A farmer who thinks that the only way to survive and prosper is through more technology, bigger equipment, more land and more money is a big farmer no matter how small their farm. For the big farmer, farming is a bottomline business. Small farmers, by necessity, are practical. They can afford to be independent because they do it mostly themselves. And if sustainable, their farms will be permanent.
Small farmers are real farmers.
We are currently living through just such a transformation. The industrial era is behind us. Something fundamentally different lies ahead. Even as agriculture continues to industrialize, industrialization is already slowing, stopping, and even reversing in much of the rest of the economy. The sustainable agriculture paradigm is consistent with the visions of a postindustrial era of human progress.