Agroecology: The Science of Sustainable Agriculture

Agroecology: The Science of Sustainable Agriculture[1]

John Ikerd

Agroecology, as the name suggests, is an integration of agriculture and ecology. Agroecosystems are farms, agricultural systems, viewed from an ecological perspective. Agroecology is the science of design and management of sustainable agroecosystems, or more simply, the science of sustainable agriculture. The explicit purpose of integrating agriculture with ecology is to enhance the sustainability of agriculture.

Agroecology is not a commonly used word, even among advocates of sustainable agriculture. It has been around for more than twenty years, but somehow the concept has just never caught on, even among agricultural scientists. I suspect this is mostly because the advocates of agroecology have never explained why it is necessary to integrate agriculture with ecology in order to achieve agricultural sustainability. Maybe they thought it was obvious to all that agriculture must be viewed from an ecological perspective, if it is to be sustainable. But it’s not obvious to all, apparently even not to many agricultural scientists.

To understand the importance of agroecology, we have to return to its roots – to its first principles. As I explained in my June-July ‘06 article, first principles are different from values. Different people may have different values but first principles are true for everyone at all times. In earlier times, first principles referred to natural law, the nature of being human, as when our Founding Fathers declared, “We hold these truths to be self evident.” First principles also refer to the laws of nature, meaning the principles that govern all natural physical phenomena. First principles cannot be proven, but they need no proof; they are “self evident.” In fact, all scientific principles are rooted in first principles, which were not and cannot be proven – they are accepted by science as self-evident.

The first principles of agroecology quite logically must be derived from the first principles of agriculture and ecology. Agriculture, by its basic nature, is a purposeful human activity. The basic purpose of agriculture is to shift the ecological balance of nature in favor of humans relative to other species. All species attempt to tip the balance in their favor; humans are no different in this regard. But, humans alone are a willful species. The rightness or legitimacy of agriculture is determined by its purpose, by why humans attempt to tip the ecological balance in their favor, and concurrently, how far they are willing to tip it.

The first principle of agriculture, and of agroecology, is life has purpose. If there is not purpose for life, there is no purpose for human life, and thus no purpose for agriculture – agriculture becomes a senseless activity. Most people probably never question whether life has purpose, but scientists do. Most scientists are philosophical materialists, at least in the practice of their professions. In his classic 1919 book, Modern Science and Materialism, Hugh Elliott, states, “The age of science is necessarily an age of materialism; ours is a scientific age, and it may be said with truth that we are all materialists now.”[i]

Elliott emphasized the primary assumptions of materialism. The first assumption asserts that when the conditions at any moment in time are precisely the same as those prevailing at some earlier moment, the results also will be identical to the earlier results. True causes and effects are always replicable. The second assumption of materialism is the denial of purpose. Elliott writes, “Scientific materialism… asserts that all events are due to the interaction of matter and motion, acting by blind necessity in accordance with those invariable sequences to which we have given the name laws.” Human life is nothing more than an interaction of motion and matter. The third assumption of materialism denies the existence of spirituality – anything that lacks tangible, material characteristics and qualities. Among those things, he includes not only gods and souls, but also such entities as intellect, will, and feelings, insofar as they are supposed to be different from material processes.

Perhaps this is why agricultural scientists are so reluctant to address issues of sustainable agriculture; agricultural sciences deal only with the processes of agriculture, without questioning its purpose, or even admitting that it has one. They don’t want to question the ethics of morality of today’s industrial agriculture because the answers to such questions require intellect, willfulness, feelings, and ultimately, spirituality.

Thankfully, most ordinary people reject the philosophy of scientific materialists. Most people do not believe their choices and actions are predetermined acts of blind necessity or the inevitable consequences of ongoing interaction of matter and motion. They know they can’t control their future but they believe they can affect their future, through their willful choices. Ordinary people act as if their actions have meaning, believing their choices can be right or wrong and good or bad. Lacking purpose, right or wrong and good or bad are indistinguishable. Purpose in life may be rejected by science, but it is expressed in the social norms and customs of every civilized society and in the constitutions and laws of every credible government in the world. If human life has purpose, then agriculture too has purpose.

The first principle of ecology, and the second principle of agroecology, is that all of all life is interconnected. Deep ecologists go even farther in proclaiming the interconnectedness of not only biological communities, but also all local and global communities, biological, human, non-human – in the past as well as in the present. While some ecologists might disagree about the relevance of connections among living things over time, ecologists agree that all of life is interconnected. While ordinary people may disagree about the relative importance of specific connections, their general consensus seems to be in agreement with this second principle of agroecology.

The third principle of agroecology comes from both agriculture and ecology: all life is good. If all life is bad or evil, neither agriculture nor ecology makes sense. It would make no sense to be concerned with the health, vitality, or survival of living communities, species, or ecosystems if continuation of life on earth were not inherently good. Obviously, the death of individuals is an inevitable and natural aspect of life, but communities, species, and ecosystems are capable of renewal and regeneration, and thus are capable of sustaining and renewing themselves. While individuals, communities, and species may appear to pursue their self-interests, within their larger ecosystems, most individuals function naturally in ways that enhance the long run sustainability of life. Nature, including both laws of nature and natural law, is biased in favor of life. This natural bias is enough to convince many people that life is good.

Many other logical, reasonable, thoughtful people simply reject the assumptions of scientific materialism. They believe that people have free will, that life has purpose, and life is spiritual – that intellect, will, and feelings are more than material processes. They believe in an intangible, unknowable higher order of things, within which all aspects of reality, including all life, have purpose and meaning. And, they believe that life was meant to be good. Very few people believe that reality and life are inherently evil, and those who do are generally labeled as sociopaths. It doesn’t matter whether the principle of goodness arises from the natural bias or nature of the goodness of some higher order; both arise as matters of faith. Such is the nature of first principles; they cannot be proven, but require no proof. They exist because people know they exist. Without first principles, life simply makes no sense.

The question of the rightness or goodness of any particular kind of agriculture then can be derived from the first principles of agroecology. Since human life is interconnected with all other life, an agriculture that is good for all life, including life across all generations, is good. An agriculture that diminishes life, including the quality of human life, is bad. An agriculture that enhances life is right and an agriculture that diminishes life is wrong. Aldo Leopold expressed much the same conclusion in his classic essay, The Land Ethic, when he wrote, “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” [ii] His land ethic asked us to “examine each question in terms of what is ethically and esthetically right, as well as what is economically expedient.” Any science of sustainable agriculture must be rooted in such an ethic – in the first principles of agroecology.

I have been criticized by my academic colleagues over the years because I am obviously an advocate for sustainable agriculture and an opponent of industrial agriculture. They argue that science must be objective, meaning scientists should make no judgment regarding what kind of agriculture is good or bad or right or wrong. But all science is rooted in such judgments, regardless of whether they are admitted or even recognized by scientists. The current science supporting large-scale, industrial agriculture is rooted in the assumption that productivity and profits will serve the long run needs of humanity, regardless of the short run ecological and social consequences. I fail to find any logical or reasonable set of first principles that will support such an assumption.

My opposition to industrial agriculture is rooted in the fact that it diminishes life – life in the soil, life in fields and feedlots, life in rural communities, and life of consumers who eat industrial foods. My advocacy of sustainable, small farm agriculture is based on the first principles of agroecology, the science of sustainability: life has purpose, all life is connected, and life is good.

[1] Sustaining People through Agriculture series,” Small Farm Today Magazine, Missouri Farm Publications, Clark, MO. January-February 2007.