Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, February 12, 1991 TAG: 9102120474
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BLAKE HURST
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The farm news in the early '80s was full of recommendations to cultivate shiitake mushrooms and other exotic solutions to our financial woes. While there may be a market for shiitake mushrooms, they could hardly solve a problem caused by $75 billion of excess debt.
In the '90s, some of these experts joined forces with environmentalists and began trying to farm from a ballot box. Fortunately, the voters exhibited some common sense last fall when they overwhelmingly voted down California's Big Green initiative, which would have banned most commercial fertilizers and pesticides.
In Texas, citizens ousted Commissioner of Agriculture Jim Hightower. It seems they weren't so enthralled with his agenda promoting "enlightened," or organic, farming. I've looked into organic agriculture, and the good people of Texas and California are right: It's just too impractical and expensive.
When the experts first began talking about "low-input sustainable agriculture," I was a tad slow to believe. But then a guest on the "Phil Donahue Show" mentioned a book called "Alternative Agriculture," and I started to listen. The book - produced by the National Research Council, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences - made a whopping claim: "The productivity of farmers that don't use pesticides is just as great as those that do."
Since we use about $100,000 worth of pesticides, herbicides and commercial fertilizers a year on our farm in Missouri, I hoped this time the experts were right, and we could save some money.
The book presents 11 case studies of supposedly successful farmers who use very few pesticides or commercial fertilizers. Because the authors did not document the superior financial performance of the farms involved, I tried to call the farmers to ask directly about the economic viability of their farms.
One of the farmers' names was withheld to protect his privacy. Another was no longer in business. He evidently had concluded that selling one's farm to be made into a subdivision is the most profitable alternative crop of all.
Only one of the farmers would divulge his income to me. In the past two years, his return on both capital and labor has averaged $20,000 per year. After a return on his capital is subtracted, he receives almost nothing for his labor.
The other farmers were unwilling to disclose their incomes, but they did reveal their costs of production - about $210 per acre of corn vs. around $230 per acre on my farm, not including costs of management. One of the farmers earned a total of $330 per acre. So, he makes a profit of $120 per acre, while I must be satisfied with $100 per acre in a good year.
The trouble is, he can till only 300 acres with approximately two full-time men. At Hurst Farms, my two brothers, my dad and I farm 10 times as much land. Our higher acreage more than makes up for our lower profits per acre.
Of the NRC farmers, only one really made a profit from alternative agriculture. And that's because he receives research funds from pressure groups favoring low-input farming, and also is much in demand as a well-paid public speaker.
Even if I could save money by forgoing man-made pesticides and fertilizers, I'm not sure I would want to. The critics of modern farming methods make a distinction between natural and synthetic that is downright disingenuous.
"Organic" methods of farming permit the use of arsenic but prohibit malathion, a chemical that a California agriculture official drank out of a glass in order to prove its safety.
One of the NRC farmers with whom I talked used municipal sludge to satisfy his nitrogen requirements. I can't get sludge in Tarkio, Mo., and it's just as well: Sludge often contains heavy metals and other contaminants that may well be more harmful to the environment than commercial fertilizers.
The other farmers in the study used manure or legumes to provide nitrogen for next year's corn crop. But at most, livestock manure can supply only 10 percent of the nitrogen that a corn crop needs; it, too, has been found to be a source of groundwater contamination. And legumes not only dry out the soil, but also can attract destructive insects.
A recent advertisement from an organic-farming catalog offered bone meal at a price 20 times higher than what I normally pay for phosphorus. But if I apply more bone meal than my corn crop needs, the environment will suffer in exactly the same manner as if I apply too much commercial fertilizer.
Used improperly, natural substances can be just as harmful to the environment as synthetic compounds. Used carefully, man-made chemicals can be perfectly safe.
by CNB