How Much Time Does a Farmer Spend to Produce My food? An International Comparison of the Impact of Diets and Mechanization

Ibarrola-Rivas, María José; Kastner, Thomas; Nonhebel, Sanderine

doi:10.3390/resources5040047

Cited by 16 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…Note that for human labor, there is an ethical dilemma regarding the consideration of farmers’ fair share of food intake as energy input in the EROI calculation (Fluck ; Ibarolla‐Rivas et al. ). In this article, farmers’ labor is accounted for as the primary energy content of the food intake not because farmers are only considered as manpower, but because they are irreducible parts of the production system.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Energy, Nitrogen, and Farm Surplus Transitions in Agriculture from Historical Data Modeling. France, 1882–2013.

Harchaoui

Chatzimpiros

2018

J of Industrial Ecology

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This article addresses agricultural metabolism and transitions for energy, nitrogen, farm production, self-sufficiency, and surplus from historical data since the nineteenth century. It builds on an empirical data set on agricultural production and production means in France covering 130 consecutive years (1882-2013). Agricultural transitions have increased the net production and surplus of farms by a factor of 4 and have zeroed self-sufficiency. The energy consumption remained quasi-stable since 1882, but the energy and nitrogen structure of agriculture fully changed. With an EROI (energy return to energy invested) of 2 until 1950, preindustrial agriculture consumed as much energy to function as it provided in exportable surplus to sustain the nonagricultural population. The EROI doubled to 4 over the last 60 years, driven, on the one hand, by efficiency improvements in traction through the replacement of draft animals by motors and, on the other hand, by the joint increase in crop yields and efficiency in nitrogen use. Agricultural energy and nitrogen transitions shifted France from a self-sufficiency agri-food-energy regime to a fossil-dependent food export regime. Knowledge of resource conversion mechanisms over the long duration highlights the effects of changing agricultural metabolism on the system's feeding capacity. Farm self-sufficiency is an asset against fossil fuel constraints, price volatility, and greenhouse gas emissions, but it equates to lower farm surplus in support of urbanization. Keywords:agricultural transitions energy return on invested energy (EROI) external energy dependence farm self-sufficiency industrial ecology nitrogen use efficiency (NUE)Supporting information is linked to this article on the JIE website

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Energy, Nitrogen, and Farm Surplus Transitions in Agriculture from Historical Data Modeling. France, 1882–2013.

Harchaoui

Chatzimpiros

2018

J of Industrial Ecology

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“…This paper has shown the importance of addressing the trade-off between the use of agricultural resources and the impact of the type of diet and production system. Other studies have shown the trade-off between the use of human labor and machinery for intensive and extensive systems, and for affluent and basic diets [35]. Further studies should estimate the trade-off between other important yield-related inputs such as water and land use.…”

Section: Our Results Within the Broader Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

“…These production systems generally differ. For instance, the food imports of developing countries with extensive systems (such as LIS in our paper) are generally produced using highly intensive systems [36,37]; in contrast, the affluent food items such as coffee which are imported by developed countries are generally produced with extensive systems in developing countries [35].…”

Section: The Role Of Food Importsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Variations in the Use of Resources for Food: Land, Nitrogen Fertilizer and Food Nexus

Ibarrola-Rivas

Nonhebel

2016

Sustainability

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Abstract:Future dietary changes will increase the global demand for agricultural resources per person. Food production requires several resources which are interrelated: land, water, nutrients and energy. Other studies have calculated the per capita requirements of only one resource (nitrogen or land). In this paper, we combine several parameters (diets, production systems and nitrogen-land trade-off) in one analysis in order to provide a more integrated assessment of the impacts of the use of agricultural resources for food. We estimated the trade-off between the per capita use of synthetic nitrogen fertilizer and crop land. With our methodology, we are able to identify separately the impacts of the type of diet and of the type of production system. We use national level data of five countries as examples of global extremes: from extensive to highly intensive systems, and from very basic diets to very affluent diets. The present differences in diets and production systems result in large differences in the per capita use of resources which ranges from 3 to 30 kg of nitrogen fertilizer use per person, and from 1800 to 4500 m 2 of arable land use per person. As the results show, in 2050, the average per capita availability of crop land will not be enough to produce food for affluent diets with present production systems. Our results are useful to assess future requirements of nitrogen fertilizer for the limited land available on the planet.

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“…The application energy of agricultural chemicals for the control of selected pests by using the selected three sprayers were estimated from the labour energy required and fuel energy used (calorific value of fuel) for all the applications during the crop season. The total labour energy was then quantified in man hour ha -1 year -1 and converted to MJ ha -1 year -1 (1 man hour = 1.96 MJ) [38,52,50,14,32]. The fuel energy was also expressed in MJ ha for the further calculation of corresponding greenhouse gas emission.…”

Section: Application Energymentioning

confidence: 99%

Carbon Footprint of Electrostatic Sprayer in Comparison with Air Compression Sprayer and Mistblower

Aneesha

Dhalin

Subhagan

et al. 2020

CJAST

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This study aimed at finding out the efficacy of electrostatic sprayer on pest control in comparison with mist blower and air compression sprayer. Six pests were selected based on specific characteristics viz. integumental, movement and ecological niche. Energy use efficiency in production and application of pesticides used by different sprayers for the control of selected pests were quantified based on application efficiency, pre and post pest count and reoccurrence of pest infestation after spray. The greenhouse gas emission for the total energy usage for the corresponding quantity of pesticide were computed for all the selected sprayers. The energy use efficiency of electrostatic sprayer was found to be 1.5 times more than that of mist blower and 2 times more than that of air compression sprayers. The chemical usage by electrostatic sprayer was reduced by 65%, and that of knapsack mist blower was 35% with air compression sprayers. The corresponding greenhouse gas emission was only 20% for electrostatic sprayer and 65% for powered mist blower than that of air compression sprayers. The post pest count was almost nil in all the categories of pest while applying with electrostatic sprayer and the reoccurrence of the pest to the threshold level was minimum. This contributes a significant reduction in emission of CO2 when considered globally, and ultimately contribute to mitigation of global warming.

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How Much Time Does a Farmer Spend to Produce My food? An International Comparison of the Impact of Diets and Mechanization

Cited by 16 publications

References 19 publications

Energy, Nitrogen, and Farm Surplus Transitions in Agriculture from Historical Data Modeling. France, 1882–2013.

Energy, Nitrogen, and Farm Surplus Transitions in Agriculture from Historical Data Modeling. France, 1882–2013.

Variations in the Use of Resources for Food: Land, Nitrogen Fertilizer and Food Nexus

Carbon Footprint of Electrostatic Sprayer in Comparison with Air Compression Sprayer and Mistblower

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