Joshua Farley

How does one know if development activities are ecologically sustainable rather than simply less degrading of the environment than current practices? The concept of scale in ecological economics provides a conceptual and practical tool for approaching this issue. Scale is defined as the physical size of the economy relative to the containing and sustaining ecosystems. The concept of scale has several strengths in terms of defining and operationalizing sustainability, and is thus central to environmental education. It highlights the relationship between economic activities and the ecosystems upon which they depend, connecting some of the most fundamental laws of science, with economic activity. To be sustainable, any economic or development activities must remain within these scientific limits. The paper highlights the basic lesson of scale, rules, policies and perspectives for applying the concept, and identifies current activities supporting the integration of scale in development ...

Recommended Citation Neher, Deborah; Horner, Katie; von Wettberg, Eric Bishop; Scarborough, Matt; Harris, Jeanne; Darby, Heather M.; Badireddy, Appala Raju; Roy, Eric D.; Farley, Joshua C.; Faulkner, Joshua; and White, Alissa, "Resilient Soils for Resilient Farms: An Integrative Approach to Assess, Promote and Value Soil Health for Smalland Medium-Size Farms" (2021). USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS) Center. 7. https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/arsfoodsystems/7

A agricultura tem se mostrado um dos principais emissores dos gases de efeito estufa (GEE). Grande parte dessa emissão está relacionada ao sistema de produção e/ou manejo inadequado. Este estudo avaliou os efeitos do Sistema Silvipastoril com Núcleos (SSPnúcleos) na massa do dossel forrageiro (pasture cover), e nos estoques de carbono e nitrogênio quando implantado em pastagens sem árvores (PSA). As variáveis foram mensuradas em três situações, duas áreas dentro do SSPnúcleos - área próximo dos núcleos (APN) e área ensolarada entre os núcleos (AEN), e pastagem sem árvores (PSA). A participação proporcional das variáveis das áreas APN (30%) e AEN (60%) em cada hectare de pastagem originou as variáveis do SSPnúcleos como um todo. O SSPnúcleos não afetou a massa do dossel forrageiro e os estoques de carbono e nitrogênio (p<0,05). AEN apresentou valores superiores de biomassa e estoque de carbono que a PSA. O SSPnúcleos manteve a massa do dossel e o estoque de carbono por hectare, me...

A delimitação das APPs é um requisito fundamental em diversos processos, tais como o Cadastro Ambiental Rural, o diagnóstico ambiental, o zoneamento ambiental e o Plano de Recuperação Ambiental. Porém, a implementação das definições legais das APPs não é tarefa trivial, dependendo principalmente da representação detalhada da malha hidrográfica.  Este artigo aborda a integração de dados e a utilização de métodos de geoprocessamento para obtenção semi-automatizada de Áreas de Preservação Permanentes (APPs).  para o município de Santa Rosa de Lima-SC.. Para delimitar as APPs ciliares através de Sistemas de Informações Geográficas, foi necessário realizar um mapa de distância para cada feição hidrográfica. A especificação da largura do buffer é dependente do tipo, largura e tamanho das feições da rede de drenagem. As APPs de nascentes foram definidas a partir 50 m, tendo como ponto central a própria nascente ou olho d’água. Para os cursos d’água, as APPs são delimitadas na faixa margina...

In Santa Rosa de Lima - SC - Brazil, a small municipality in South Region mainly covered by Atlantic Rain Forest, there is an effort to promote agroecology as socio-ecological improvement for family farmers. Part of this effort was conducted with young farmers in a debate about their land-use practices and the consequences of diversifying their activities. This study describes the process of a participatory modeling approach carried out in a workshop with young farmers to co-design conceptual models for land use practices. As results, a system dynamics model was built to represent their reality. The results of the workshop were embedded in a model to simulate a typical local property and provide insights into the consequences of diversifying their agricultural production by using the agroecological practices.  Finally, the work presents the designed model and the first outcomes of scenario simulation, discussing the use of system thinking approaches in participatory modeling.

COVID-19 has shone a bright light on a number of failings and weaknesses in how current economic models handle information and knowledge. Some of these are familiar issues that have long been understood but not acted upon effectively – for example, the danger that current systems of intellectual property and patent protection are actually inimical to delivering a cost-effective vaccine available to all, whereas treating knowledge as a commons and a public good is much more likely to deliver efficient outcomes for the entire global population. But COVID-19 has also demonstrated that traditional models of knowledge production and dissemination are failing us; scientific knowledge is becoming weaponized and hyper-partisan, and confidence in this knowledge is falling. We believe that the challenges that COVID-19 has exposed in the information economy and ecology will be of increasing applicability across the whole spectrum of sustainability; sustainability scholars and policymakers need...

Ultrasociality, as expressed in agricultural, monetary, and fossil fuel economies, has spurred exponential growth in population and in resource use that now threaten civilization. These threats take the form of prisoner's dilemmas. Avoiding collapse requires more cooperative economic organization that must be informed by knowledge of human behavior and cultural evolution. The evolution of a cooperative information economy is one possibility.

The economic process transforms raw materials and energy into economic products and waste. On a finite planet, continued economic growth threatens to surpass critical socio-ecological thresholds and undermine ecosystem services upon which humans and all other species depend. For most systems, whether such thresholds exist, where they lie and whether they are reversible cannot be known with certainty until they are crossed. We argue that our central economic challenge is to maintain the resilience of the current socio-ecological regime. We must reduce net impacts of economic activity to avoid critical ecological thresholds while ensuring economic necessities. Conventional economists pursue continuous growth as the central goal of economic activity, and assume that the price mechanism and technological breakthroughs ensure system resilience. Unfortunately, the price mechanism fails to address ecological thresholds because it ignores unowned ecosystem services, and fails to address eco...

... There was an encounter with the San Pedro River on the second day out, when the tables were turned and Jake had to pull Red out of belly-deep quicksand. ... I logged it in at ninety-nine metric tons. We're talking hundreds of thousands of fish, almost all of which were pollock. ...

Healthy mangrove ecosystems provide an abundance of goods and services critically important to humans and other species. Yet, in spite of the numerous benefits they provide, mangrove ecosystems are being lost at an alarming rate, with conversion to shrimp aquaculture as a primary cause. How do we best conserve the ecosystems--like mangroves--on whose ecosystems services we depend for our survival?

Palm heart from juçara palm (Euterpe edulis) has been one of the most important non-timber forest products (NTFPs) from the Brazilian Atlantic forest since 1960s, but overharvesting, among other factors, drove the species near to extinction. However, the recent conversion from extraction of hearts of palm to berries harvesting for pulp production, a nondestructive use, had a remarkable effect on species conservation and its potential for cash provision and forest landscape restoration. Pulp production from E. edulis in the Atlantic Forest is strongly benefiting from the traditional and expanding market of açaí pulp produced from Euterpe oleraceae in the Amazon Basin. In this article, we assess the current status of this new NTFP from E. edulis in the State of Santa Catarina, tracing a parallel with the açaí production chain in the Amazon. In addition to a literature review, we surveyed the production chain and interviewed key stakeholders. Production of juçara pulp soared from 5 tons in 2010 to 97.76 tons in 2011, but production is clearly far from fulfilling the fast growing demand. With 115 fruit collectors, management in backyard agroforestry represents 80% of production, with the secondary forests providing the remainder. Two types of producers in Santa Catarina —industrial and family farmers—are distinguished by their form of processing, production scale and sales. Familiarity of farmers with juçara palm as well as the better infrastructure of the region compared to the Amazon gives juçara pulp good condition for the development of the production chain. Nonetheless, it is clearly important to define strategies under public and private policies for research, development, and dissemination of sustainable production models, based on the ecology of the species, landscape structure, and sociocultural values.

... Brian Czech Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy, USA, Herman E Daly University of Maryland School of Public Affairs, USA; Josh Farley University of Vermont, USA;Deepak Malghan University of Maryland School of Public Affairs, USA. Abstract: ...

Les principes qui fondent l'économie mondiale doivent changer, et vite ! Nos modes de vie s'accompagnent de prélèvements qui détruisent les ressources limitées de la planète et menacent les bases mêmes de la vie. Pire, la poursuite de la croissance a cessé d'améliorer le bien-être dans les pays riches tandis que pauvreté et sous-alimentation perdurent au Sud. La bonne nouvelle est qu'il serait possible de satisfaire les besoins de tous, de concilier le nécessaire et le souhaitable, et de vivre mieux dans une économie rendue enfin durable. Sous la houlette d'une équipe rassemblée par Robert Costanza (Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University), ce livre brosse un panorama des solutions à mettre en oeuvre : prendre en compte les limites écologiques (émissions de déchets, exploitation des ressources), abandonner l'objectif de croissance du PIB au profit de l'amélioration du bien-être humain, rediriger nos techniques de production vers d...

... F. Abdon Schmitt 1-, Willian Murphy 1,2 and Joshua Farley 1,2 ... The viability of small family farms, through pasture-based ecological dairying, has been highlighted as a way to revitalize rural communities and so avoiding urban social problems in Brazil (Rizzoli and Schmitt, 2007 ...

The Atlantic Forest is a global hotspot of biodiversity that may be on the verge of ecological collapse. Current changes in forest legislation have increased the debate concerning policy impacts on land-use and the consequences for biodiversity conservation and ecosystem services provision. This paper evaluates the impact of three environmental policy options (National Forest Act from 1965-NFA65, Business as Usual-BAU, National Forest Act from 2012-NFA12) on land-use patterns and ecosystem services in the southern Atlantic Forest. InVEST (the Integrated Valuation of Environmental Services and Tradeoffs tool) was used to model ecosystem services. Synergies and tradeoffs between commodities, erosion regulation, carbon storage and habitat for biodiversity were assessed with the Spearman Correlation Test. The NFA65 produced the largest gains for forest ecosystem services, while BAU favored commodities expansion. The NFA12 approaches the baseline, contributing less to the provision of ecosystem services and biodiversity conservation.