Alternative Agriculture in Europe (sixteenth-Twentieth Centuries)

Alternative Agriculture in Europe (sixteenth-Twentieth Centuries) PDF Author: Gerard Beaur
Publisher:
ISBN: 9782503586748
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 349

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Book Description
The treatment of long-term agricultural transformation remains a lively topic for historians. Much debate arose when agricultural development patterns were discovered that did without a dominant, production-oriented cereal crop, even when it was accompanied by livestock farming. Joan Thirsk hoped to conclude this debate by putting forward the hypothesis that such "alternative agriculture" was the farmers' way of responding to the difficulties caused by periods of low agricultural prices. This theory stirred up controversy and arguments both for and against.00The contributions to this volume take this hypothesis seriously and attempt to assess its validity. Examining a large number of "alternative agricultures" over the long term, from the fifteenth to the twentieth century, they discuss the issues encountered in tracing the links between the spread of alternative crops, such as fruits and vegetables, flowers, and industrial crops, and the general economic environment, across a vast swathe of territory stretching from Flanders to Spain and from France, through Italy and Switzerland, as far as Russia.

Alternative Agriculture in Europe (sixteenth-Twentieth Centuries)

Alternative Agriculture in Europe (sixteenth-Twentieth Centuries) PDF Author: Gerard Beaur
Publisher:
ISBN: 9782503586748
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 349

Get Book

Book Description
The treatment of long-term agricultural transformation remains a lively topic for historians. Much debate arose when agricultural development patterns were discovered that did without a dominant, production-oriented cereal crop, even when it was accompanied by livestock farming. Joan Thirsk hoped to conclude this debate by putting forward the hypothesis that such "alternative agriculture" was the farmers' way of responding to the difficulties caused by periods of low agricultural prices. This theory stirred up controversy and arguments both for and against.00The contributions to this volume take this hypothesis seriously and attempt to assess its validity. Examining a large number of "alternative agricultures" over the long term, from the fifteenth to the twentieth century, they discuss the issues encountered in tracing the links between the spread of alternative crops, such as fruits and vegetables, flowers, and industrial crops, and the general economic environment, across a vast swathe of territory stretching from Flanders to Spain and from France, through Italy and Switzerland, as far as Russia.

Alternative Agriculture

Alternative Agriculture PDF Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309039851
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 465

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Book Description
More and more farmers are adopting a diverse range of alternative practices designed to reduce dependence on synthetic chemical pesticides, fertilizers, and antibiotics; cut costs; increase profits; and reduce the adverse environmental consequences of agricultural production. Alternative Agriculture describes the increased use of these new practices and other changes in agriculture since World War II, and examines the role of federal policy in encouraging this evolution, as well as factors that are causing farmers to look for profitable, environmentally safe alternatives. Eleven case studies explore how alternative farming methods have been adoptedâ€"and with what economic resultsâ€"on farms of various sizes from California to Pennsylvania.

Agroecology in Action

Agroecology in Action PDF Author: Keith Warner
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262731800
Category : Agricultural ecology
Languages : en
Pages : 292

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Book Description
Detailed case studies of agrecological initiatives show how growers, scientists, agricultural organizations, and public agencies can form partnerships to develop innovative, ecologically based techniques for reducing reliance on agrochemicals.

Alternative Agriculture: A History

Alternative Agriculture: A History PDF Author: Joan Thirsk
Publisher: OUP Oxford
ISBN: 0191586811
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 382

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Book Description
People like to believe in a past golden age of traditional English countryside, before large farms, machinery, and the destruction of hedgerows changed the landscape forever. However, that countryside may have looked both more and less familiar than we imagine. Take todays startling yellow fields of rapeseed, seemingly more suited to the landscape of Van Gogh than Constable. They were, in fact, thoroughly familiar to fieldworkers in seventeenth-century England. At the same time, some features that would have gone unremarked in the past now seem like oddities. In the fifteenth century, rabbit warrens were specially guarded to rear rabbits as a luxury food for rich mens tables; whilst houses had moats not only to defend them but to provide a source of fresh fish. In the 1500s we find Catherine of Aragon introducing the concept of a fresh salad to the court of Henry VIII; and in the 1600s, artichoke gardens became a fashion of the gentry in their hope of producing more male heirs. The common tomato, suspected of being poisonous in 1837, was transformed into a household vegetable by the end of the nineteenth century, thanks to cheaper glass-making methods and the resulting increase in glasshouses. In addition to these images of past lives, Joan Thirsk reveals how the forces which drive our current interest in alternative forms of agriculture a glut of meat and cereal crops, changing dietary habits, the needs of medicine have striking parallels with earlier periods in our history. She warns us that todays decisions should not be made in a historical vacuum: we can find solutions to our current problems in the experience of people in the past.

Sustainable Agriculture

Sustainable Agriculture PDF Author: Mary V. Gold
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Alternative agriculture
Languages : en
Pages : 16

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Book Description


Agroecology

Agroecology PDF Author: Miguel A. Altieri
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781853390005
Category : Agricultural ecology
Languages : en
Pages : 227

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Book Description
(Westview special studies in agriculture science and policy).

Transition Toward a Sustainable Agriculture

Transition Toward a Sustainable Agriculture PDF Author: Jane Potter Gates
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Government publications
Languages : en
Pages : 42

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Book Description


Sustainable Or Alternative Agriculture

Sustainable Or Alternative Agriculture PDF Author: Jayne T. MacLean
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Alternative agriculture
Languages : en
Pages : 44

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Book Description


Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education in the Field

Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education in the Field PDF Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309045789
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 456

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Book Description
Interest is growing in sustainable agriculture, which involves the use of productive and profitable farming practices that take advantage of natural biological processes to conserve resources, reduce inputs, protect the environment, and enhance public health. Continuing research is helping to demonstrate the ways that many factorsâ€"economics, biology, policy, and traditionâ€"interact in sustainable agriculture systems. This book contains the proceedings of a workshop on the findings of a broad range of research projects funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The areas of study, such as integrated pest management, alternative cropping and tillage systems, and comparisons with more conventional approaches, are essential to developing and adopting profitable and sustainable farming systems.

The Basic Principles of Sustainable Agriculture

The Basic Principles of Sustainable Agriculture PDF Author: William J. Hudson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Sustainable agriculture
Languages : en
Pages : 40

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Book Description