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http://www.enn.com/agriculture/article/4
The knub of the problem is that of scale. Clearly there is no way to run a farm of a couple of thousand acres on one's own without a massive dependence on machinery and the fuel that drives that machinery. But it is a vicous cycle - as the famers have mechanised the rural jobs and population have dwindled, and without the labour force there is no choice but to further mechanise. The huge capital costs of the machinery can only be covered by cropping vast areas with it, and that drives a monoculture approach. These mega scale diversity deserts have no hope of relocalising and rescaling agriculture. It is why I keep emphasing to those that would listen that we in Jersey with our necessarily very small scale farming have an opportunity to get it right where others simply cannot follow. Small is beautiful.
