Organic Farming for Sustainable Agriculture – Introduction, Importance and Advantages

From genetics to ecology, Biology Topics cover a vast array of life sciences.

For their existence, all living organisms essentially require food. Early humans started hunting animals and collecting fruits, flowers, and roots of forest plants to meet their food requirements. Food is required for growth, development, and body repair. It also protects the body from diseases and provides energy for doing all life functions. For example, food supplies proteins, carbohydrates and fats (lipids), vitamins, minerals, and water to our bodies.

Among all the living organisms, only green plants are autotrophs, i.e., they make their own food. In fact, green plants perform a basic metabolic activity, called photosynthesis. In photosynthesis by using the energy of sunlight, green plants combine carbon dioxide (CO₂) and water (H₂O) to produce carbohydrates (Food). In contrast to green plants, animals and humans are heterotrophs, i.e., they depend on plants and other animals for food. Since time immemorial, human beings have been farming and rearing animals to meet their food requirements.

Organic Farming: A Solution Towards Sustainable Agriculture

Plants as food are a gift of nature to humans and most animals. In fact, different parts of plants, such as root, stem, leaf, flower, and fruit, are consumed by humans in the form of cereals, vegetables, spices, and fruits. Animals produce milk, egg, meat, etc., which also supplement our food requirements.

With 1.04 billion people, our country ranks second in population growth around the world. According to an estimate, by the year 2020, the Indian population would rise to 1.343 billion. To feed such a huge population, we will require at least 241 million tonnes of grain production per annum. Therefore, it is necessary to increase the production of both, plants and animals. Even in the past, to meet the demands of the growing Indian population, our scientists (such as Swaminathan, and Kurein) adapted methods to increase food production.

This resulted in a variety of ‘revolutions’, which helped India become self-reliant. These revolutions include the green revolution (high production of food grains), the blue revolution (enhanced fish production), the white revolution (increased milk production), and the yellow revolution (increased oil production). Our scientists are continuously making efforts to increase pulse production, i.e. to spread the golden revolution.

Sustainable Agriculture

Sustainable agriculture can be defined as the adoption of various farming and production management techniques to maximize agricultural yield. Implementing such practices would help in (i) conserving natural resources, (ii) maintaining environmental balance and (iii) coping with changing human needs. Hence, to assure the sustained livelihood of Indian farmers and related persons, it is necessary to adopt sustainable agricultural practices such as mixed farming, crop rotation, intercropping, and integrated farming (also known as integrated agriculture).

• Farming: It is the process the harnessing solar energy from plants and animals in the form of economic production.
• Conservation: It means careful utilization, preservation, or restoration of the natural environment and resources.

Integrated agriculture implies a combination of agriculture with other forms of culture such as pisciculture (fish culture), aquaculture, apiculture (beekeeping), sericulture (silkworm culture), poultry farming, piggery, livestock production (animal husbandry), etc.

Why sustainable agriculture?

With the increasing human population of our country, natural resources such as land, soil, water, fossil fuels, etc., are being overexploited for food, shelter, and urbanisation. All these human activities have degraded our environment and have caused the following problems: soil erosion, salinization of soils, desertification, silting of rivers, floods, droughts, eutrophication, ozone depletion, deforestation, wildlife extinction, pollution of air, and water, and land, biomagnification of toxic substances, etc., to name a few. Thus, it has become far more important that we should increase food production without degrading our environment and disturbing the natural balance.

In recent years a concept of sustainable agriculture has been developed in order to ensure that the agroecosystems are stabilized and sustained crop yields are assured on a long-term basis. Sustainable agriculture refers to agriculture – where the agroecosystems function on a self-sustaining basis of nutrient supply and crop protection in order to stabilize crop yields.

Sustainable agriculture involves practices such as organic farming, biological and natural control of pests, emphasis on watershed approach to conserving the soil and water, buildup of microflora in close harmony with beneficial soil – inhabitants, and complete desisting the use of synthetic chemicals. It is sustainable agriculture that ensures, pollution-free food production and the continuation of agriculture with the least damage to the ecosystem.

Advantages of Sustainable Agriculture:

Sustainable agriculture is an agricultural production and distribution system that

• Achieves the integration of natural biological cycles and controls.
• Protects and renews soil fertility and the natural resource base.
• Optimizes the management and use of farm resources.
• Reduces the use of non-renewable resources and purchased production inputs.
• Provides an adequate and dependable form of income.
• Promotes opportunity in family farming and farm communities.

Organic Farming

It is the practice of raising crops that have not been polluted with Sustainable agriculture, the use of manures, biofertilizers, and biopesticides. Instead healthy cropping systems that provide optimum nutrients to plants and keep the pests as well as weeds under control are used. In organic farming, there is little or no use of chemical fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides. Therefore, there is no toxicity due to the pollution of crop plants, soil, water, or air. Organic wastes are recycled in the form of manure.

Biofertilizers include nitrogen-fixing organisms (bacteria and blue-green algae) and mineral-solubilizing bacteria. Biopesticides are organisms or their extracts that repel or kill weeds, insects, and other pests, e.g., azadirachtin (Morgosa or Neem), pyrethrum (chrysanthemum), trioxide (bacterium Bacillus thurigiensis). Neem leaves are often used in grain storage as biopesticides. Healthy cropping includes mixed cropping, intercropping, and crop rotation. These cropping systems help in controlling insects, pests, and weeds.

Advantages of Organic Farming:

• It prevents pollution of any component of our environment.
• Farm wastes are recycled.
• The foods obtained from organic farming are free from pesticides and toxic chemicals.
• Organic farming maintains soil health.
• The cropping system of organic farming keeps insect pests and weeds under check.