Conventional farming, also known as industrial agriculture, is defined as methods of farming in which include the use of synthetic chemical fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides and genetically modified organisms. When chemicals were first introduced in farming, everyone wonder at what they could do. Yields were dramatically increased. In the beginning, the soil was so healthy, any damage done by chemical fertilizers was insignificant, and pests had yet to advance resistance to the insecticides. Farmers were very happy to see the remarkable results. Now, it is difficult to find somewhere where pesticides aren’t used — from the can of bug spray under the kitchen sink to the airplane crop dusting acres of farmland, our world is filled with pesticides. There are a number of problems brought on by conventional agriculture’s techniques.
Conventional methods are inhumane to animals; they spread disease and pollution and degrade our nation’s soil and water. In the interests of sustainability, protecting our nation’s resources and improving our health, conventional agriculture needs to be banned, both in the Pakistan and abroad. We must protect our nation’s arable land in order to protect our food supply for future generations but unfortunately, our nation’s soil is treated as though it were disposable. Pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, and petroleum-based fertilizers strip the soil of nutrients and kill beneficial organisms such as earthworms, predatory insects, and microorganisms.
Our food is toxic when grown by conventional means. As a result, acute dangers – such as nerve, skin, and eye irritation and damage, headaches, dizziness, fatigue, and systemic poisoning – can sometimes be dramatic, and even occasionally fatal. Conventional farming utilizes phosphorous and nitrogen chemical fertilizers. When rain and runoff carry these fertilizers into the ocean, marine life is suffocated. The farmers of our country are mostly un-educated and lack technical knowledge .
They are unable to understand the modern scientific methods of agriculture and often remain ignorant of good means to protect and increase their yield. Mostly, they use pesticides without any recommendation. Whenever our agriculture officers go to the field and want to instruct about modern scientific techniques, pesticide recommendation and also tell them about beneficial aspects of organic farming, then farmers don’t bother their instructions and they only want to prefer on their traditional ways.
Pesticide residue, antibiotics, and genetic modification directly affect the long-term sustainability of farming and the consumer’s health, and the health of those who grow and produce the food. We do not exist separately from the environment in which we live. If what we consume is polluted, our bodies become polluted. Beyond choosing what we buy in the store, we as a nation must choose, for the long term or short term, organic or conventional. This choice affects us all, even those not yet born.
Author: Saqib Mushtaq
