ABSTRACT
In coming to deal with the place of food production in industrial societies we face a set of strong tensions. There is the productivist view of agriculture as a technical problem of how best to exploit particular biophysical structures and functions to produce the maximum amount of useable food and fibre. Set against this is a spectrum of views of agriculture as a socio-cultural activity that all but defines a particular society or nation, farming as a way of life, through to it being seen as a key agent of economic development. Riding uneasily with all these is the growing understanding of the place of agriculture as the dominant form of human land management on the planet that must account for many landscape functions and processes other than just providing for human needs. We need a framework for understanding agriculture in all its complex roles of providing human sustenance and cultural meanings, as well as delivering ecosystems services.
