THE organic agriculture is an environmentally sustainable way of using the ground for production, that is, in order to guarantee the preservation of natural resources for future generations. The main concern and objective of organic agriculture is to ensure healthy food consumption, reducing or eliminating the presence of pesticides and other chemical products during cultivation.
There are four basic principles of organic agriculture, namely:
1 - respect for nature: considering the need to preserve soils, natural resources, animals etc.;
2 – crop diversification: with the concern to develop the diversity of cultivated products, both to balance the soil and to guarantee variety;
3 – independence between production systems: in order to separate agricultural production from industrial and commercial systems, unlike mechanized agriculture;
4 – the soil is a living organism: the understanding that the soil must be preserved, including the maintenance of its nutrients, micro-organisms and living beings in general.
In this sense, the entire process is carried out so as not to use any chemical that can change the quality of the cultivated elements and neither the food's ability to do good to the health. Thus, fertilizers and pesticides are replaced by organic fertilizers and natural methods of pest control, among other forms of cultivation.
In most cases, organic agriculture is maintained in the context of family farming, with small producers who use, above all, manual work, that is, without resorting to large machinery. Furthermore, in areas of larger-scale production, a large amount of labor is employed, generating more jobs in the countryside. Most cultivated products refer to the so-called “culture of the poor”, which basically involves those foods that are daily consumed by families, such as rice, beans, vegetables, fruits etc.
Organic agriculture prioritizes variety in food production
Brazil is the tenth largest country in the area destined to agriculture organic. However, this amounts to just 0.25% of all agricultural land in the country, which shows the need to increase public and private investments in this sector, mainly to ensure more healthy food on the table. people. The countries that have the most organic agriculture are Australia, Argentina, the United States, China and Spain.
By Me. Rodolfo Alves Pena
