Plant Chat: Philip Ackerman-Leist
I’m so honored to have Philip Ackerman-Leist on my Plant Chat today. Philip is Professor of Sustainable Agriculture & Food Systems at Green Mountain College, where he established the college’s organic farm, sustainable agriculture curricula, and the first online graduate program in Sustainable Food Systems in the United States. I am lucky, because Philip is my professor, as I am enrolled in the MSFS program at Green Mountain College, and I’ll be joining him on his study abroad program this summer in Europe. He and his wife Erin live on a remote off-grid farm in Pawlet, Vermont with their three children. His newest book is A Precautionary Tale: How One Small Town Banned Pesticides, Preserved its Food Heritage, and Inspired a Movement. He is also the author of my first textbook in the MSFS program, Rebuilding the Foodshed: How to Create Local, Sustainable, and Secure Food Systems and Up Tunket Road: The Education of a Modern Homesteader. Continue reading to learn more about Philip’s thoughts regarding modern agriculture, the environment, animal welfare, and more.
What are the primary ways in which agriculture has changed in the U.S. over the past 50 years?
For one, we know better than ever the ecological impacts of our farm management and technology choices, even if we continue to ignore a certain portion of that scientifically-based knowledge. We’ve made tremendous gains in efficiencies, if measured predominately in units of dollars, human labor, and per acre yields. However, our tallying has minimized and sometimes ignored costs in terms of biodiversity, intact ecosystems, human health, human nutrition, and animal welfare.
How do these changes impact the environment, animal welfare, and the community?
Environment, animal welfare, and community are all inextricably linked. For example, look at what happens when one or more CAFOs enter a community: just as animal welfare is compromised, so is the well-being of the on-the-ground and in-the-barn workers. The surrounding environment becomes a mitigation zone: how do we mitigate the negative impacts of high levels of livestock excrement while confronting the problems of extensive monocultures? Wealth (and often debt) becomes highly concentrated within the given communities, and social stratification becomes more pyramidal in nature. With the export of the farm products for processing and distribution elsewhere, rural communities soon find themselves exporting not just the basis of their ecological wealth but also the dollars that will be captured by those outside businesses that have control of the product after it drives past the farm gate.
What is the single aspect of modern agriculture that most concerns you?
It’s hard to know whether one should worry more about what we are doing to our bodies or to our natural environments, but then again, the two are one in the same when we think about what we are leaving for future generations. The way we treat our bodies is ultimately the way we treat our land, and vice-versa. I suppose I worry most about our reliance upon inputs, whether they be fossil fuels or synthetic fertilizers or pesticides. When we rely extensively on outside inputs and not natural ecological cycles that begin with photosynthesis and replicate themselves over and over again, we are creating an imbalance that is hard to rectify…and we keep adding to the imbalance while losing track of our ecological compass that served us reasonably well for millennia.
How do you feel the public perceives agriculture today? Do they have good knowledge of the challenges, practices, and outcomes?
Unfortunately, I think we are losing a lot of basic agricultural literacy, so public perception isn’t equal to public knowledge. Ultimately, we depend upon knowledgeable citizens to hold our society accountable for promoting the best agricultural practices possible, not regulators, so we face the conundrum of how best to educate the public about the best farming practices, especially in their home regions. How do we do that? It makes the most sense to start with the most nutritional foods on our plates and work our way back to the farms from there.
How does the cultivation of monocrops impact the sustainability of the food system?
While a monoculture can be a challenge to define, you generally know one when you see one. And so does a pest or disease, both of which equate a monoculture with an ideal habitat. A monoculture is a human-created imbalance that invites trouble because it has difficulty fending for itself. A monoculture just doesn’t have much in the way of resilience, and hence, the need for synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, irrigation, etc. A monoculture on one farm multiplied by a thousand farms becomes more than just a mega-monoculture—it soon becomes a mindset.
Is agricultural efficiency sometimes confused for sustainability? If so, why?
“Agricultural efficiency” is a commendable objective that serves as a primary component of farm sustainability. However, the path we take in getting to that objective determines how close we come to true sustainability. True sustainability depends upon solar-driven biological cycles, not fossil-driven mechanical energy, synthetic pesticides and fertilizers, confined livestock, and genetically modified organisms.
When it comes to animal agriculture, what are the most pressing concerns facing our current system?
Where to begin? Perhaps with the life cycles of animals before they were domesticated and understanding how they interacted with the surrounding ecosystems. The farther our departure from livestock within their native ecosystems and life cycles, the more dramatic the concerns. Ruminants should forage healthy and diverse feed for themselves to the extent possible, and monogastrics such as pigs and poultry should be allowed to function as the omnivorous recyclers that they are. When confinement goes beyond seasonal pragmatism, such as winter housing, the health and the well-being of the animals suffer. Furthermore, human nutrition and health reflect the diets and health of livestock. Excessive confinement of livestock leads to high antibiotic use, poor animal welfare, and pollution from animal excrement, not to mention imbalanced excesses in greenhouse gases.
What will it take to move the needle from our current agricultural system to a more sustainable model, which takes care of the soil, natural resources, animals, communities, and people?
If we care about what we take into our own bodies, then we move toward understanding our own roles within ever-expanding ecological and socioeconomic circles. Nutritionists have the capacity to be ground zero for a revolution in conscious consumption, if they do what pioneers like Joan Dye Gussow suggested: focus on food—with all of its cultural and ecological nuances—and not just nutrients.
The sustainability movement has often focused on small, organic, local agriculture within a community, but what are the limitations for this sort of agricultural system within the overall food system? What are the successes of these sorts of agricultural systems?
I’m convinced that we need a mosaic of agricultural scales in the United States. While small farms and home gardens alone will likely not produce all of the food that we need, my hope is that they can once again become more of the backbone of our food system and core components of our communities. In much of the rest of the world, small farmers produce the majority of the food for their communities, so we’re not talking about an abstract pipe dream. The good news is that small, diversified, organic farms form the hottest trends in US agriculture right now. The sobering reality is that those trends have yet to capture more than 5% of the US marketplace, by any measure. Regardless of scale, however, using organic methods of production is critical. There’s no excuse for doing otherwise—we have the scientific knowledge to produce any and every product organically. It can’t always be done in just the way it’s being done on medium and large-scale conventional farms, but it shouldn’t be. It’s not a matter of trying to force-fit organic methods onto a conventional template; rather, it’s about finding ways to meld organic methods with surrounding ecosystems, markets, and communities.
What are some solutions that can be applied to make today’s modern agriculture feasible yet more sustainable? Do you have an example you can share?
I’m a huge fan of year-round farmers markets. When we get past the notion that farmers markets are a summer thing and into the habit of connecting with farmers as part of a weekly rhythm, we simultaneously create values-based commerce and community, and we maintain the local economic engine by fueling it and our bodies with steady attentiveness. Farmers do best when their income streams are steady throughout the year, and families eat the best when fruits and vegetables are always present, along with healthy choices of dairy and meat products. And what’s more rejuvenating to body and soul—going to the grocery store or visiting a farmers market or farm store?
What are some simple messages dietitians can communicate to their clients and the public about how they can support a more sustainable agricultural system in their daily lives?
Dieticians have to think about two sides of the same coin. When we think about food and not just nutrients, then the act of eating becomes ecological and therefore more connected and meaningful. That said, all food is not created equal. When we do examine the details of what we ingest–nutrients as well as synthetic chemicals and antibiotics—then we start to better understand how eating is caring, not just for ourselves but also for the health of our environment and our children’s future. The act of caring for ourselves through our food choices is really an act of benevolence, not selfishness.
I also think that the practice of eating alone is a driver of nutritional ills in our society. Whenever possible, sharing food allows for sharing of ideas about that food and increases the likelihood of positive reflection and habits. While nutrients tend to be more about self, food is more about us and our place in the world.