Comment by IncreasePosts
6 months ago
Agriculture is generally essential but that doesn't mean that any specific thing done in the name of agriculture is essential.
If Americans cut their meat consumption by 10%, we would use a lot less water in agriculture and probably also live longer in general
Iran's ongoing water crisis is an example. One cause of it is unnecessary water-intensive crops that they could have imported or done without (just consume substitutes).
It's a common reasoning error to bundle up many heterogeneous things into a single label ("agriculture!") and then assign value to the label itself.