1
The Role of Agriculture in Today's Food Industry

The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops, but the cultivation and perfection of human beings.

-Masanobu Fukuoka

1.1 Introduction

In every form, agriculture has always been and most likely will always remain the twin sibling of food and especially the food industry. We all seem to be rather clear on what "agriculture" stands for but let me provide a short definition, so that we are on the same page.

Agriculture means to use natural resources to produce commodities which maintain life, including food, fiber, forest products, horticultural crops, and their related services. This definition includes arable farming or agronomy, and horticulture, all terms for the growing of plants, animal husbandry and forestry.

("Agriculture," n.d.)

Merriam-Webster gives a slightly shorter, yet rather similar definition:

The science, art, or practice of cultivating the soil, producing crops, and raising livestock and in varying degrees the preparation and marketing of the resulting products.

("Agriculture," n.d.)

There are some important keywords to be found in both of these definitions, such as: arable farming, cultivating the soil, crops, horticultural crops, fibers, forest products, growing plants, livestock, animal husbandry, preparation and marketing of resulting products, and food.

The most important message though is using natural resources to produce commodities (mostly food but also fibers for cloths and wood for shelter and fuel, at least in part), which maintain life. Maintaining life and all that goes with it is really the major driver here; agriculture in all its forms and shapes and all that derives from it is the basis of life. Without it we could not really exist, let alone survive.

Although all this is pretty obvious, it is definitely worthwhile to remind us of these various elements and roles and to put them in a right perspective. So let's briefly list and define the four major building blocks that are necessary for life and agriculture to exist in the first place.

1.1.1 The Four Building Blocks

These supporting building blocks are necessary not only for life at large but also agriculture in any form.

The first building block is water and hasn't been mentioned yet. Water plays a crucial role; it is one of the cornerstones of life and growth on this planet. Interestingly enough, whenever my colleagues at JPL/NASA launch a rover to Mars, one of the great questions they want to find answers to is: "Is there or was there water on that planet?" Seems that there was and actually still is-at least traces-and that could mean that, although quite some time ago (maybe hundreds of millions or even billions of years back), there was enough water on Mars to sustain growth of agricultural matter of one kind or another.

This just shows how critical the presence of water is for any organic growth-water, together of course, with other compounds such as oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, sulfur, and phosphor, to name just the most important ones. These atoms, in their various molecular permutations form the backbone of every living matter as we know it and, together with water could be called the "dirty half dozen" of forming and sustaining life, including the growth of plants and animals. This combination of a multitude of such molecules forms the second building block.

Let me add one more critical element, light, that is, mainly visible light. It is the third building block. Without light, the two first building blocks would not be able to work together and support the growth of life, organic matter, and animals and plants, let alone humans. I do realize that there are life forms on our planet earth that grow and thrive in the absence of light, but when it comes to traditional agriculture for both plants and animals, light is a crucial element.

The fourth building block is temperature. Life as we know it does not really thrive in extreme temperatures, such as below 273?K (-0.15?°C) or above 325?K (~52?°C). Yes, there are bacteria or even specially adapted types of frogs that are known to grow or survive below 273?K (-0.15?°C) or even close to temperatures at which water is boiling in volcanic environments. The latter goes for bacteria, not the frog! Animals in arctic or Antarctic environments can survive at temperatures as low as 220?K (-53?°C) because they have developed survival strategies, both genetic as well as behavioral. So the range in which life as we know it can exist is probably larger than described here and could range from 220?K (-53?°C) to 370?K (97?°C).

Enough of this excursion into these basics; I just want to make sure that we have the same basic understanding of the topic ahead and accept these definitions of the major required building blocks of water, molecular composition, light, and temperature as baseline for this book. I know that this is rather short and only scratches on the surface, but believe that this is setting the tone of this book appropriately.

Figure 1.1 depicts in a simplified form the four main building blocks for growth and sustenance of life.

Figure 1.1 The four building blocks of growth.

1.1.2 Some History of Agriculture

In case you know it all already or are typically not interested in history of any kind, including the one that describes agriculture at large, then please skip this section and move on to the next section. Although I do hope that I can convince you to read on through this section.

The drive for survival, which includes searching and finding food and water as well as breathing air, is the most important basic physiological need according to Maslow (1943): "Air, water, and food are metabolic requirements for survival in all animals, including humans. Clothing and shelter provide necessary protection from the elements."

It can safely be said that since the dawn of time, or since the beginning of animal life in any form, this drive for survival has always existed and has preoccupied all life forms in important ways. Even plants, solidly rooted in the ground, strive for growth and existence by feeding on nutrients in the ground "breathing" oxygen, assimilating carbon dioxide and reaching out for light. Animals, irrespective of whether they are prey or predator, are in constant search of food and water, while breathing air and, for many different reasons, they also need light.

Humans, by most definitions, are predators, although they might be hunted as prey by large carnivores in some parts of the world. Their first and foremost task during all periods of evolution, and to this very day, is to find enough "fuel" or enough food and water to grow, to survive, to exist, and be able to expand their activities to whatever they have chosen them to be. However, satisfaction of basic physiological needs, or in simpler words, making the body function properly, is still the main driver. Unless we all become robots, this is not likely to change any time soon.

Although debated by some, humans, at least in more recent times, are omnivores (i.e., eating just about anything, from plants to animals and most recently even cheap and crappy food). With some exceptions, every type of food is welcome into the stomachs of human beings. Not surprisingly, exceptions are rather numerous and include people who don't eat certain foods for ethical or religious reasons (e.g., vegetarians, vegans, halal, kosher) or health reasons (e.g., free of lactose, gluten, sugar, salt). I shall discuss this and other related topics in much detail in Part 2, especially in Chapters 5, 8, and 10.

The story goes that human beings started out as predators with opportunistic strategies to obtain food and find water. Hunting was part of this strategy and being able to read and understand surrounding nature intimately was of the utmost importance. Moreover, there was no guaranteed and continued supply for food, especially enough food for all. Community was, and is, important for physiological needs and safety needs escribed by Maslow (1943): "Once a person's physical safety needs are relatively satisfied, their safety needs take precedence and dominate behavior."

1.1.3 Eat More and Increase the Likelihood for Survival

There is one more, often overlooked element to this story of the development of mankind, namely those who were able to eat more food and drink more water than others in the community or village-whenever food and water became available-had a better chance to for longevity and longer-term survival than those who were second in line. In actual terms, this simply means that the more you could eat and keep, the fuller your stomach became, the better your chances were that you were still around say in 2 weeks or so, when the next successful hunt was brought in or when you or your friends came across enough berries and other edible plants in your environment.

I used the village loosely because those were also times when groups of people, hunters and other members of the tribe, roamed along after game, edible plants, and sources of water in opportunistic ways. Once...