Lightfoot, Clive, M. Bimbao, J. Dalsgaard, and R. Pullin. 1993. Aquaculture
and sustainability through integrated resources management. Outlook on
Agriculture. 22(3): 143-50.
Dalsgaard, J.P.T., C. Lightfoot, and V. Christensen. 1995. Towards
quantification of ecological sustainability in farming systems analysis.
Ecological Engineering. 4:181-9.
Lightfoot et al. identify four easily quantified indicators of agricultural
sustainability: species diversity, bioresource recycling, resource system
capacity, and economic efficiency. Species diversity counts the number of
cultured and utilized species in the farm system, including crops, non-crop
plants, and animals. These species provide a variety of essential
functions, including food, forage, fertilizer, and habitat for natural
enemies of crop pests. Bioresource recycling measures the number of flows
between components of the farming system. For example, corn fed to cows,
chicken manure applied as fertilizer, and corn straw spread as mulch all
represent bioresource flows. Resource system capacity describes total farm
yield, and is measured as biomass output per hectare. Economic efficiency
represents annual net farming income. Together, these indicators provide a
snapshot of the sustainability of current practices, and allow researchers
and farmers to visualize and predict the impact of the adoption of new
techniques.
Dalsgaard et al. link farming system analysis with ecosystem theory. These
authors introduce four ecological attributes for quantifying and ranking
farming systems: diversity, cycling, capacity, and stability. These
indicators are similar to those used by Lightfoot et al., but are more
grounded in esoteric ecological concepts and equations.
-Evan Hansen
>I would also be interested in any information on working farm-level
>approaches to sustainability evaluations. We are trying to develop
>approaches that allow farmers to incorporate environmental and animal
>welfare issues more explicitly into their decision-making. Often, financial
>and yield data are given more weighting simply because farmers have more
>information on these topics.
>
>This links to the (never-ending) organic and sustainability debate. Organic
>production methods and production standards exist for a reason, not just for
>the sake of it. These reasons (or goals such as environmental and resource
>use sustainability, financial viability of family farms, socio-cultural
>concerns, food security, animal welfare) are identical to those commonly
>associated with sustainable agriculture. Organic production standards
>represent a means to achieve organic/sustainability goals, and are not an
>end in themselves. Developing a distinct market provides a means by which
>farmers who voluntarily internalise external costs can be compensated. The
>real question is which approaches (organic, LISA, integrated) are more
>successful in moving towards sustainability goals, as I remain unconvinced
>that anyone can demonstrate a perfectly sustainable agriculture. This
>assessment would involve reconciling conflicting goals, such as food
>production levels and environmental impact/resource consumption, which makes
>consideration of whether organic farming can feed the world irrelevant in
>isolation from the other issues.
>
>>From: Loku Dam Gunaratna <gunaratn@hawaii.edu>
>>Subject: Software for evaluation sustainable systems
>>
>>I am in search of software programs to evaluate the suatianbility of
>>agricultural systems. I understand sustainabilty is a broad term and
>>there are different ways to measure sustainbility. My major concern is
>>measurement of sustaianbilty in economic terms.If you folks are aware of
>>any such software to evaluate sustainability, please let me know the
>>details. Thanks!
>>
>>Guna
>>
>Nic Lampkin
>Welsh Institute of Rural Studies
>Stapledon Building, Penglais Campus
>University of Wales, Aberystwyth
>GB-Dyfed SY23 3DD.
>Tel: +44 (0)1970 622248
>Fax: +44 (0)1970 622238