Organic farming is a form of agriculture that avoids or excludes the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, plant growth regulators and livestock feed additives. Organic farming is also known as ecological farming in many countries, it reflects the reliance on the ecosystem management instead of external inputs whether chemical or organic.
The role of organic agriculture is to sustain and enhance the health of ecosystems and organisms from the smallest soil to the human beings. The main aim of the organic farming is to enhance the soil health. Organic farmers usually use various methods in organic farming, these include the crop rotation, crop residues, animal manures, green manure, cover cropping, application of compost, mulching, and mechanical cultivation.
The organic farmers use certain processed fertilizers such as seed meal, and various mineral powders such as greensand and rock phosphate. These methods help in maintaining the soil productivity and to supply the plant nutrients and to control weeds, insects and other pests.
Organic farming is helpful in creating integrated, humane, environmentally and economically sustainable agriculture production systems. The maximum reliance is placed on locally or farm-derived renewable resources and the management of self-regulating ecological and biological processes and interactions to provide the acceptable levels of the crop, livestock and human nutrition, protection from the pests and diseases, and an appropriate return to the human and other resources employed.
Organic pest control involves the cumulative effect of many techniques, including the allowance for an acceptable level of the pest damage, encouraging or even introducing the beneficial organisms, careful crop selection and crop rotation. These types of techniques provide benefits in addition to the pest control – soil protection and improvement, pollination, fertilization, season extension, water conservation, etc.
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