At Hardin’s Natural Foods, we work hard to get the best organic and natural products to your doorstep. Did you know that buying organic can be a way to help the environment? Here are just a few ways that organic farming can be one way to make our world a bit cleaner:
Climate and Soil
Organic farming practices helps make for healthier soil that is chock full of organic matter, nutrients, and microbial activity. This makes for rich soil that can produce large yields without resorting to synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. Organic farming practices also locks more carbon in the soil by using techniques like cover crops, crop rotation, and using nitrogen fixing legumes. In addition, synthetic fertilizers and pesticides tend to use non-renewable resources (like petroleum) in their manufacture, so organic practices tend to have a lower carbon footprint there too.
Biodiversity and Water Quality
A diverse ecosystem is a healthy ecosystem. Bio-diverse ecosystems are more resilient because if the population of a particular species drops, it’s less likely to take the rest of the ecosystem down with it. Diverse populations of plants and animals optimize nutrient and energy cycling for agricultural production. Also, the lack of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides also contributes to healthy ecosystems by not polluting waterways via runoff.
Ecosystem Services
An ecosystem service is something that nature does that serves humans in some way. For example, plants provide ecosystem services by producing oxygen and filtering water. Organic farming contributes to the ability of ecosystems in the ways described above – soil enrichment, keeping pollution out of waterways, carbon sequestration, and species diversity.
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