List three solutions that scientists are suggesting to solve the problems caused by monoculture farming.
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Permaculture gardening promotes biodiversity. It seeks to maximize the number of productive species of plant within a plot, not only to offer the gardener a diverse and vibrant number of crops to harvest for the kitchen, but also so that the ecosystem is itself is strong, with different plants performing different functions so that all can thrive. Permaculture design seeks to avoid any one thing – be it a species of insect, a ground cover plant or an extreme weather event – becoming too influential on a site, to the detriment of the other valuable parts of the ecosystem.
In contrast, much modern agricultural production is based on the opposite premise – cultivating monocultures. Think of vast fields of wheat or barley, plantations of a single species of fruit tree, or furrowed fields of a single vegetable crop. Modern commercial agriculture often seeks to increase yield – and so profits – by cultivating a single type of plant. The theory is that the farmer need only provide for the needs of a single species, with its individual characteristics, in order to grow a successful crop. And the economy of scale allowed by cultivating a single crop (by, for instance, requiring a single automated harvesting method) boosts profits for the farmer.
However, monoculture agriculture has significant negative impacts, impacts that must be alleviated if the ecological systems of the earth are not to be irreversibly damaged.
Eliminates Biological Controls
The lack of diversity in a monoculture system eliminates all the functions that nature provides to plants and the soil. It means that there is no range of insect species in a location to ensure that a single population does not get too large and damage too many plants. It means that there are no varieties of plant that naturally provide nutrients to the soil, such as nitrogen-fixing legumes, or ground cover crops that can be slashed and left to improve the nutrient content of the topsoil. It means that there are fewer species of microorganism and bacteria on the soil as there are fewer nutrients available for them to survive on, and it undermines the integrity of the soil by not having a variety of plants with different root depths.