The Good Farmers

Dear Reader,

During the second half of the twentieth century, the world was entranced with the Green Revolution—a program to dramatically enhance the productivity of agricultural land, especially in the developing world, through the use of fertilizer, machinery, irrigation, and new seed varieties. Its chief proponent, Norman Borlaug, won the Nobel Peace Prize and was widely credited with saving millions of people from starvation.

Today the Green Revolution doesn’t look nearly as admirable. It has exacerbated climate change, depleted soil, and aided the rise of big agriculture. It is a revolution that no longer looks sustainable.

In The Good Farmers, Christopher de Bellaigue, the veteran correspondent (and second-time Columbia Global Reports author) travels the world in search of an alternative model for twenty-first-century agriculture. Through vividly rendered visits to Brazil, India, and Kenya, he introduces us to an array of experts on agriculture, and, more centrally, to farmers who are working heroically to raise crops differently, in ways that protect land over the long term and reduce the emission of greenhouse gases. That these are admirable people doesn’t mean that they represent a magic solution to the problems of farming. Conservation agriculture, the umbrella term for their cause, unavoidably privileges environmental concerns over immediately maximized food production. The Good Farmers is a sympathetic, honest, and realistic book—and therefore a wise one.

Sincerely,

Nicholas Lemann
Director, Columbia Global Reports