**6.6 Other commentaries**

Smil has written extensively on both food (2000) and energy (2003). He is optimistic that fossil fuels will remain abundant for several decades and that the agricultural system has sufficient inefficiencies to accommodate the needed productivity growth while undergoing transition to a renewable energy base. In *Energy at the Crossroads* (2003), he stresses the fact that an energy transition on the societal scale projected in the coming decades will itself require decades, owing to the massive capital investment required and the time needed for these investments to bear fruit. The same consideration clearly applies to the agricultural system as well. As an optimist about energy supply, Smil does not consider the possibility, as does Heinberg (2009), that the upfront energy investment required for renewable energy technologies and potential limits in absolute energy supply could prevent the needed investments. He does, however, stress the need for more equitable distribution of both energy and nutritional resources at levels intermediate between the current consumption levels of developing nations and of the highest consuming nations, particularly the United States.

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Section 6, in particular, the reduced material and energy inputs and greater labor intensity illustrated by Rodale (2011). Technological inputs from improved crop strains, precision application of water and nutrients, and other innovations will also contribute. Higher energy prices will accelerate the longstanding evolution of agriculture and the larger economy toward higher energy efficiency; they may also reverse the corresponding trend toward greater overall energy use. Because of the significant food system costs to individual households, food and energy price increases will directly impact household budgets, leading to choices of more efficient appliances and possibly dietary changes. Owing to the long life of home appliances, however, evolution will be slow. Fuel costs will directly impact the transport sector, while electricity costs will impact food processing. Possible responses are greater reliance on biofuels, which exacerbate food price increases, reliance on renewable energy resources, and localization of processing and distribution facilities. The evolution probably will include all three, in a variable mix

Smil's (2000, 2003) optimism about the adaptability of both the food and energy systems is likely well-placed, unless severe economic shocks of the more pessimistic Peak Oil forecasts disrupt the economy on a large scale and undermine capital investment. Then, the more drastic localization scenario represented by the Cuban experience (Wright, 2009)

Agricultural and energy policy initiatives could either accelerate or inhibit adaptation to an environment of gradually increasing energy prices; they also could reduce or increase vulnerability to price shocks. Unfortunately, politically powerful vested interests in conventional agriculture and fossil fuel production are likely to oppose policy innovations

Figure 5 also displays the distribution of farm energy inputs in developing countries, showing that fertilizer embodies the largest energy cost. Rising prices will make this input increasingly expensive, and probably unreachable for most small farmers, unless subsidized by government policy. The cost of fertilizer will exert pressure to accelerate agroecological innovations, although soil fertility already compromised by reduction in animal nutrients and rotation cyles (Bunch, 2011) may warrant targeted use of synthetic fertilzer as part of a long range plan for land restoration. Scarcity of other fossil fuel inputs will confirm existing patterns of labor-intensive farming. Success in global efforts to raise crop yields on small farms in the developing world will require sustained policy commitments from national and

Little information is available about post-farm energy inputs in developing country agricultural systems (Ziesemer, 2007). Organic systems in developed countries may provide a partial model, although these data also are few. Transportation costs will largely confine distribution to local and regional markets, although success in intensifying production may increasingly satisfy local needs and require expansion of regional marketing opportunities. Urban farming should have a role to play (Karanja & Njenga, 2011), as should innovative approaches that simultaneously minimize waste, generate income, and provide food, e.g., cultivating mushrooms on invasive water hyacinths in Africa (Pauli, 1998, Chapter 11). Because the largest population growth rates also occur in countries where agricultural

depending on national and regional market forces.

to promote more sustainable systems.

**7.2 Developing countries** 

international agencies.

may be relevant.

Bottom-up analyses such as Smil's, typically take little account of institutional inertia that creates significant obstacles to widespread achievement of possible system efficiencies. One such potential obstacle is the disparate influence on agricultural systems and food trade between rich nations and transnational corporations on the one hand, and poor nations and small farmers on the other (FAO, 2003). The new movement for food sovereignty (Wikipedia, 2011) is a grass roots attempt to redress this imbalance, asserting as a human right access to healthy, culturally appropriate, sustainably produced food.

Pimentel and Pimentel (2008, Chapter 23) are less sanguine than Smil about the energy future. They review future food needs, energy requirements for producing the food, constraints on land and water, climate change, and environmental pollution. They stress, as do none of the other sources discussed here, that lowering birthrates is an additional food security and sustainability strategy. They acknowledge the social challenge involved in conveying to parents that having smaller families would serve their interests and those of their children, but do not mention evidence that improving the status and education of women yields multiple societal benefits, including voluntary fertility reduction. The gender gap in world agriculture is highlighted by the FAO (2011b).

Smedshaug (2010) provides a long view of the history of agriculture and the role of national and international policy in regulating food production. He takes as given the constriction of energy resources in this century, but provides no detailed projections of its impact. He does, however, stress the critical role of policy in moderating the fluctuating effects of markets on production and on farm incomes. The history of intermittent overproduction that he documents suggests that providing adequate food supplies will be possible—even as it is today. The question is whether policy makers can achieve a state that meets the broad definition of food security, particularly including not just food availability, but universal access to food on a stable basis.
