Wednesday, September 8, 2010

The Case for Industrial Farming

This week's reading in The American entitled The Omnivore's Delusion: Against the Agri-intellectuals, written by Blake Hurst placed an emphasis on the criticisms that modern day industrial farmers face. Hurst brings the reader into the mind of the industrial farmer and gives substantial reasons for the actions of himself and others like him. Unfortunately, most of the public thoughts today about industrial farming have negative connotations and Hurst rebuffs a lot of this common thinking. He quotes several authors from Matthew Scully to Michael Pollan, and specifically with the latter, he explains why their statements are far from the whole story. In much of his article, Hurst focuses on the claims made by Pollan and proves to the reader that Pollan presents an extremely biased perspective; "Pollan should talk to some actual farmers before he presumes to advise a president". Hurst conveys to the reader that many of the fertilizers, pesticides, and other farming methods currently employed by many of today's farmers actually provide more benefits than negatives, contrary to the public opinion. This goes beyond positives on the farm and increase in sheer output of crops; he explains that current farmers' methods also benefit the ecosystem and our globe as a whole in the long run.


Having read the beginning of Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma, I have seen both sides of the issue. As I think about the cases presented by each author, I believe Hurst's are stronger, especially because he is an industrial farmer himself. The knowledge he has accumulated from his experiences on the farm since childhood are invaluable. Although we must account for the bias Hurst must have, being that he is an industrial farmer being attacked for his methods, he presents his perspective confidently and succinctly in the article. He brings the reader to the farm, figuratively, and explains to us why the methods he uses benefit us, him, and the world through specific examples and reasons only a farmer so close to the source itself could present.

When two sources present both sides of an issue, with strong evidence for each case, how do we determine who is more correct in the situation?
Are industrial farmers, through their methods, benefitting or hurting the ecosystem and economy in the long run?





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