with large Aun' Z the intensive agriculture is a agricultural system of production characterized by the important use of Intrant S, and seeking to maximize the Production compared to the Factors of production, which it is about the Labor, of the ground or other means of production, such as the Farm equipment .

It is sometimes described as Productivisme|productivist , term sails about it at the time of the Après-guerre in the totalitarian countries and of the occident, but aujourdh' ui with sometimes pejorative connotation. It rests on the optimum use of chemical Engrais, of treatments Herbicide S, Fongicide S, Insecticide S, growth regulator…
It calls upon the means provided by modern technology, agricultural Machinisme, genetic Sélection, Irrigation and drainage of the grounds, Culture under greenhouse and culture out-ground, etc while seeking to benefit from the technological advances permitted by the projection of agronomic knowledge and scientists.

Relative concept

The concept of intensive agriculture is relative. It can seek to maximize the productivity of the ground, by increasing the human factors and financial. It is for example the case of the breedings out-ground or growing under glass. It can on the contrary seek to reduce the labor by the recourse to mechanization on large surfaces, it is the case of the cultivation of cereals of the developed countries. She is opposed in that to the Extensive agriculture.

History

The intensive agriculture made it possible, during the 20th century, to very strongly increase the outputs and consequently the Agricultural production, and to decrease the production costs correlatively. The profits of Productivité realized authorized the very strong reduction in the Farming population in the developed countries (it accounts for nothing any more but 2 to 3% of the Active population), while meeting the food requirements and for fiber (cotton) for the farming population and nonagricultural and by finding new markets via the Exportation S massive of part of the production, contributing sometimes to correct, partly at least, imbalances food existing on planet, but sometimes by accentuating them by breaking the noncompeting local markets.
L' agricultural industrialization made move back the painfulness of the living conditions and/or work of the farmers, often by increasing their incomes, but with a strong agricultural job loss.

The intensification of agriculture dating from the Années 1960 with 1980 is also known under the term of Green revolution. It ensured the Food safety, as well in quantity as in quality, of the developed countries and to contribute to improve approvisonnement of certain countries in the process of development, in particular India.

The countries known as “in the process of development” often could not profit from the advantages or the hoped richnesses permitted by modern agriculture. The most quoted reasons are grounds and often unfavourable Climat, the insufficiency of water, Capital financier, adapted formation and in a certain number of countries of political conditions, economic or legal unfavourable, or the imbalances induced by certain taxes or protection of markets, or especially by the massive subsidies data with the industrial agriculture of the rich countries.

Discusses on the environmental impacts of the intensification

The intensive agriculture is sometimes shown to be practiced at the expense of the considerations Environnement ales, from where its rejection by a certain number of producers and consumers, it with what certain defenders of the intensification assert that the intensive agriculture can achieve its goals of output only by providing to the plants optimum conditions for growth, by compensating for the loss of natural fertility of the grounds by inputs replacing the exported elements. Their detractors answer that precisely the Engrais and the Pesticide S contribute to the loss of humus and a deterioration of the pedological qualities of the ground, and that the drainage and watering have impacts (external costs) not compensated upstream and downstream.
Of others finally notes that certain traditional agricultures had developed other forms of intensification, without mechanization, for example with the traditional rice plantations, the Bocage, the Agrosylviculture or as in America by planting runner beans on the corn stems (double harvest, the leguminous plant enriching the ground nitrogenizes some with the profit of corn), producing comparable harvests or sometimes exceeding those permitted by the chemical mechanization and inputs.

The intensification and industrial agriculture are often associated (some times wrongly) audéveloppement and with the use of the genetically modified organizations, and could be put in connection with the increasing appearance of plants resistant to weeding total, like with crises such as the disease of the mad cow, dioxanes in certain meats, or dispersion of virus such as H5N1. The farmers are however often also victims of crises related to industrialization, but also sometimes induced by industrial accidents, or urban pollution or of Séquelles of wars upstream or downstream from agriculture.

See too

External bonds

  • The Meatrix : Site criticizes industrial agriculture

Random links:Bonapartism | Tarquin the Superb one | Heat-acute | Anatole | Agostino Agazzari