A Stewardship of Land and Creatures

Agriculture is a production industry, producing food, forage, fibre, energy, and other raw or processed products for human nourishment and use. We readily recognize these provisioning (production) services as a major role of agriculture; sometimes, we speak and act as if production is the singular role of agriculture. This view, though, is reductionistic, as it fails to realize the potential of agriculture for a fuller, richer stewardship, to the detriment of our creativity and faithfulness.

At a recent meeting of our Agriculture Department Advisory Council, a group of industry advisors reflected on the need to renew a conservation ethic in our industry. This is the idea that a commitment to stewardship necessitates more than efficiently managing resources to optimize production and income generation. Our role as stewards requires us to be productive in such a way that creation can keep doing all the things it was meant to do.

Creation itself has numerous roles, which we can call ecosystem services [i]. Agriculture, working in the creation, can contribute to these services or detract from creation’s ability to supply them. There are four categories of ecosystem services that are usually recognized: provisioning services, regulating services, cultural services, and sustaining services.

Along with the provisioning services we usually associate with agriculture, agriculture also needs to fulfil ecosystem regulating roles. Regulating services of ecosystems are those things that help to control and maintain balance in local or global systems. Healthy agricultural systems can contribute such things as maintenance of air, water, and soil quality, soil’s resistance to erosion, the control of diseases and pest outbreaks, water control to prevent or manage flooding, pollination services, and others.

When agricultural landscapes provide for tourism or recreation, such as hunting or fishing, they are supplying cultural services. This category of services also includes aesthetics, heritage connections, education, and spiritual experiences. For example, many rural communities have pioneer villages that give an insight into the history of that place and its people. And throughout Scripture, from the Psalmists to Jesus, agricultural landscapes or practices provided wonder, awe, and instruction.

Supporting services provide the essential functions that enable the other three categories of services to operate. For example, ecosystems, including those in agriculture, need to supply habitat for biological and genetic diversity of many creatures. Soils must cycle organic matter to provide the nutrient cycling and productivity for plant growth. Water must be able to be captured by soil, percolate to aquifers, be filtered by wetlands, and fill streams and lakes.

Agriculture, when viewed through the lens of stewardship, must necessarily be involved in all four of these categories of services to fulfill its calling.

Is that enough? When we have so managed the creation that it can fulfill all these roles for us, is our stewardship mandate complete?

Inasmuch as we are not our own but belong to our faithful Saviour, so too does the creation. We are not the chief end of creation, but we and all creatures exist to give glory to God. We are not the masters of creation, but as caretakers, we owe a responsibility for our caretaking to God, who is the true master, creator, and sustainer.

Humanity’s dominion (Genesis 1:28) was mandated over a creation that itself already had a mandate to be fruitful and multiply (Genesis 1:22). The dominion of humanity is one, therefore, that tends and keeps so that the rest of creation can also flourish, not simply as an extension of our flourishing, but as creation’s own response to its Creator. In a sense, we are partners with the creation toward mutual flourishing and praise.

Our agriculture, then, must nurture the flourishing of ourselves, our fellow humans, and the rest of creation, not only livestock and domesticated plants, but also wild creatures and the earth itself. Our agriculture must give the creation the freedom and the tending hand to do all the things God designed it to do. But when our agriculture, or any other industry, so rules that the diverse creatures and parts of the creation are unable to fulfill their mandate, we fail at our mandated stewardship.

A farmer’s story I heard several years ago provides what I think is a helpful example. This farmer was an early adopter of no-till soil management practices in the irrigated areas of southern Alberta, Canada. His family’s farm is large-scale, growing wheat, peas, mustard, and other grains. He uses precision agriculture to efficiently spray, fertilize, and manage soil moisture conditions, minimizing costly and potentially harmful inputs and maximizing their effectiveness toward their intended purpose. When he told his story to my students, he shared about his yields, which after the initial drag that is expected following the transition from conventional tillage to no-till, saw gains through the decades he had been no-tilling. He shared about the organic matter in his soils and the natural fertility and pest management he benefited from, which were advantages of his healthier system. He shared, emphatically, about how no-till is appropriate even under irrigation where moisture is not limited [ii]. But the thing he shared with the greatest joy was how birds, even hawks, were nesting in increasing numbers in his fields among the crop plants he leaves standing after he strips off the grain at harvest time. He is contributing to all of the categories of ecosystem services through his stewardship of his cropland, and he is witness to a system that is flourishing because of his stewardship.

The point is not to have everyone become no-till farmers (though my students sometimes suspect that is my intention). Instead, the goal is that as farmers do productive agriculture, they embrace practices that promote soil health, protect water bodies and aquifers, enhance species diversity on the farm and in surrounding landscapes, and manage pests and diseases in ways that present the least risk of harm to the environment, the farmer, and those eating food. These are among the practices that can support production and supply other regulating, cultural, and sustaining services.

The goal includes more than just farmers; it includes everyone. If you are able, buy locally-produced foods so you can get to know the men and women who serve in agriculture. Grow something in a pot on a windowsill or in a flower bed or garden. Sit in a place surrounded by nature. Take a walk in it, even get lost just a little. Cook your own meals. Eat regularly with others, maybe as a family, maybe with neighbors or friends. Deliberately join in community with other people. Thank God often for his many good gifts.

A fuller, richer vision of agriculture is no less than one that supplies varied types of services for humans while also ministering to the need for creation to praise its Creator through its own being. Such agriculture brings praise to God from many voices.

That is agriculture stewardship.

Footnotes:

[i] The concept of ecosystem services gained greater recognition through the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005): Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005. Ecosystems and Human Wellbeing: Synthesis. Island Press, Washington, DC.

(ii) No-till is often heralded as a solution to concerns about low soil moisture conditions in arid and semi-arid agriculture. It can be applied in climates with greater moisture, generating soil health and other benefits.