Concepts Regarding the Agricultural Use of the Danube Meadow
Concepts Regarding the Agricultural Use of the Danube Meadow

Summary/Abstract: This paper synthesizes the ecological view of biologist Grigore Antipa and that of the noted engineer Anghel Saligny on the agricultural use of the Danube Floodplain. History gave satisfaction to Anghel Saligny’s constructive conception. However, this conception proved to be ecologically unviable. The paper describes the key moments of this dispute, the evolution of the irrigated agricultural system in the Danube Floodplain, the effects on the environment, the financial aspects of Saligny’s engineering concept. We have also assessed (in financial terms) the consequences of this concept, a damaging agricultural system for both the state and farmers. It is considered erroneous to continue the policy of rehabilitating old, expensive, energy-intensive and non-environmentally friendly irrigation systems. The author are concerned about the future of large-scale agriculture that concentrates economic power in the most favorable agricultural agrozone while the country’s disinherited peasantry earns their living in an increasingly hostile external environment.

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