Sense and Sustainability: Sustainability as an Objective in International Agricultural Research

Lynam, John K.; Herdt, Robert W.

doi:10.1111/j.1574-0862.1989.tb00098.x

Cited by 61 publications

(49 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Although there are as many definitions of sustainability as authors on the subject, the basic thrust of sustainable agriculture is the improvement in the quality of life in the context of an environmentally sound approach, so that the resource base is maintained or enhanced for future generations. Lynam and Herdt (1988) considered a sustainable system as one with a non-negative trend in measured output. The rate of regeneration, repair andor maintenance of a sustainable agroforestry enterprise must exceed or at least parallel the rate of harvest, consumption, exploitation or degradation.…”

Section: Sustainability Concernsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agroforestry as alternative land‐use production systems for the tropics

Kang

Akinnifesi

2000

Natural Resources Forum

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The science of agroforestry has progressed significantly during the past three decades. This article describes and documents various prominent traditional agroforestry systems. In‐depth research on interactive processes of some agrisilvicultural systems have been undertaken and quantified. It has been found that the presence of woody species can enhance nutrient cycling, and can improve soil productivity, soil conservation and soil biotic andfaunal activities. In simultaneous systems however, their presence can also cause competition with the associated food crops. Most agroforestry systems constitute ecologically and bio‐physically sustainable land use systems. Some are highly sustainable and economically viable, in particular the highly complex and specialized types, such as the damar and rubber agroforests in Indonesia. Agroforestry systems have potential uses in stabilization of sloping lands and buffer zones around forest reserves, for recovering degraded lands, and for improving the productivity of the bush fallow system. Despite rapid progress in biophysical research, field application of the science of agroforestry is still minimal. This article examines the possibilities of exploring the multiple contributions of trees to food security, rural income generation, diversity of products and ecosystem conservation within sustainable agroforestry contexts. Research efforts in the new millennium need to focus more on practical research and also on socio‐economic and policy factors that can enhance beneficial application of the science in the near future to smallholder farmers in the tropics.

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Section: Sustainability Concernsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agroforestry as alternative land‐use production systems for the tropics

Kang

Akinnifesi

2000

Natural Resources Forum

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“…As Lynam and Herdt (1989) note, there is no easy answer to this dilemma. They recommend that the appropriate level of analysis of sustainability is at the cropping or farming systems level defined in terms of a relatively homogeneous agro-ecological resource base that leads to similar choices of crop and livestock activities and inputs.…”

Section: Level Of Aggregationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sense and sustainability revisited: the limits of total factor productivity measures of sustainable agricultural systems

Byerlee

2001

Agricultural Economics

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Many economists have advocated and applied total social factor productivity (TSFP) (i.e., total factor productivity estimated with both market and non-market inputs and externalities, and with all factors valued at social prices) as a single all-embracing measure of agricultural sustainability. This paper reviews the conceptual and practical issues in measuring TSFP and shows that no one measure alone will be theoretically or empirically robust as an indicator of sustainability. TSFP is a conceptually flawed measure since inclusion of non-market inputs and outputs and social price-based valuation, in most cases, violates the theoretical basis underlying those estimates. Trends in TSFP also have limited value in diagnosing the nature of sustainability problems, unless changes in productivity are related to underlying changes in technology, human and physical infrastructure, and indicators of resource quality.More attention needs to be given to defining key indicators of agro-ecosystem health and relating these measures to trends in productivity. This analysis must be sufficiently disaggregated and for a long enough time period to allow for spatial and temporal variability inherent in agricultural production. Secondary data at the district level on both conventional inputs and outputs and resource quality have recently allowed more quantitative estimates of sustainability and its causes. With limited data, yield growth decomposition analysis can often be used to provide valuable insights into sustainability problems. Meanwhile, there is a need to invest in long-term experimental and panel surveys of farmers and their fields for key production systems in order to provide long-term data that will allow full productivity accounting, using more formal statistical procedures. Regardless of the approach selected, the findings of this paper strongly suggest a need for economists, agronomists and soil scientists to collaborate in integrating approaches in order to provide more robust and informative measures of sustainability.

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“…A third definition which is provided by Conway (1985) says: "Sustainability is the ability of a system to maintain productivity in spite of a major disturbancc, such as causcd by intensive stress or a large perturbation." Building upon Conway's definition, Lynam and Herdt (1989) define sustainability as "the capacity of a system to maintain output at a level approximately equal to or greater than its historical average, with the approximation determined by its historical level of variability", i.e. a sustainable system is "one with a non-negative trend in measured output and technology contributes to sustainability if it increases the slope of the trend line."…”

Section: Definitions Of Sustainability and Economic Viabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, their proposed methodology requires defining the alternative compensatory projects as weil as measuring the associated environmental effects. Lynam and Herdt (1989) suggested a framework by which the sustainability concept could be empirically incorporated into the research process. They developed a number of propositions, one of which states that "the appropriate measure of output by which to determine sustainability at the crop, cropping or farming system level is total factor productivity, defined as the total value of ail output produced by the system over one cycle dividedby the total value of ail inputs used by the system over one cycle of the system; a sustainable system has a non-negative trend in total factor productivity over the period of concern."…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Measuring the sustainability and economic viability of tropical farming systems: a model from sub-Saharan Africa

Ehui¹

1993

Agricultural Economics

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New technologies must be developed in sub-Saharan Africa which arc sustainable and economically viable. This paper discusses a methodology for measuring the agricultural sustainability and economie viability of tropical farming systems for new technology evaluation. The approach is based on the concept of interspatial and intertemporal total factor produetivity, paying particular attention to valuation of natural resource stock and flows, Agriculture is a sector which utilizes natural resources (e.g. sail nutrients) and the stock and flows of these resources affect the production cnvironmcnt. However, in many cases, the stock of these resources is beyond the control of the farmer and must be accounted for in an agricultural sustainability and eeonomic viability measurement. For example, soil nutrients are removed by crops, erosion or leaehing beyond the crop root-zone, or other processes such as volatilization of nitrogen. Agricultural production can also contribu te ta the stock of sorne nutrients by leguminous plants such as agroforestry systems. Using a data set available at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, we compute the intertemporal and interspatial total factor productivity indices for four cropping systems in southwestern Nigeria using stock of major soil nutrients as the natural resource stock. Results show that the sustainability and economie viability measures are sensitive to changes in the stock and flow of soil nutrients as weil as the rnaterial inputs and outputs. Where the contribution of natural resource stock and flows are important (such as in the case of alley cropping), the Correspondence to: mcasurcs providc markedly different results from conventional TFP approaches. The advantagc of this approach is that interspatial and intcrtemporal total factor productivity measures are computed using only priee and quantity data, thus eliminating the need for econometrie estimation.

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Sense and Sustainability: Sustainability as an Objective in International Agricultural Research

Cited by 61 publications

References 11 publications

Agroforestry as alternative land‐use production systems for the tropics

Agroforestry as alternative land‐use production systems for the tropics

Sense and sustainability revisited: the limits of total factor productivity measures of sustainable agricultural systems

Measuring the sustainability and economic viability of tropical farming systems: a model from sub-Saharan Africa

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