Continuing my review of Nutrition and Physical Degeneration by Weston A. Price...
Given my vocation as a farmer, chapter 20 represents an important part of Weston Price's message. The general concept is that soils the world over have been losing their capacity to produce nutritious food and that it is not an easy problem to solve. He calls this "the most serious problem confronting the coming generations" (p.358)
He sees the demise of all great civilizations as tied to a loss in agricultural fertility - and he sees the United States as standing squarely in this lineage of fallen cultures. He writes, "The complacency with which the masses of the people as well as the politicians view our trend is not unlike the drifting of a merry party in the rapids above a great cataract. There seems to be no appropriate sense of impending doom." (p.355)
And so the modern and contemporary farmer has attempted to counter this effect of reduced fertility by adding endless chemicals to the land - which works to a point - but runs counter to the will of the Creator. Organisms and microorganisms - all animals - have a role in the fertility of the soil and the practice of monocultures with chemical additives destroys the cycle of life that is the wisdom of God. The only answer to this problem is the slow methods of farming which not only keep fertility but even add to it through nature-observant methods of farming. And that is what I seek to to through farming in a permaculture context. May it be the will of the Lord.
He sees the demise of all great civilizations as tied to a loss in agricultural fertility - and he sees the United States as standing squarely in this lineage of fallen cultures. He writes, "The complacency with which the masses of the people as well as the politicians view our trend is not unlike the drifting of a merry party in the rapids above a great cataract. There seems to be no appropriate sense of impending doom." (p.355)
And so the modern and contemporary farmer has attempted to counter this effect of reduced fertility by adding endless chemicals to the land - which works to a point - but runs counter to the will of the Creator. Organisms and microorganisms - all animals - have a role in the fertility of the soil and the practice of monocultures with chemical additives destroys the cycle of life that is the wisdom of God. The only answer to this problem is the slow methods of farming which not only keep fertility but even add to it through nature-observant methods of farming. And that is what I seek to to through farming in a permaculture context. May it be the will of the Lord.
No comments:
Post a Comment