Monday, June 14, 2010

Organic Agriculture: Cleaner Produce & Cleaner Air?

With the way we live today, we produce very large amounts of Carbon Dioxide among many other hazardous chemicals that get released into the air day after day. Los Angeles has a cloud over itself proving that we as a species are slowly destroying the habitat we live in. Some will argue that this is called Global Warming. Others will contest that the changes in our environment are expected and we will be okay. Either way, we [overall population] are aware that our behavior must change in order to protect the other living organisms in the world. Something we call the “green movement”.
The Rodale Institute, which is dedicated to the promotion of organic agriculture, produced the theory that by replacing our current farmed land which is approximately 3.7 billion acres with organic farming we could in fact reduce the global carbon emission by up to 40 percent. The report was called, “Regenerative Organic Farming: A Solution to Global Warming” which was released in 2008. Since then we have found truths and inadequacies in such predictions.
When we look at the methods organic farming brings to the table, carbon reduction is a large accolade. But, what we have noticed is that climate change by agricultural influences do not limit at carbon dioxide. Methane and nitrous oxide are the primary forms of gasses that affect the atmosphere and climate. Methane, which creates up to 23 times more of an affect than carbon dioxide according to the EPA along with Nitrous oxide pushing way beyond reasonability with 310 times more potent than carbon dioxide.
Composted Manure, which is the main source of fertilizer for row crops impacts our environment most directly, releasing 2.7 percent of it’s carbon as methane before it reaches the field.
As we develop more innovative ways to increase efficiency in growing the Nation’s vegetables and fruit along with row crops for other means of use, we hope that we take into account the environment and what we are releasing out into the air that we breathe day in, and day out. While the Rodale study showed a concern for our current methods, we learn from this study, that many other variables were there that they did not include and we can only look around and wonder, what have we not figured out yet.