Environment & Energy
In reply to the discussion: Turns out those old-fashioned ways of farming were actually pretty smart [View all]bhikkhu
(10,717 posts)"old fashioned" farming can produce higher yields, and more sustained yields, and with a higher quality standard, but it requires more labor. Labor is expensive. Farmers don't farm for maximum yield, they farm for maximum profit. Reducing labor costs with machinery allows the greatest profit, but not the greatest yield.
This is a good over-view of traditional methods (in China) http://www.academia.edu/1500404/Sustainable_Traditional_Agriculture_in_the_Tai_Lake_Region_of_China
One of the fundamental things is the mixed use of the land, where there would be one or two primary crops where yields were comparable to current numbers, but then the same farm would raise animals for meat and fertilizer, and other crops in the margins, and tree crops mixed in. The amount of labor was very high, but the net yield from the land and the large variety of products was higher.