What are good farm practices?

The food industry is not just the biggest – it is also the most important for humanity. And with problems of climate change, hunger, and poverty hounding the world, the question of how practices in the sector can be improved to reduce carboon footprint and boost supplies has become ever more important.

Obviously, we would all like to source our food from farms that do more good to the society and to the environment. But it is not always clear what this entails. So in this entry, we discuss: What does it mean to be a good, Earth-friendly farm?

The farmers work with, not against the soil. A fertile tract of land is generally capable of supporting different forms of life. Sadly, agriculture as we know it goes against soil’s own wisdom by planting only one species, introducing chemical fertilizers, and treating the pests and weeds with very strong pesticides and herbicides that harm the soil’s natural composition. Healthy soil practices, on the other hand, include long-term crop rotation, the use of pest-resistant crops, carefully selecting the seeds to sow based on the soil’s type and death, as well as the area’s topography, and creating a farm that supports a mixture of crops (in other words, polyculture). To reduce soil erosion, good farmers also balance their use of fertilizers, avoid heavy machinery, and take advantage of natural, instead of synthetic pest killers.

There is commitment to create as little waste as possible. A good farm honors the Earth – its natural laws, its cycles, and its many, many inhabitants. It understands that everything is interconnected, and so much care is given towards ensuring that each stage of the food production process does not harm creatures. This means planning the operations so well such that there is no waste: only energy stored in matter that gets passed from one specie to the next. Furthermore, if waste is in fact generated, a good farm will dispose of it in the right way.

Animals are treated humanely. Animals in good farms live a good life – the kind that closely resembles their life if they were in the wild: They are not cramped into very small spaces, they are fed well but also are provided the opportunity to forage for their food, and they are not injected with growth hormones to artificially speed up their growth (and thus their journey to the slaughterhouse).

If these practices are adopted, we all would be in a better place.

Author's Note:
This is a blog post by Richard A. Kimball from the beautiful state of California. He is an environmental blogger whose aim is to educate people about conserving the environment for the next generation. You can also him out on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/richardakimball.