Acceptance of social and environmental responsibility in agriculture

Holló, Márta – Bálint, János – Gál-Berey, Tünde – Juhász, Mária

Keywords: climate change, food miles, ecological footprint, virtual water, biodiversity

A few decades ago the main task of agriculture was the production of food and industrial row material in sufficient quantity and quality thereby employing a significant proportion of country population. Later it transpired that agricultural pollution of the environment should be reduced by mainly minimising the use of agricultural chemicals. These aspirations lead to the development of bio-cultivation or ecological farming, which is now a success throughout the developed world. At the turn of century and millennia further pursuits appeared; the reduction of gas emissions responsible for global warming to consumption of local products and food safety to aiding poor countries. Our study was concerned with possible agricultural approaches to these new challenges (food miles, locavore, virtual water, ethical farming). We recommend the method of total life cycle assessment (LCA) and cost-benefit (CBA) analyses for evaluation and pro-activity for operations.

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