Organic+Farming

= __Organic Farming__ =

O rganic farming is a form of farming that is based on crop rotation, green manure, compost, and biological pest control. The main goal of Organic farming is to maintain soil productivity and control pests while limiting the use of synthetic fertilizers, synthetic pesticides, and other additives such as plant growth regulators, livestock feed additives, and genetically modified organisms. For the past 15 years the market for organic products and organically managed farmland has been increasing greatly reaching 46 billion dollars by 2007. Approximately 32.2 million hectares worldwide are now farmed organically, representing approximately 0.8 percent of total world farmland. Organic agricultural methods are internationally regulated and legally enforced by many nations, based in large part on the standards set by the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM). They believe: "Organic agriculture is a production system that sustains the health of soils, ecosystems and people. It relies on ecological processes, biodiversity and cycles adapted to local conditions, rather than the use of inputs with adverse effects.” In the 1980s, governments began to produce organic production guidelines. Starting in the early 1990’s many countries began to abide by these rules and regulation to produce the safest and most healthy farm products possible. The reason Organic farming is preferred over regular farming is due to many factors. One of the biggest reasons however is because organic farms use fewer pesticides than conventional farms. Pesticides damage the environment and human health. The main five pesticides used in organic farming are Bt (a bacterial toxin), pyrethrum, rotenone[citation needed], copper and sulphur [36]. Surveys have found that Organic farms barely, if at all use these pesticides and the ones that do use some pesticides, usually don’t use all of them. Organic pesticides are often used to complement other pest control strategies because they are less hazardous to the environment. Pesticides are extremely unhealthy in our food and water sources. Organic farming uses alternative ways to produce the same amount of goods and conserve the soil without using pesticides, and putting people and animals health at risk. Also non organic farms produce a large amount of pesticide runoff, which is one of the most significant effects of pesticide use. This is caused when pesticides run off from the farms into our water supplies. The USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service tracks the environmental risk posed by pesticide water contamination from farms, confirms that the nation's pesticide policies during the last twenty six years have succeeded in reducing overall environmental risk, in spite of slight increases in area planted and weight of pesticides applied. There are however still places where drinking water and fish are still in grave risk of being contaminated by pesticides. By: Donie Levie