The calculus of sustainability
Howdy from Aggieland!
I’m excited to begin sharing sustainability as I see it from this platform. My intention is for this blog to be an amalgamation of scientific updates, new perspectives, and my process of learning and growing into my role as a Livestock Sustainability Specialist.
It’s been a year since I started my role at Texas A&M AgriLife Extension. During the past year, I intentionally focused on listening and witnessing the needs of Texas livestock producers, county extension agents and specialists, and industry professionals. Initially, I imagined that I would absorb and deeply understand the root issues, conversations, concerns, and developments in the sustainability space. I envisioned the following step would then be to dive in and start to share my insights and newfound wisdom. What I learned however, is that this is a process that will never end! So, I am diving into the writing process regardless of my lack of omniscient awareness on every sustainability-related topic there is.
I want to be transparent and pensive on this page – I want to share newfound insight into topics I did not previously grasp, revelations, epiphanies, and stories. It’s possible that I will miss the mark here and there, or even surprise readers with a perspective they did not expect from me. However, there is one thing I often say about sustainability: that the goal is not perfection; it’s the pursuit of improvement, or even the pursuit of maintenance in many cases. In fact, here is one of my most used presentation slides:
Part of my dissertation involved mathematical modelling of dairy cattle metabolism, so I often think of sustainability as a problem from which we are trying to derive the optimal (the best) solution given a set of constraints (what we have available). Take a look at the graph below of a basic optimization function:
Hang with me here for some watered down calculus. The solution to the above function – the blue dot at the top of the graph – represents the best outcome given the inputs you’ve thrown at it, and the limits of those inputs.
- For example, it could be the set of most effective treatments for a cancer patient’s unique situation generated by their oncologist.
- It could be the route your GPS calculated as the fastest way to get to a friend’s house, avoiding traffic jams in real time.
- From a ruminant nutritionist’s perspective, it could even be the mixture of ingredients needed to feed a group of lactating dairy cows that balances the most cost-effective feedstuffs with the maximum amount of milk they can produce.
In theory, “optimization” is supposed to help us do everything smarter, faster, and more efficiently. However, sometimes the intention of a best solution is not privy to unforeseen circumstances. If you’re developing dairy cow rations on a computer program, the software may “know” that silage is the base of your ration, but it won’t “know” if part of silage bag is spoiled, and when that spoiled silage may be fed (and then, lower milk production due to cows’ unwillingness to eat it). Human intuition is still essential to solve problems.
Also, anyone who has ever used a GPS has had moments where the darn thing takes you on a ridiculous or worse route because it did not know, say, that a road was closed, or there is a median blocking a left-handed turn. Still, the beauty of a modern-day GPS system is that it has the capability to learn and adapt from its own mistakes. Often, the mistake has to be made first for learning to occur (albeit, at your inconvenience).
This is how I view sustainability. It’s a complex set of questions, equations, inputs, and obstacles that are not the same from farm to farm, ranch to ranch, business to business.
A livestock producer’s sweet spot, their blue dot on top of the graph, is where they find the balance that works best for them. For a cow/calf producer, that includes the right combination of animals, cropping needs, family time, budget, soil quality, local regulations and, if they’re particularly concerned about ecological conservation, the best combination of inputs (feed type, animal management, animal waste treatment processes) and outputs (pollution, sequestered carbon) to utilize as it relates to their operation.
More importantly, progress is more likely if a person is striving to do it for themselves, not for a third-party. So, to recap,
- Perfection is impossible,
- Improvement or maintenance of good principles is the goal,
- The pursuit to improve an enterprise, the environment, or one’s way of life is more sustainable if it’s done for oneself (or maybe even their higher power), not someone else.
“Healthy striving is self-focused: ‘How can I improve?’ Perfectionism is other-focused: ‘What will they think?’”
The Gifts of Imperfection. Book by Brené Brown, 2010.
-JPW