How does organic farming help global warming?

Question

How does organic farming help global warming?

Answer 1

The chemicals used in "regular" farming contains chemicals that are breaking down the ozone. By using organic farming, less chemicals = less atmosphere destruction.

Answer 2

It doesn't because global warming is not created or affected by man, which is why its also happening on Mars.

Answer 3

I don't think it helps combat global warming, what it does is NOT damaging the soil and stuff like that. in other words it doesnt stop lobal warming, it just doesn't contribute to the global warming.

Answer 4

organic farming helps global warming by reducing the amount of fossil fuels used to raise the crop.  In conventional farming seed, chemical and fertilizer application and harvest requires heavy diesel equipment passing back and forth over a field for hours for each individual task.  Organic farming eliminates the use of chemicals and non-organic fertilizer,  so the overall fuel consumption to grow and harvest the product is reduced.

Answer 5

It really boosts global warming.

Organic production yeilds are much lower per acre (or hectare - or any unit of area measurement).

Hence more land is required to be under cultivation to produce the same amount of food as non-organic.

More land under cultivation = less un-cultivated land.

Un-cultivated land = forest.

More organic = less forest.

This is especially true when you realise that most organic food is produced in third-world counties.

Answer 6

First of all, this is a loaded question. This assumes that organic farming helps fight global warming, which, depending on the practices each farmer/operator chooses to employ. For example, a farmer who only makes 3 passes across his field all year- side-dressed fertilizer with planting , one-pass herbicide, harvest- would make less of a dent to global warming than a farmer who uses conventional tillage and multiple chemical applications- yes, organic does NOT mean chemical free.

    The basic answer to this question is that it all depends on the practices of the farmer.

Also, to clarify for other posters, organic uses chemicals. The original modern fungicide was "Bordeaux Mixture", used to control downy mildew on grapes in France, thereby protecting the precious French wine industry. The mixture is copper sulphate and hydrated lime. Ancient Egyptians used mercury seed coating to provide seed-borne protection for disease control. And in a very personal aside, Norman Borlaug, father of the Green Revolution, recently dismissed organic as a craze that cannot and will not solve the world's food shortage problems.

Answer 7

I dont think it really does much difference, when you think about it the chemicals used normally are formed from natural things anyway.

One could argue that the manufacturing process involves burning fossil fuels and so contributes to global warming, but otherwise the difference is minimal.

That said there are alot of other benefits of organic gardening like having less chemical uptake in the plants so that they dont effect humans when they are eaten, but even that doesent really do anything much any way!

Hope this helps

Answer 8

I'd just like to point out that however much the actual organic farming may help the environment (or not contribute, atleast) the emissions given off by the vehicles used to transport the organically grown product across country or halfway around the world far outweighs the act of not using chemicals. This is why you should buy locally grown products whenever possible. By buying locally grown you are contributing to the quality of the product. You can ask about the specific farms reputation, you can see exactly where and under what conditions your food is being grown and you can interact with the person/people doing the growing. You are also supporting your local economy and helping to preserve agriculture in your area by giving that farmer money. Not to mention, the product is much fresher and more nutritious with no artficial coloring (which is why produce from the grocery store is more colorful than fresh from the farm produce). Buy local and everyone wins!

Answer 9

Hi Wishfulthinking,

That is a really great question.  How an organic farm impacts global warming depends a lot on the type operation being, their size, their management practices, and their target market.

As many of the answers have pointed out there are a wide variety of issues that come into play.  Anything that is put on a crop has a “carbon footprint” cost.  This means that X amount of carbon is created during another process.  That process could be the making of something, the transportation of the various components to the manufacturer (or producer) to make the product, and the transportation of the final product to the consumer.  Regardless of the item or process we talk about, almost everything has a carbon footprint.

So back to your question – how does organic farming help global warming….

In conventional farming if an item that is being put on a crop is fertilizer, then the energy to haul all those fertilizer components, to convert them into a product (including pumping vast amounts of water required by most industrial processes), and the fuel required to transport that fertilizer to the consumers …. Well, it doesn’t take long for things to add up and we are only talking about a single item.  In organic farming a lot of the products and practices used in conventional, non-organic, farming are prohibited.  Thus the carbon costs associated with those practices are negated or reduced.

One thing that most people do not consider in the carbon costs of mainstream agricultural practices is the contaminated water runoff of things like fertilizer.  Sure, people are aware of it and how it works but they don’t think about how much carbon (and other gasses) are released into the atmosphere due to secondary interactions in the ecosystem.

When that fertilizer enters an ecosystem through a stream or a river it’s final destination is usually the ocean or other large body of water.  The high levels of things like nitrogen from fertilizers allow single cell plants like algae to grow like crazy.  Now while this doesn’t sound like a bad thing because algae is a plant – and things like to eat plants, right?  Well, sort of.

The problem is that all that algae depletes resources normally found in the water column (like oxygen).   Almost nothing can survive in these areas and huge dead zones, like the one found off the coast of Texas, kill everything in a huge area.  As all of that dead stuff (to include the algae) starts decaying it releases carbon, methane, and other gases back into the atmosphere at many times the normal and natural rate.  

Most organic operations forego a lot of the conventional practices used in mainstream agricultural operations.  So it would make sense that since they don’t use as much “stuff” that they would seem to be the perfect solution.  Organic farming can definitely reduce some aspects of contributing to global warming from what you would get from conventional farming.  But in other ways organic farming has a much larger carbon footprint than you would expect.  For example, what if you had the “perfect” organic farm and yet the only real market for your product was on the other side of the world?  Depending on the product and the amounts, the energy (and fuel) expended to get your product to the customers would be huge compared to what it would be if there was a local market available.  While this might sound far-fetched, a recent article about a couple in New Zealand that has an organic operation had run into that very issue.  The article can be found at:

http://www.newfarm.org/international/fea...

I apologize for the length of this reply.  I guess I should have said that organic farming in and of itself may or may not have an impact on global warming – it all depends on the practices of the farm itself.  Organic farms putting compost on their crops might seem like a good idea, I mean, they aren’t using synthetic fertilizer, right?  

But a conventional farm that uses a digester to break down the compost (think big tank with manure and other biomass waste in a liquid slurry) AND capture all the gases for other uses might have less of a carbon footprint because they use the gases for energy and still recapture the nutrients to be put back in their fields – even though they are not an “organic” farm.  A compost heap can produce a lot of methane and methane is many times worse than carbon as a greenhouse gas.

Organic farming in and of itself may or may not help with global warming.  Too much manure on a field is still going to have problems with the excess nitrogen leaching into the water supply.  However, many of the “best practices” that organic farmers use towards the goal of self-sustainability can lessen their carbon footprint cost – if they properly manage the various processes involved.

I hope this helps a little.  There are many other aspects that we could examine but I’m afraid that if this answer gets any longer they might find you passed out face down on your keyboard .  Good luck with your endeavor!

Y

Answer 10

I do not know. I do know that Al Gore and his left leaning Hollywood buddies live in monster houses and take private jets all over the world. I know that while we have coal fired power plants belching smoke in the air, the French lead the world in nuclear power.

Answer 11

organic farming do not involve the use of fertilisers and pesticides. So these chemicals will not be washed away into the soil and nearby river when it rains. Water pollution is reduced. Less algae will survive on the river.... because there is less nutrients. It has nothing to do with global warming

Answer 12

Organic farming today has  very little if any effect on global warming.  But I'm guessing this is not the answer that you are looking for.