Evaluating agricultural policy and the sustainability of production systems: An economic framework

IN recent years, researchers struggling to define “sustainable agriculture” have generated a plethora of qualitative definitions that include maintaining farm productivity and profitability, while minimizing environmental impacts. But until now, analytical definitions of agricultural sustainability have ignored the condition of the natural resource base, which is fundamental to sustainability. This oversight has meant that the concept of “sustainable agriculture” has been less useful than it could be to policymakers and researchers trying to determine the effects of various policies and technologies. Sustainability means that economic activity should meet current needs without foreclosing future options, according to the World Commission on Environment and Development's 1987 report, Our Common Future. The standard textbook definition of income—the maximum amount that can be consumed this year without reducing potential consumption in future years—encompasses this notion of sustainability (22). But this notion is conspicuously absent from conventional agricultural accounting systems, which ignore what current production is doing to such resources as soil and water, even though they are any farmer's principal natural assets. Nowhere is …