Foodprints for the Future
One Crop to Rule Them All? The Hidden Dangers of Monoculture Farming
November 25, 2025
The potential that one acre of land holds is vast. Take a minute to imagine a plot of land, about the size of a football field, lush with different grains, fruits, and vegetables. In this image, agriculture and terrain work in symbiosis to paint a vibrant landscape in front of you. Now think of the most recent road trip you took.
As a California native, frequent drives up and down the Interstate 5 (I-5) are the norm. This highway connects most of the West Coast, linking California, Oregon, and Washington. While the route runs parallel to the Pacific Ocean, the California portion rarely touches the coast, cutting through the middle of the state. Along the highway, you can spot extensive fields of corn, wheat, almond trees, or tomatoes (among other crops). Looking out into the homogenous expanse, you will find yourself face to face with a historical, environmentally taxing practice; monocropping.
Monocropping is actually an extreme sub-practice of monoculture, which is growing the same crop species, but allowing for crop rotations – where the same crop species might be grown but rotated among different fields over seasons or years. In 2022, just ten crops dominated 63% of global farmland, supplying 83% of the world’s harvested food calories, and yet only 37% of these crops are directly used for human consumption.
The rest are used for other industrial purposes like to support the growth of the animal agriculture industry. Around 70% of global agricultural land is used to grow food for livestock, Other crops are used to make biofuels.
This focus on a small number of crops prioritizes uniformity and efficiency over biodiversity and soil health. As a result, the ecosystems and soils where these crops are grown become exhausted and degraded because the natural balance is disrupted by this lack of variety. In other words, agriculture is dominated by a monoculture system that neglects diversity, which harms the environment and soil vitality over time.
Why Did Monocropping Take Off?
There are reasons farms chose to monocrop. For larger farms with access to big agricultural machinery, it can make sowing and harvesting more efficient. Which is why it’s common when farming crops such as corn, soybeans, and wheat. Economically, there is more security in this type of farming too. Harvests are more consistent , and it saves money not having to purchase different kinds of fertilizers as these crops thrive with nitrogen based fertilizers.
Farming, once one of the most natural of endeavours, has become “artificialised.”
Raul Zornoza Belmonte, Professor of Agricultural Engineering at Universidad Politécnica de Cartagena, Spain
The industrialization of farming began in the United States in the 1940s, and is known as the Green Revolution. This movement has strong connections to the work of Norman Borlaug.
Borlaug, born in 1914, was an American agronomist and plant pathologist known as the “Father of the Green Revolution.” He developed high-yield, disease-resistant varieties of wheat starting in the 1940s, particularly in Mexico, which dramatically increased food production. His semi-dwarf wheat varieties, combined with modern farming techniques, helped Mexico, India, and Pakistan overcome food shortages during the mid-20th century. His work is credited with saving over a billion people worldwide from starvation and earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970.
His central objective was to increase productivity in the agricultural sector to feed more people – it was his obsession with high-yielding varieties (HYVs) of crops (such as wheat or rice) that made this possible. These crops are highly specialized versions of the original crop, but specifically cultivated on the basis of desirable gene mutations.
HYV strains, such as “miracle wheat”, especially thrived in monoculture farmed land and benefited from nitrogenous fertilizer. They were an agricultural game changer, as yield nearly tripled. Plus government agricultural policies at the time, also favored monocropping practices with subsidies. Subsidies came in the form of monetary or other kinds of federal support.
But while monocropping can seem like the betterment of agricultural endeavors, the price of temporary productivity is being paid, with interest, by the environment.
Stark Reality of Monocropping
To begin, intensive monocropping severely impacts soil quality by accelerating soil erosion more than organic farming practices do. This nutrient depletion weakens the soil, reducing its fertility and structure, and forces farmers to rely heavily on synthetic fertilizers to replenish what the soil loses and to sustain plant growth. Over time, this cycle not only degrades soil health but also leads to further environmental issues such as reduced microbial diversity, poorer water retention, and increased vulnerability to pests and diseasesIn 2020, the USDA reported that fertilizer costs accounted for 33-44% of corn farming operating coasts and 34-45% for wheat operating coasts. So, not only is this practice disastrous for our soil, it’s got a hefty price tag.
For the soil is the gut – the source of nourishment – for the plants we farmers grow. And it now seems there is a vital link between the microbiome of our intestines and the microbiome of the soil. Seventy years of intensive farming have decreased the microbiome of the soil to such low levels that now we urgently need to restore it. And this will mean changing the way we farm.
Patrick Holden, Founding Director of the Sustainable Food Trust, Organic Farmer
In organic farming, methodical crop rotation is used to introduce other plant species, like clover, that restore the soil nutrients naturally that the prior crop exhausted. Beans are regarded as “nitrogen fixers” because they can deposit nitrogen into the soil, reducing the need for synthetic fertilizers.
While natural ecosystems are diverse, and have symbiotic relationships that contribute to the survival of the whole, monocropping has helped lead to 75% of the world’s crop varieties being lost in the last century alone.
Our crops are also becoming more susceptible to highly specialized diseases. An excellent example of this is the 1950s banana extinction. Gros Michel was the name of the dominant variety of bananas at the time, and in comparison to our current variety (Cavendish bananas), were less likely to bruise and sweeter. The Gros Michel species were swept into extinction by the Panama disease (a soil related fungal disease). The resilient Cavendish bananas survived this fungus, and are now produced at a volume of 50 million tonnes annually and account for about half of global production. But these bananas are at risk of facing the same fate as their sibling variety.
Due to the uniformity and single genetic lineage of these bananas, both strengths and weaknesses are shared. Fusarium Tropical Race 4 (TR4) is a soil-borne fungus that targets banana roots. This disease could wipe out entire plantations in a single outbreak, and the lack of biodiversity within bananas accelerates this process.
Growing a single cultivar of any crop, also called monoculture agricultural production, provides breeding ground for the development of pathogens.
Li-Jun Ma, Molecular Biologist
The lack of diversity in monocropping means that if a disease evolves to infect one plant, it can quickly spread through entire fields with no natural barriers to stop it. The optimal solution, which applies to most monoculture problems, is to diversify plant production, and invest in cultivating different varieties of bananas.
Variety Isn’t Just the Spice of Life—It’s the Survival of It
Polyculture is the flip side of this agriculture coin, and necessitates growing a variety of plant species on the same land, for the goal of diversification. Polycultures preserve soil health, because the variety of plants balance consumption and replenishment of nutrients in the soil. The root structures of different plants help with water filtration, strengthen soil structure, prevent nutrient depletion, and reduce the need for synthetic fertilizers.
We need to move away from chemistry to biology in the way that we farm.
Patrick Holden, Organic Farmer
Polycultures can even increase crop yields. In certain instances, they produce 80% more food per acre than their monoculture counterparts. Increased yields like this one, can be attributed to the interconnectedness of the plants, largely represented by the term agro-symbiosis. This is a form of symbiosis that is mutualistic, as every plant involved benefits from the exchange.
A benefit of this relationship is the deterrence of pests. An entomology study from 2019 showed that as plant species diversity increased within a plot of land, so did the ratio of natural enemies to crop pests. Natural enemies are insects that are in nature’s arsenal as defense against pets. The implementation of polycultures can support their impact on pest management, by creating habitat niches.
Polycultures also equip plants with climate resilience. Weather has profound effects on crop yield, especially extreme conditions such as droughts, heat waves and excessive rain. The resilience of polyculture plots to these conditions are an amalgamation of the aforementioned factors. Rich soil health also strengthens soil structure, creating stronger foundations for the plants. The surge in biodiversity keeps the ecosystem balanced and stable, so failure as a whole is unlikely.
Looking Across the Pond
There are many inspiring stories of success when it comes to sustainable agriculture. One prominent example is the work of UK trailblazer Patrick Holden. He was the former head of the Soil Association and is the current founder and CEO of Sustainable Food Trust. During Holden’s time at the Soil Association the charity’s staff and sales of organic produce in the UK grew significantly. He was one of the primary contributors to paving the UKs organic produce landscape, with notable achievements.
One such being the work he did on the Organic Livestock Standards Committee, where efforts were made to ensure organic certification credibility and organic livestock standards. His current work with the Sustainable Food Trust, is a framework style approach for farm sustainability and redesigning systems to integrate ethical practices.
Small Actions, Big Harvests
By choosing to support polyculture farming, you’re doing more than improving what ends up on your plate; you’re helping rebuild ecosystems, reduce pesticide use, and protect the planet’s natural balance. If you’re interested in learning more about regenerative agriculture, you can read more articles here. You can also take the EARTHDAY.ORG Pesticide Pledge, which helps safeguard vital pollinators.
For an even greater impact, consider advocating for transparency in pesticide use. Hidden deep in the Interior Appropriations Bill (Section 453) lies a clause that shields chemical companies from public accountability about the health risks of their products. Learning more helps push for the honesty our environment deserves.
Together, small actions can sow the seeds for lasting change and move us closer to a food system that nourishes both people and the planet.
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