"We have to remember that what we observe is not nature in itself but nature exposed to our method of questioning."
Heisenberg
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Agricultural marginalisation and sustainability
"Es sprechen zu den Menschensinnen
die Dinge in den Raumesweiten.
Sie wandeln sich im Zeitenlaufe.
Erkennend dring die Menschenseele,
von Raumesweiten unbegrenzt
und ungestört durch Zeitenlauf,
ins Reich der Ewigkeiten."
Rudolf Steiner
die Dinge in den Raumesweiten.
Sie wandeln sich im Zeitenlaufe.
Erkennend dring die Menschenseele,
von Raumesweiten unbegrenzt
und ungestört durch Zeitenlauf,
ins Reich der Ewigkeiten."
Rudolf Steiner
Links:
- Centre for Environment and Society
- CNA - Confederação Nacional da Agricultura
- Eco-living Portugal
- Food Sovereignty
- Global Network on Social Threefolding
- Institute for Social Threefolding
- International Institute for Environment and Development
- International Society for Ecology and Culture
- Jules Pretty
- Karmabanque
- Luzku-Fuzku
- Steiner Archive
- The Foundation for the Economics of Sustainability
- Via Campesina
- Wuppertal Institute
About Me
- A.S.
- Born in Bavaria, grown up in Portugal, mainly on a farm in Beira alta. From 1999 to 2003 I studied Biology at the University of Coimbra. In 2004/05 I did a master's in "Environment, Science and Society" at the University of Essex. Currently I'm about to finish my PhD in Environmental Science on agricultural marginalisation.
Agricultural Marginalisation in Portugal: threats and opportunities for sustainable livleihoods
In Portuguese mountain areas traditional and sustainable forms of agriculture are on the edge of economic viability, mainly due to agricultural and trade policies which apply economic theories from the industrial sector to agriculture. As a result, small-scale and family-farmers are forced out of business and they become dependent on the global food-system and markets, when they have no alternative income sources in the rural areas where they live. At the same time, environmental degradation, unemployment and health epidemics related to urban lifestyles spread and more and more people wish to escape unsatisfying jobs and to reconnect to the land. An economic system that prevents people form satisfying their livelihood needs directly from the land ultimately creates artificial hindrances to human well-being. It is essential that sustainable land-based livelihoods are properly valued and become viable again. For this to happen both policy change and grassroots action are needed. Policies need to consistently support the aim of proximity-based sustainable agri-food systems, i.e. regional food sovereignty, and interested individuals need opportunities to learn how to make a living from sustainable agriculture and other land-based activities.
In my research these problematic global trends are explored in detail, regarding the specific situation of Portuguese mountain areas, and existing sustainable agriculture initiatives in the area are mapped as a means to understand the possibilities to support the development of low-impact land based livelihoods.
In my research these problematic global trends are explored in detail, regarding the specific situation of Portuguese mountain areas, and existing sustainable agriculture initiatives in the area are mapped as a means to understand the possibilities to support the development of low-impact land based livelihoods.
I'm able to do a Ph.D. thanks to a studentship from the Portuguese Science Foundation - Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), that I wish to acknowledge here.
1 comment:
here we go
Humberto R. Maturana
http://www.inteco.cl/biology/ontology/ooo-c5.htm
Ontology of Observing
THE BIOLOGICAL FOUNDATIONS OF SELF CONSCIOUSNESS AND
THE PHYSICAL DOMAIN OF EXISTENCE
...
ii) Objectivity in parenthesis. The assumption of objectivity is not needed for the generation of a scientific explanation. Therefore, in the process of being a scientist explaining cognition as a biological phenomenon I shall proceed without using the notion of objectivity to validate what I say, that is, I shall put objectivity in parenthesis. In other words, I shall go on using an object language because this is the only language that we have (and can have), but although I shall use the experience of being in language as my starting point while I use language to explain cognition and language, I shall not claim that what I say is valid because there is an independent objective reality that validates it. I shall speak as a biologist, and as such I shall use the criterion of validation of scientific statements to validate what I say, accepting that everything that takes place is brought forth by the observer in his or her praxis of living as a primary experiential condition, and that any explanation is secondary.
iii) The universum versus the multiversa. The assumption of objectivity, objectivity without parenthesis, entails the assumption that existence is indpendent of the observer, that there is an independent domain of existence, the universum, that is the ultimate reference for the validation of any explanation. With objectivity without parenthesis things, entities, exist with independency of the observer that distinguishes them, and it is the independent existence of things (entities, ideas) that specifies the truth. Objectivity without parenthesis entails unity, and, in the long run, reductionism, because it entails reality as a single ultimate domain defined by independent existence. He or she who has access to reality is necessarily right in any dispute, an those who do not have such access are necessarily wrong. In the universum coexistencee demands obedience to knowledge.
Contrary to all this, objectivity with parenthesis entails accepting that existence is brought forth by the distinctions of the observer, that there are as many domains of existence as kinds of distinctions the observer performs: objectivity in parenthesis entails the multiversa, entails that existence is constitutively dependent on the observer, ant that there are as many domains of truths as domains of existence she or he brings forth in her or his distinctions. At the same time, objectivity in parenthesis entails that different domains of existence constitutively do not intersect because they are brought forth by different kinds of operations of distinction,. and, therefore, it constituvely negates phenomenal reductionism. Finally, under objectivity in parenthesis each versum of the multiversa is equally valid if not equally pleasant to be part of, and disagreements between observers, when they arise not from trivial logical mistakes within the same versum but from the observers standing in different versa, will have to be solved not by claiming a privileged access to an independent reality, but through the generation of a common versum through coexistence in mutual acceptance. In the multiversa coexistence demands consensus, that is, common knowledge.
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