What if we paid farmers for more than for food?

We think that water is free and is easy to come by. In the 21st century, safe drinking water will become more scarce and more expensive than oil.

Here is a picture of Babylon taken recently. Babylon was the first great civilization founded on the idea of the power of irrigation to deliver intensive agriculture. It and all such societies collapsed because nature demands her due.

In our next chapter we will show the threat in more detail but for now a hopeful question.

We know that farmers can and do change if they have the right incentives.

What would happen if we incented farmers to become true stewards of the biosphere? What if they were paid primarily to keep us viable as a society? What if we could see that they could do more than produce commodities for multinationals and see if they could produce valuable services for us who share the same landscape? What if we could afford to pay them for this service?

What if we understood and applied ALUS or Alternate Land Use Services? ALUS is an idea that is now being applied and is having the kind of effect on farmers and on the biosphere that we need to shift farming into becoming a profitable and restorative process.

What if we made the farm the Trusted Space for our biosphere?

Check out how this is happening in Trusted Space - Food