2024 Volume 96 Issue 2 Pages 229-239
Based on the “Strategy for Sustainable Food Systems, MIDORI” formulated in 2021, this paper aims to redefine the missions of agricultural economy/history by surveying various literatures. Since the beginning of agriculture, humans have sought to simplify arable ecosystems by plowing, weeding, and controlling pests and diseases. Its historical origin was to minimize the asymmetry of information on yields between taxpayers and tax collectors. By critically reviewing the modern agricultural methods that minimize biodiversity, the narrative of agricultural history needs to be drastically revised. At the same time as pursuing the optimal share of the social costs of natural farming, agricultural economics must carefully examine the aspects that natural farming suppresses such as gender asymmetry.
