Summary
Abstract Agriculture has undergone dramatic technological and cultural changes over the past century. Many would argue that the changes have been unquestionably positive with huge gains in productivity, reduced labour requirements, and alleviation of food insecurity for most people. However, the adoption of increasingly specialized and separated crop and livestock enterprises has also had widespread negative consequences resulting in (a) decline in biodiversity, (b) degradation of groundwater and surface waters with agrochemical pollutants, (c) poor soil health with monoculture crop production and frequent soil disturbance, (d) intensive greenhouse gas emissions from both specialized cropping systems relying on external inputs and concentrated animal feeding operations that accumulate wast
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