Given the finite supply of natural resources, agriculture that is inefficient will eventually exhaust the available resources or the ability to afford and acquire them. It will also generate negative externality, such as pollution as well as financial and production costs. Agriculture that relies mainly on inputs that are extracted from the Earth's crust or produced by society, contributes to the depletion and degradation of the environment. Despite this continuing practice, unsustainable agriculture continues because it is financially more cost-effective than sustainable agriculture.
In an economic context, the farm must generate revenue. The way that crops are sold must be accounted for in the sustainability equation. Fresh food sold from a farm stand requires little additional energy, aside from that necessary for cultivation, harvest, and transportations (including consumers). Food sold at a remote location, whether at a farmers' market or the supermarket, incurs a different set of energy cost for materials, labour, and transport.
To be sold at a remote location requires a complex economic system in which the farm producers form the first link in a chain of processors and handlers to the consumers. This practice allows greater revenue because of efficient transport of a large number of items, but because it produces externalities and relies on the use of non-renewable resources, shipping, processing, and handling, it is not considered sustainable. Moreover, such a system is considered vulnerable to fluctuations, such as strikes, oil prices, and global economic conditions including labor, interest rates, futures markets, and farm product prices.
In a social context, the actions required for greater sustainability profoundly affect business methods and lifestyle. Current large-scale agricultural practices do not meet the above sustainability criteria, but shifting toward practices that do meet them would require significant changes by corporations and individuals engaged in agribusiness.
From a system's view, the gain and loss factors for sustainability can be listed. The most important factors for an individual site are sun, air, soil and water as rainfall. These are naturally present in the system as part of the larger planetary processes and incur no costs. Of the four, soil quality and quantity are most amenable to human intervention through time and labour. (The economic input depends solely on the price of labour and cost of machinery used).
source : hydroponicarticle
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