F.A. Farm

While looking at my tiller gas consumption in my spreadsheet for the last year, I noticed something astonishing. I used 23 gallons of gas for mowing the lawn, versus 22.25 gallons for my tillers (I don't have a tractor). In other words, I use more gas for keeping up appearances than I use for growing food. Amazing! For another comparison, think of how many gallons of gas the average consumer uses in his/her car, just to get around. The US national average is 25 miles per gallon and 12,500 miles traveled per year. That works out to 500 gallons of gas per year. This amount of gas dwarfs the amount of gas used for sustainable agriculture - and probably industrial agriculture as well! All of us postmodern agriculturalists are flogging a dead horse as long as American consumers continue to drive their cars. The solution is mass transit, but cities across the US are cutting bus/train service, instead of increasing it. Strange as it may seem, the automobile is still king - and the greatest source of our problems. I have managed to get my mileage down to 4-5,000 miles per year and have done so for several years. However, I work at home, so that solution is not amenable to most people. We really do need massive amounts of mass transit, right now.