After reviewing City Root's website, think of two questions that you would like answered on Monday. Think about the production, business, and social aspects of sustainable farming.
Industrialization has greatly (and mainly negatively) impacted farms both socially and environmentally. Socially, industrialization has essentially destroyed the necessity for farmers. In the past, farmers were needed to perform labor in the fields however now machines are becoming the farmers. Also, credit has become a large issue within the farming community. To survive as a farm you now need the required heavy machinery--which requires large sums of money--and once you acquire the bigger machinery you want more land and therefore more money is required. This has negatively effected farms because getting loans is not always easy and its most certainly causing small farms to suffer. Environmentally, industrialization has forced farms to move away from using renewable energy sources. When speed and efficiency are the major factors in creating a successful farm, the environment is left out of consideration. We are no longer using cover crops to make the soil useful and are wasting energy and becoming dependent on fossil fuels. Overall, I do not feel that the benefits outweigh the costs and feel that we should be focusing on creating more sustainable farms as opposed to perpetuating these social and environmental issues. As Berry very accurately stated, "I now suspect that if we work with machines the world will seem to us to be a machine, but if we work with living creatures the world will appear to us as a living creature." And I think, in a nutshell, that has become our problem-- viewing the planet as a machine that is constantly cranking out resources and not as a living thing that requires care and nurturing in order to continue yielding the resources we require.
2. How difficult is it to become USDA certified organic?
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