A modern classic of the new agrarianism
"Chris Smaje...shows that the choice is clear. Either we have a small farm future, or we face collapse and extinction."-Vandana Shiva
"Every young person should read this book."-Richard Heinberg
In a groundbreaking debut, farmer and social scientist Chris Smaje argues that organizing society around small-scale farming offers the soundest, sanest and most reasonable response to climate change and other crises of civilisation-and will yield humanity's best chance at survival.
Drawing on a vast range of sources from across a multitude of disciplines, A Small Farm Future analyses the complex forces that make societal change inevitable; explains how low-carbon, locally self-reliant agrarian communities can empower us to successfully confront these changes head on; and explores the pathways for delivering this vision politically.
Challenging both conventional wisdom and utopian blueprints, A Small Farm Future offers rigorous original analysis of wicked problems and hidden opportunities in a way that illuminates the path toward functional local economies, effective self-provisioning, agricultural diversity and a shared earth.
Perfect for readers of both Wendell Berry and Thomas Piketty, A Small Farm Future is a refreshing, new outlook on a way forward for society-and a vital resource for activists, students, policy makers, and anyone looking to enact change. "Food is the core of culture, and modern industrial culture is rotting from the inside out due to its reliance on fossil-fueled agriculture. The only viable future is one based on small, ecologically regenerative, labor-intensive farming. Chris Smaje's brilliant book presents the rationale, surveys methods and issues, and supplies an abundance of insight derived from the author's twenty years of experience. Every young person should read this book."-Richard Heinberg, Senior Fellow, Post Carbon Institute
"We are facing an existential crisis – with species extinction, climate catastrophes, desertification of soil, disappearance of water, pandemics of infectious and chronic diseases, hunger and malnutrition. Industrialized, globalized agriculture based on the myth that it feeds the world is driving the multiple, interconnected crisis. Eighty percent of the food we eat comes from small farms. Chris Smaje's A Small Farm Future shows that the choice is clear. Either we have a small farm future, or we face collapse and extinction."-Vandana Shiva, author of Oneness vs. the 1% and Who Really Feeds the World?
"A Small Farm Future is a solid and truly inspiring book. I have dedicated the last 17 years of my life to creating a micro farm, and what I have learned fully confirms what Chris Smaje says: a small, ecologically inspired farm can produce high-quality, local food while also improving soil fertility, storing carbon, conserving water resources and improving biodiversity. Not to mention creating jobs and improving quality of life. A return to Mother Earth is the foundation on which we can build a new paradigm of sustainable and equitable abundance based on biological resources, renewable energies, eco-construction and solidarity – among individuals and cultures, and across generations. Getting out of a virtual and globalized economy to cultivate the land with love and respect is our only hope to pass on a viable planet to our children. This is also the secret to happiness!"-Charles Hervé-Gruyer, author of Miraculous Abundance; co-founder, Bec Hellouin Farm, France
"On one side we have science-based high tech with neoliberal economics, driven by the perceived need to control nature and to maximize material wealth; and on the other are traditional human skills and values. Whether it's dressed in the trappings of communism or capitalism or autocracy or democracy, the former is undoubtedly winning. Governments and their chosen advisers the world over equate high tech and measurable
