reliant on "finite" fossil energy sources.

Genetic manipulation should be “safely” left to evolution as it has been in the past. We arrogant Selfish Big Brained Mammals (SBBMs) have done enough damage already, attempting to manipulate our natural eco systems; the ecosystems that include biodiversity without which we can’t survive. Mono cropping can never succeed in the longer term.

We need to learn to live within the finite bounds of the earth. Doing otherwise has always proved fatal for all former civilizations, especially agricultural ones.

It may already be too late.
Posted by Bucko, Tuesday, 21 August 2007 12:41:32 PM
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m-i-a,
We just need to make sure we harness the sewerage nutrients, not waste them, or actually pay for alternate disposal.
http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/whri/research/plantmineralnutrition/struvite/
Posted by rojo, Tuesday, 21 August 2007 6:30:00 PM
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Agrichar seems to offer the dual benefit of improving soil fertility and sequestering carbon. Pyrolysis also seems to offer the prospect of utilising the nutrients and energy from organic waste. Crushed granite may also improve soil fertility, and could become a viable product should fast breeder reactors be developed.

I agree that substantial technological development is necessary to support the existing population, let alone a growing one. So it seems paradoxical that a government so bent on growth should have such contempt for science. Hopefully this will change.
Posted by Fester, Tuesday, 21 August 2007 9:47:26 PM
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very interesting and an eye opener michael. Is recycling human waste an option? i know we'd have stacks of it.... Probably a messy, stinky job but i read an article once in which a sewerage worker mentions that u get used to the smell ...that it dosent get any worse_ie: stays the same..
Does human waste contain much phosphate? is it comparable to rock phosphate?
if phosphate isnt reuseable _once we have digested it how could our waste then be of value?
after living with drop dunnies on alternative properties for much of my life i've always known we ought re-use our poo, but does it contain phosphate.
thanks
Posted by mariah, Wednesday, 22 August 2007 10:21:03 AM
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Hi Mariah,

Everything you eat, including phosphate, that does not accumulate in your body, gets pooed out or urinated out. We need to recycle all urine and poo back to the fields and even people's bodies when they are through using them. Bones are quite a good source of phosphate.

This will not prevent the loss of phosphate, but will slow it down.

If you are interested in recycling human poo then Google for books on "humanure" and composting toilets. Composting toilets are a great idea because you not only save nutrient loss, you also save a large amount of water and prevent eutrophication of waterways etc.
Posted by michael_in_adelaide, Wednesday, 22 August 2007 6:42:08 PM
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If I interpret the article correctly, it makes sense: a more overall view of crop-related problems are needed than concentrating on one aspect.

Australia is lucky so far – we can still grow wheat as a commercial proposition. Better by a long measure than many developing countries. Those which have flogged their soils to death trying to cater for populations doubling in the course of one generation. Where they depend largely upon introduced cassava which will grow almost anywhere. A root product, even the best of which depends upon treatment to bring its potassium cyanide levels down to an acceptable level.

We haven’t got to that stage yet, but have been working hard in such direction in spite of William James Farrer, Dr Fischer and all.

Expect increasing heat stress, evaporation, soil salinity, acidity, oil-based fertilizer and fuel costs; decreasing precipitation, soil carbon and biota from erosion, soil nutrients due to erosion and products exported from the paddock.
Magnificent work is being undertaken in relation to many of these problems, but their sheer scale is not being matched; nor, probably, can ever be to a sufficient degree to enable Australia’s citizens to carry on business-as-usual in the cities – or the country for that matter.

Fertiliser problems can be overcome to some extent by soil enhancement (eg “Agrichar from pyrolysis, lime application, and seed inoculation by fungus to enhance phosphorus uptake and minimise particular diseases). But they are not always easy to introduce, and can be costly – as with lime to lessen soil acidity and its connotations such as aluminium toxicity.

We might be able to get more bang from our crops by combined exercises. Such as land remediation/transport fuel production from carbon-neutral pyrolysis of regenerating mallee or other vegetation; where carbon, hydrogen and oxygen are extracted for methanol, and nutrients returned to the soil.

But, the nutrients extracted during export of agricultural products need to be returned from Sydney, Tokyo, etc. toilets to the paddock. Costly. Duncan Brown’s Feed or Feedback (International Books 2003) gives authoritative discussion of this. Phosphorus gets a special gong.
Posted by colinsett, Friday, 24 August 2007 1:40:57 PM
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The old adage still counts, "Replace what you take out"
To make this fit into our present, one must first put in 'double' to take out ONE and to be left with ONE.
In practice,grow something inedible which frees remaining minerals and nutrients from rock or dirt and does not need water but draws moisture from air, selfcomposting whilst creating a habitat for earthworms and the like.Companion planting will become available after a year or two.Magic!!
Posted by eftfnc, Tuesday, 28 August 2007 6:01:25 PM
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