ИСТИНА

Courses, related with different aspects of agricultural activities (land resources, soil fertility, agro-chemistry and mineral fertilizers use, prevention of erosion, fundamentals of agriculture, geography of agriculture, agricultural economics, etc.) are taught in most classic universities of Russia. Usually, these courses deal with different specific concepts: e.g. agro-chemistry and fertilizers use – mineral plant nutrition, agricultural economics – profitability. Though, the knowledge graduates get is rather narrow: soil scientists, geographers, economists even may not understand each other, discussing agricultural development policies and practices. Controversial understanding of sustainability as substitution of “conventional” agriculture by “organic” is criticized. As an alternative the author proposes sustainability of agriculture as a complex concept for education, with special focus on higher geographical and environmental education. Sustainability of agriculture comprises environmental, economic and social aspects. Balance between these components of sustainability varies depending on geographical conditions, as shown on examples of different countries of the world. Geographical and landscape approach for understanding the essence of sustainability of agriculture are fundamental for the courses “Modern agricultural technologies and regional agricultural systems” and “Territorial strategies in the development of agribusiness”, recently developed by the author for the M.Sc. program “Anthropogenic Transformation of Agricultural Systems” at the Faculty of Geography of Moscow State University.