How Eating Organic Can Improve the World
The Good Effects of Eating Organic Food
Eating Organic food may be a choice most people make to be healthier and to eat food more like nature intended. Free of the pesticides or the genetically modified foods that you get with non-organic.
There are other reasons to go organic that you may not have thought of or really considered. There are ecological, agricultural and environmental benefits that can have an effect across the world. The article below talks about these beneficial effects and that going organic has more meaning than just being good to yourself.
Nourishing Soils
When you eat organic, you endorse farming systems designed to maintain and improve the physical, chemical, and biological conditions of the soil. Organic farmers manage crop nutrients and soil fertility through the application of organic matter and compost, as the organic regulations require.
They plant cover crops for weed suppression, to increase earthworms and beneficial microorganisms in the soil, and to add essential plant nutrients that assist in plant growth and seed and fruit production. These practices also mitigate the adverse effects of climate change by improving the soil’s water-holding capacity and regulating soil temperatures so that crops can survive during droughts, floods, and bouts of extreme heat or cold.
Flourishing Environments
When you eat organic, you contribute to conserving water, protecting biological diversity, and defending wildlife, wild nature, and pollinators like bees, and butterflies. Standard organic farming practices such as planting high residue cover and rotational crops, like oats and hay, create large volumes of plant biomass that increase the amount of carbon stored (sequestered) in soils.
These practices also prevent erosion and topsoil loss. Planting native hedgerows creates wildlife habitats and attracts pollinators, beneficial insects, and birds that fertilize crops and combat pests.
Healthy Workers and Communities
When you eat organic, you also champion a healthier environment for those who grow your food. That’s not to say that farm work, organic or not, is easy. But a farm is certainly a healthier place for farmers to work when they are not exposed to synthetic fertilizers, insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides as they labor.
Growing organic is also healthier for farming families and the communities where food is grown because those major sources of hazardous air and soilborne farm chemicals are largely eliminated. So, when you eat organic, you can feel confident that you are contributing to a better world by supporting farmers and farming practices that steward the fertile land upon which a secure food future depends. What’s more, you help ensure that current and future generations of farmers can continue to provide themselves, their communities, and the world with healthy and nutritious, fresh food.
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