ASSESSMENT OF DIFFERENT AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION PRACTICES

This paper illustrates the complexity of the assessment of different agricultural production practices. It is argued that any assessment of agricultural production should address the type of interaction between human society and its ecosystem. In fact, the characteristics of the society in which the farming system is operating and of the natural ecosystem that is altered, influence the perception and meaning of the agricultural production process. Assumptions adopted in the assessment, such as optimizing strategy and boundaries of the production system, are as important for the significance of the analysis as the availability and reliability of data. A numerical illustration of the problems inherent in the assessment of agricultural production is provided by comparing the performance of four different systems of livestock production: (i) beef feed-lot closed; (ii) beef feed-lot importing feed; (iii) beef feed-lot organic system; (iv) beef nomadic pastoral system. Some numerical indicators used in the assessment are derived from models of energy analysis, such as: the level of technological capitalization of society; the quantity of biophysical capital altered by agricultural production activities and the degree of alteration; and the ratio between densities of energy throughput in ecosystem and society.