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18 The Society of Malawi Journal

in traditional husbandry. Small farms always tend to be more productive than
large farms (Tudge 2016:49).
The social and ecological impact of high-tech industrial farming has
been described as "devastating"; an impact that has been widely discussed by
numerous scholars. It includes the extensive rural depopulation; the
concentration of land ownership; the widespread degradation of the
environment with a serious loss of wildlife habitats; the abuse of farm animals
under factory conditions; the undermining of rural economies throughout the
world, and, finally, as contributing significantly, though high carbon emissions
to global warming. The general conclusion of many scholars is, therefore, that
industrial agriculture is unsustainable and a serious threat to both the
environment and to human health and well-being. (Clunes-Ross and Hildyard
1992, Tudge 2003:92, Empson 2016).
With the human population on earth around seven billion, half of
whom are living in cities, the notion that the future is "primitive", involving a
return to a hunter-gathering mode of existence (Zerzan 1994) is clearly not an
option for humanity (Morris 2014:62).
At the other extreme, high-tech agriculture, given its adverse social and
ecological impact (detailed above) is neither conducive to the diversity of life,
nor is it sustainable.
What is then needed is an indigenous revolution (Richards 1985), and
the development of an enlightened or organic form of agriculture that combines
what is valid and important in the farming practices of small farms and peasant
smallholders - such as those of the people of the Shire Highlands whose socio-
economic life I have attempted to portray; and the insights of the ecological and
biological sciences.

Select Bibliography

Wilson, R. 2011 Witch-Hunt Saboteurs, New Humanist May-
June pp 14-17
Conroy, A.C. et al 2006 Poverty, AIDS and Hunger: Breaking the
Poverty Trap in Malawi
London: Palgrove MacMillan
Chilowa, W.R. 1990 Smallholder Maize Production and
Household Food Security in Malawi
Zomba: Centre for Social Research
Morris, B. 2016 An Environmental History of Southern
Malawi: Land and People of the Shire
Highlands
Basingstoke: Palgrave MacMillan
Mweninguwe, R. 2001 Rooting Out the Cause, The Nation 28
February