Environmental, Energetic, and Economic Comparisons of Organic and Conventional Farming Systems
David Pimentel et al.
Image from: Global Warming
The majority of US agriculture uses synthetic chemical fertilizers and pesticides which causes a serious impact on public and environment health. Pesticides can be commonly found in streams and groundwater which puts an effect on public community that are getting these water.
David talks a bit about the three experimental design of cropping systems from the "Rodale Institute Farming System Trail" which were conventional cropping, organic animal-based cropping and organic legume-based cropping. These were then compared with impacts of droughts on the three crops, as well as energy requirement, costs and benefits, soil carbon changes over time, and nitrogen accumulation/nitrate leaching. As the result they found that organic systems had a greater biodiversity than conventional systems.
David also talks about the challenges of organic agriculture. The two primary problems are nitrogen deficiency and weed competition. These are a problem because researchers have found difficulties in maintaining good quality soil without the use of fertilizers, while weed control is limited to mechanical and biological weed control; opting out chemical weed control.
He lists some benefits of organic technologies as a conclusion. Some of the benefits of organic technologies are the costs of organic products helps bring the net economic to an equal or higher profit than conventional products; energy input is also lowered by 30% compared to conventional crops; and of course it also helps make the environment more sustainable and ecologically sound.
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