Big discussion in the Netherlands now, and going on to some extent for decades already, about: does it make sense for such a small country to have this much intensive agriculture?
As the article mentions, the nitrogen deposited in the little patches of what should pass for nature are killing it.
Nice to be self-sufficient in food, but we're more than that in some areas. But say something negative about farmers and you'll have protesters in big tractors blocking highways and city centers.
The parties currently trying to form a government will only let these problems fester and not make hard choices to put an end to them one way or another.
My cousin works as a farmer's hand in the Netherlands. He had an interesting anecdote about liquid manure. They used to spray it over the land, but people living nearby started complaining about the smell, so they started injected it underground. They found that yields improved after that.
They stored the liquid manure in a big bag. I stood on it, it was a bit like a water bed.
Fun fact:
In open fields in Spain you can harvest around 4 kilograms of tomatoes per square metre. A Dutch high-tech greenhouse produces 80 kilograms per square metre and with four times less water.
To the extent that the greenhouses are a significant source of light pollution, and every once in a while (faulty coverings, or for a holiday) the sky will be bright purple[1,2]
[1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/Netherlands/comments/10mc6ah/can_an... [2]: https://www.reddit.com/r/Rotterdam/comments/ylmcgy/bright_pu...
Big discussion in the Netherlands now, and going on to some extent for decades already, about: does it make sense for such a small country to have this much intensive agriculture?
As the article mentions, the nitrogen deposited in the little patches of what should pass for nature are killing it.
Nice to be self-sufficient in food, but we're more than that in some areas. But say something negative about farmers and you'll have protesters in big tractors blocking highways and city centers.
The parties currently trying to form a government will only let these problems fester and not make hard choices to put an end to them one way or another.
The Netherlands is a good example of intensive agriculture: not only have they put heavy capital investments into the land they already had, they even invested substantial amounts of capital in creating new land.
If you'd asked me which country was the 2nd largest exporter of agricultural products, I certainly wouldn't have said the Netherlands. It's cool to see what they're doing to maximize efficiency, and I hope that efficiency can be replicated globally as well.
Yeah well.
Those things grow the quickest because they were cultivated to absorb the most water.
So there's little taste and advantages with those, compared to others.
So yeah, great. But numbers only say part of the story.
The bummer is how much of it driven by fossil fuels: greenhouses heated with gas, air pumped with CO2 to speed up ripening, fertilizer made from fossil fuels.
very poor quality though, if you've had dutch tomatoes or peppers, you'll know
I'd be interested in the nutritional value of said products as well
Slightly related, the Maritime Museum in Amsterdam has an interesting exhibit looking at global agriculture trade (which the Netherlands plays a large role in).
https://www.hetscheepvaartmuseum.com/whats-on/exhibitions/fo...
It's also one of the largest importers/re-exporters.
According to Statista this is just a statistical anomaly as a result of the Netherlands having such large port facilities - the agricultural products are imported to the country and then exported elsewhere in Europe, which artificially bumps up the export statistics without any correlation to the actual production amount.
Which makes a lot more sense, because even an efficiently-run farming sector surely couldn't be so efficient that it can produce almost as much as the US despite being 1/50 the size. If you look at actual agricultural production the Netherlands isn't at the top of anything - the best they're doing is world #5 in cheese production.