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Examples of no-till farming
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Over the past thirty years, a new technique for planting has started to be slowly adopted by many farming operations throughout the United States and the world. This method, which reduces greenhouse gas emissions, soil erosion, and farm expenditures, is no-till agriculture. No-till agriculture is an alternative to conventional tillage practices which have dominated the landscape of agriculture for many centuries. There are multiple issues that hinder the rate at which no-till agriculture is being adopted, but they are far outweighed by the advantages provided by no-till farming. This paper will seek to provide evidence and logic that will prove that no-till farming is vastly superior to conventional techniques, and as the next natural step in the advancement of agriculture no-till farming will serve as a way to improve farms across the world in terms of efficiency and cost effectiveness. It will also provide evidence that our current industry must change in order to provide incentives for farmers to work to conserve our resources and look towards the future.
Conventional agriculture refers to the process by which farmers break up the soil using farm equipment in order to speed up the decomposition of organic matter in the soil and prepare the soil for the planting of seeds. This process is referred to as tillage, and is accomplished using certain farm implements which have been developed and specialized specifically for this task. No-till practices effectively eliminate the entire tillage process, negating the need for the equipment, gas, labor, and maintenance costs that are associated with soil tillage. The elimination of this step in the farming process can decrease farm costs a great deal, and allow many farmers more fre...
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...eb. 19 Feb 2014. https://cropwatch.unl.edu/tillage/notill
O'Connor, Claire. "Farmers Reap Benefits as No-Till Adoption Rises." Switchboard. National Resource Defense Council, 14 Nov. 2013. Web. 18 Apr. 2014.
Reagan, Brad . "Plowing Through the Confusing Data on No-Till Farming." The Wall Street Journal 15 Oct. 2012: n. pag. Print.
Reji P. Mathew, Yucheng Feng, Leonard Githinji, Ramble Ankumah, and Kipling S. Balkcom, “Impact of No-Tillage and Conventional Tillage Systems on Soil Microbial Communities,” Applied and Environmental Soil Science, vol. 2012, Article ID 548620, 10 pages, 2012. doi:10.1155/2012/548620.
University of Illinois College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences (ACES). "No-till soil organic carbon sequestration rates published." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 18 April 2014. .
...nergy from an acre of Iowa farmland. Unfortunately, for more than fifty years, farm policies is designed to encourage the overproduction of this crop and hardly any other. It simply because the government subsidize high-fructose corn syrup in this country. While the surgeon general is warning the epidemic of obesity, our government is still signing bills encouraging the river of cheap corn flowing. It is clearly shown that food production in America is partly a mixture of politic, economic and morality.
The. Saloutos, Theodore. A. The "New Deal Agricultural Policy: An Evaluation." The Journal of American
The nature of the Southern Plains soils and the periodic influence of drought could not be changed, but the technological abuse of the land could have been stopped. This is not to say that mechanized agriculture irreparably damaged the land-it did not. New and improved implements such as tractors, one-way disk plows, grain drills, and combines reduced plowing, planting, and harvesting costs and increased agricultural productivity. Increased productivity caused prices to fall, and farmers compensated by breaking more sod for wheat. At the same time, farmers gave little thought to using their new technology in ways to conserve the
Kegans, M. (2005). Mountains of Corn and a Sea of Farm Subsidies. The New York Times.
middle of paper ... ... Katsvairo, Tawainga W., David L. Wright, Jim J. Marois, and Pawel P. Wiatrak. "Making the Transition from Conventional to Organic Farming Using Conservation Tillage in Florida. " University of Florida IFAS Extension.
A. “Farm Policy.” CQ Researcher 10 Aug. 2012: 693-716. Web. The Web. The Web.
...o. “The Great Agricultural Transition: Crisis, Change, and Social Consequence of the Twentieth Century US Farming”. Annual Review of Sociology 27 (2001): 103-124.
By implementing new farming techniques provided with the new technological advances in machines we can see abundant harvest in even the poorest third world countries. For example, the Green Revolution has already showed admirable progress in the northern part of India ever since it took start in 1950. By 1997, northern India increased its grain production by 37 percent. This has proven that traditional farming methods are being rendered obsolete. And because by the year 2000, there will be half the land per person in developing countries as there was in 1970, we need to apply ultra-efficient methods to sustain the growing need. Not only does the Green Revolution enhances food output, it also preserves the environment.
In recent history, farming in America has changed dramatically, and Naylor’s farm is representative of many in the American Corn Belt. Though it began growing a variety of crops and keeping livestock too, Naylor now only plants corn and soybeans. In Naylor’s grandfather’s days, the farm fed the whole family with just enough left over for twelve others. Now, Naylor indirectly feeds an estimated 129 people, but this does not mean his farm is any more successful. In fact, Naylor’s farm cannot financially support his family.
New York Times, p. 1. Riedl, M. (2011, March 30). Farm subsidies ripe for reform?
For years organic farmers and conventional farmers have feuded over which is superior. Organic farmers argue that their product is more eco-friendly because they do not use the synthetic chemicals and fertilizers conventional farmer’s use. Conventional farmers argue that their product is healthier and yields more. People tend to have stereotypes regarding the two types of farmers. Organic farmers are usually thought of as liberal, hippy, tree-huggers while conventional farmers are usually thought of as right-wing, industrialists. Obviously, some do adhere to this stereotype, but a majority of these farmers are normal, hardworking people. Although these farmers, both believe in their methods, one is no better than the other. There are advantages and disadvantages to both, but there is no true superior method of crop farming.
As agriculture has become more intensive, farmers have become capable of producing higher yields using less labour and less land. Growth of the agriculture has not, however, been an unmixed blessing. It, like every other thing, has its pros and cons. Topsoil depletion, groundwater contamination, the decline of family farms, continued neglect of the living and working conditions for farm labourers, increasing costs of production, and the disintegration of economic and social conditions in rural communities. These are the cons of the new improved agriculture.
Thompson, Paul B. and Stout, Bill A. Beyond The Large Farm. Westview Press, Inc.: Colorado 1991
Agriculture is one of the most ancient forms of art and science that ties human development and well-being to natural resources and ecosystems. (Fritz J. Häni, 2007) Sustainable Agriculture is the production of food, fibre, plant and animal products using farming techniques that protect the environment, public health, human communities and animal welfare. (Sustainable Agriculture - The Basics, 2015) Sustainable agriculture is an integrated system of plant and animal production practices having a site – specific application that over the long term will:
Stone, Archie. Careers in Agribusiness and Industry. Danville: The Interstate Printers & Publishers, Inc., 1970.