With ever increasing population the sustainability for vital ecosystems will always be an expensive affair. The developed economies will talk about it but the third world and poorer nations which have a lots of these resources don't give it a due attention. That too with a valid reason their priority is sustaining people.

Should attention be drawn to meeting demands of the people (both in the first and third world, not forgetting the second and fourth worlds), is there hope for meeting such needs without a trade-off between ecosystem services and economic services (like increasing land area for food production, infrastructure development,etc)

David I am personally not hopeful in short term and probably the answer lies in better management. In countries like india 40% of agriculture produce is lost due to improper storage. Small farmers have abandoned agriculture because land holdings are too small that they can sustain. But it is different in Africa where not enough resources have been put in agriculture and in middle east where extensive resources are dedicated and does not make any economic sense.

With regards to the situation in India, what efforts have been put in place so far by government/policy makers to incentize farmers to go back into agriculture bearing in mind the size of the populations and the presumed high intra-country demand for food?

David guess these farmers cannot be attracted back to agriculture due to the fact that landholdings are too small to make any sense. The rapid urbanization is another factor to give an example a farmer can make about $480 per acre earning per year. Most don't have even an acre land holding and if it is near an urban area they can better sell it to developer at very high price that can change their life to give an example an acre land in vicinity of Delhi could be sold between $150,000 - $180000 it can be a tenth of this price in other cities but still a substantial amount there. The government has no means and probably intention to give any such incentive. If they start promoting greenhouses and incorporation of advance technologies in agriculture probably situation could be better.

but should researchers give up any hope of attracting farmers back to agriculture, and government refuse to give any incentive now, is there any hope for curbing future food security and poverty implications? With regards to the small land holdings, is it as a result of the land tenure systems in India or due to decreasing availability of the lands due to population increases? How is the land tenure system there like?

David this is very difficult to answer. Recently I did a paper on if the earth can sustain 7.1 billion people and the answers I got were not good. The book 6 billion plus was a big help. The sad truth is even our renewable recourses are being overused by an average of 30% you might want to look at the natural step you might find interest in that

oh ok, thanks a lot Dave for the view shared on the issue. I just pray and hope we find a way out of this with ecological economists holding firmly unto the concept of "strong sustainability"

Education is a key factor. People need to see that keeping some land for natural ecosystems is financially better than farming all available land. Eg. Protecting coral reefs provides breeding grounds for fish = more fish for fishermen. Keeping forest creates homes for birds =more birds to eat locusts and crop damaging insects.

Thanks a lot Craig for your unique view and suggestion. Your point is well noted

Craig i am happy to read your note. AM not so optimist and strongly believe that this term sustainability for environment is not going to hold, how can we sustain something when everything else is changing. We have to change to a more efficient more productive system and mere sustaining of what is there wont help. I can see why you can say it you might not have seen the situation in over populated anfd over crowded countries. how would you define sustainability in case of Germany for example, they are going on large scale to make wind farms in sea will it be sustainable?