It is 2050 and Dutch agriculture is completely carbon neutral. Mechanisation has been reversed, more people are working in the fields again, farms have shrunk. Technological innovation has made farm work a lot more comfortable, ergonomic, safe and efficient.
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Ever fewer farmers
For most of history, agriculture ran largely on human power. From the Neolithic Revolution (about 10,000 years ago) until the start of the Industrial Revolution, more than 75% of the global labour force worked in agriculture. Since the nineteenth century, that share became smaller and smaller. It fell to 51% in 1970 and to 27% in 2020, when about 1 billion people worldwide worked on the land. [1][2]
However, there were large regional differences. In 2018, only 5.9% of the European workforce and 1.7% of the North American workforce were employed in agriculture, while in less industrialised countries the share was much higher: almost 26% in Asia and more than 53% in Africa. There were also large differences within Europe. The Netherlands was the global leader in mechanisation in 2020, with only 1.2% of the workforce employed in agriculture - less than 125,000 people out of a total of about 10 million.
Ever more machinery and fossil fuels
A major reason for the declining proportion of farmers in the workforce was mechanisation. [2][3][4] Tasks that were performed manually or with pack animals for centuries were increasingly handled by machines and fossil fuels in modern times.
Thus, the share of human labour in agriculture fell overall by 9.5% between 1971 and 2017, while the use of fossil fuels increased by 38%. In the Netherlands, the advance of fossil fuels in food production was even more remarkable: energy consumption increased by 400% between 1950 and 2020.
Mechanisation in agriculture accompanied a trend towards ever larger farms. The use of machinery requires a lot of initial capital, making farmers increasingly dependent on banks and forcing them to produce on an increasingly large scale - for a meagre income. By the early 2020s, it became clear that these trends were causing huge social costs.
Large-scale, fossil-fuel-based agriculture was incompatible with reducing emissions to combat climate change. In addition, Dutch food production was adversely affecting the environment and health through nitrogen pollution and toxic chemicals from chemical crop protection. Soil erosion and declining biodiversity threatened the long-term survival of agriculture. To make matters worse, despite all technology, the Netherlands could not provide for its own food production. Most of the Dutch agricultural output (75%) was destined for export, and at the same time a lot of food was imported.
Labour productivity growth is a wash
Changing the direction of Dutch agriculture has not been easy. For a long time, there was the idea that sufficient food could not be grown without large-scale technology. By using fossil fuels and machinery, about 17% more food could be grown on a hectare in 2020 than in 1950. Labour productivity - the number of hectares that 1 person can cultivate - actually increased by 73%.
Gradually, however, the insight grew that the technology and economies of scale responsible for this also involved indirect labour and land use, often beyond Dutch borders. [4] This involved growing animal feed, mining materials, producing agricultural machinery, fertilisers, pesticides, antibiotics and so on.
When these indirect inputs were taken into account, it turned out that labour productivity and yield per hectare had hardly increased. The only advantage of large-scale mechanisation was that fewer Dutchmen were working in the fields. It was time for a fundamental change in agricultural policy. That finally came in 2027, when farmers' protests in The Hague culminated in large-scale vandalism and the assault of the then agriculture minister.
Less machines, more humans
The new agricultural policy reversed the main trends of past decades. More human power (and animal power) was used again, and fewer machines. Farms became smaller again, and the Netherlands started growing food primarily for its own consumption. However, the turnaround in agricultural policy was not a return to the past. Many new machines and tools were developed, but innovation was no longer focused exclusively on reducing labour. The focus of technological development was now on making human power more pleasant, efficient, ergonomic, healthy and safe. [4]
Before the advent of mechanisation, working in agriculture was considerable toil. [5] Many manual operations were not ergonomic and made people struggle with many physical problems at a relatively young age. For example, manually weeding or harvesting grain with a sickle implies that the farmer stands in a bent position pretty much all day, often resulting in severe back pain.
However, thanks to the use of light vehicles with recliners, propelled by a solar panel and an electric motor, it is possible to weed without back pain. Harvesting grain with a scythe instead of a sickle had a similar effect. [6] By 2030, 10,000 Dutch people were trained in the skilful handling of the scythe, which requires some skill. Gradually, more and more oxen and work horses were also used.
A key discovery during this period was that large-scale agricultural machinery was not at all as energy-efficient as thought when energy inputs are also taken into account. For example, a comparison between 15 historical and modern grain-harvesting techniques yielded the conclusion that cleverly developed manual solutions were five times more energy-efficient than old-fashioned manual techniques. [6] Large-scale fossil-fuel-powered machines were found to be only 1.75 times more efficient. Especially pedal-powered machines for tilling agricultural crops can save a lot of human power, as they increase human energy production by a factor of three to four.
As a result of these developments, the increase in the labour force in Dutch agriculture in 2050 is limited to about one and a half million people - about 15% of the labour force. The greater need for workers during the harvest season is solved by temporarily employing a larger part of the population, who camp out in the fields for several weeks or months in late summer.
Especially the famous harvest festivals that come with it, mean that so far there has been no problem finding sufficient temporary labour. Many vegetables and fruits are grown in cottage gardens, where just about every Dutchman spends several hours a week without grumbling. Social contacts are especially appreciated - loneliness is no longer a problem in our country.
Less meat, more legumes
Making agriculture sustainable also implied a different diet. Livestock was largely liquidated and the proportion of meat in the diet was reduced by 80%. The pigs and cows that have remained eat food waste and grass (respectively), rather than grain or soya. Reducing meat production further appears undesirable because pigs and cows provide good manure. [7] However, most cows are now oxen - castrated bulls - because they not only provide manure and meat but are also used as beasts of burden. With more and more working horses being bred - a skill that had all but disappeared by 2020 - the number of dairy cows has fallen even further. So cheese and butter are no longer typical Dutch products. [5]
As staple foods, the focus is on the production of potatoes, nuts, vegetables and pulses. Legumes are particularly rich in protein and were the staple food in agriculture for most of history. They are highly nutritious, easy to grow, require no fertiliser, improve soil fertility, and promote natural biodiversity. [8] It is only since the formation of large states that cereals took over the role of pulses. [9]
The new agricultural policy in the Netherlands is particularly committed to the production of tempeh, a fermented product native to Indonesia. Fresh tempeh has a creamy meaty taste and can be made from most pulses. The preparation process requires little energy - the low-temperature heat is partly supplied by heat from dung heaps.
Heated greenhouse cultivation has completely disappeared. Most fruits and vegetables are now produced in home gardens. It had long been known that the productivity of vegetable gardens is higher than that of agriculture because more attention is paid to the crops. [10][11] Moreover, many more varieties are now grown, so the food supply has become a lot more diverse.
Fruit and vegetable varieties no longer have to be suitable for mechanical handling and transport. With the reduction in scale and change in diet, the need for a cold chain for food preservation also disappeared. Seasonal vegetables are picked fresh or stored on the land itself, and the remaining livestock walks to market via cattle drives themselves.
Less city, more countryside
The new agricultural system and the transition to a sustainable society on human power has dramatically changed the Netherlands. All the big cities have lost inhabitants and here and there urban areas are starting to deteriorate into ruins. It is bad farming and gardening on the polluted soils of urban and industrial areas. Much economic activity has disappeared from the cities and many people have moved back to the countryside. Villages have grown larger again and the Dutch population lives more dispersed than before. This also makes autonomous energy production a lot easier.
Anno 2050, the nature reserves in the Netherlands have completely disappeared. After all, these date from a time when humans had the idea of being above nature. Since agriculture became more sustainable, the realisation has grown that man and nature should no longer be separated. Human interventions have even enhanced natural biodiversity. For instance, the establishment of coppice plantations led to an explosion of butterfly species, while the cultivation of legumes boosted bee populations. With the reduction of livestock and the cessation of chemical crop control, waterways have also become clean again.
Anno 2050, the Netherlands is still a global leader in agriculture, albeit in a different way. Our country now has the most sustainable agricultural system in the world, and given the major food supply problems in the rest of the world, a lot of knowledge and technology is again being exported. Moreover, agriculture and nature are united, which has also triggered a lot of sustainable tourism.
This scenario was made for kunstfietsroute Kunst van hier tot ginder, 10-11 June 2023. Lokatie Windmolen, Bokkelerweg, Wesepe.
Human Power Plant: Scenario 4 human powered farm
Text: Kris De Decker
Drawing and photos: Melle Smets
Map design: Arvand Pourabbasi, Golnar Abassi
Graphic design: Golnar Abassi
Print run: 200
Print: Printer Pro
Exhibited at Kunst van Hier tot Ginder
Made possible by Kunstenlab
Thanks to Henry Franken, H3R Investment
References
[1] Grigg, David B. "The World's Agricultural Labour Force 1800-1970." Geography (1975): 194-202.
[2] Nag, P. K., and L. P. Gite. Human-Centered Agriculture: Ergonomics and Human Factors Applied. Springer Nature, 2020.
[3] Rasmussen, Wayne D. "The mechanization of agriculture." Scientific American 247.3 (1982): 76-89.
[4] Smit, Meino. De duurzaamheid van de Nederlandse landbouw: 1950–2015–2040. Diss. Wageningen University and Research, 2018.
[5] Scholliers, Peter. "Geschiedenis van de techniek in Nederland. De wording van een moderne samenleving 1800-1890. Deel I. Techniek en modernisering. Landbouw en voeding." Revue belge de Philologie et d'Histoire 74.3 (1996): 1028-1029.
[6] Franco, Walter, and Matteo De Piccoli. "Intermediate agricultural machines energy efficiency: the example of harvesting and threshing." Advances in Italian Mechanism Science: Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference of IFToMM Italy 3. Springer International Publishing, 2021.
[7] Fairlie, Simon. Meat: A benign extravagance. Chelsea green publishing, 2010.
[8] Ferreira, Helena, Elisabete Pinto, and Marta W. Vasconcelos. "Legumes as a cornerstone of the transition toward more sustainable agri-food systems and diets in Europe." Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems 5 (2021): 694121.
[9] Scott, James C. Against the grain: A deep history of the earliest states. Yale University Press, 2017.
[10] Crouch, David, and Colin Ward. The allotment: its landscape and culture. Faber and Faber, 1988.
[11] Kropotkin, Petr Alekseevich, and Colin Ward. Fields, factories and workshops tomorrow. London: Allen & Unwin, 1974.
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