2.organic farming adoption By Allah Dad Khan Visiting Professor Agriculture University Peshawar

2. Organic Farming Adoption
Techniques
By
Mr. Allah Dad Khan
Visiting professor
Agriculture University
Peshawar

4.  To alleviate this situation, farmers need to
practise alternatives which are more
environmentally friendly. Such alternatives
include organic farming, which is a blend of
traditional and modern farming systems.
Traditional practices enabled communities to
farm for generations before the introduction
of modern technologies. This traditional
wisdom needs to be documented and its
value reinforced.

5.  By supporting organic farmers’ indigenous
knowledge, environmental adult education
can make concrete links between the
environment and the social, economic,
political and cultural aspects of people’s
lives. In this way, it helps to open new
pathways for adult education, to confirm it
as a community-based enterprise, and to
make it a leader in the field of sustainability
because, in the end, sustainability must be
learned.

6.  Indigenous knowledge is sometimes limited
to the knowledge of indigenous peoples, and
other times applied in a broader context,
such as to farmers. Overall, indigenous
knowledge can be understood as the local
knowledge of a defined community that has
developed over time and forms the basis for
agriculture, food preparation, health care,
education, conservation and a wide range of
other activities that sustain a society and its
environment.

7.  It was found that the reasons for introducing
organic farming practices varied with the
timing of their adoption. Additionally, the
kinds of organic-related activities adopted
varied depending on how the individual
adopter first encountered the term “organic
farming.” However, all individuals involved in
organic farming shared some common
motivations, such as desires for personal
health, quality produce and rural
development.

8.  ORGANIC AGRICULTURE: SOME BASIC TENETS Despite the range of
agricultural practices followed by organic farmers, most of them are
guided by certain basic values and beliefs which may be called the
"organic ethic." Some of the principal tenets of this ethic are summarized
below. However, not all organic farmers would place equal weight on
these tenets.
 Nature is Capital -- Energy-intensive modes of conventional agriculture
place man on a collision course with nature. Present trends and practices
signal difficult times ahead. More concern over finite nutrient resources
is needed. Organic farming focuses on recycled nutrients. Soil is the
Source of Life Soil quality and balance (that is, soil with proper levels of
organic matter, bacterial and biological activity, trace elements, and
other nutrients) are essential to the long-term future of agriculture.
 Human and animal health are directly related to the health of the soil.
Feed the Soil, Not the Plant -- Healthy plants, animals, and humans result
from balanced, biologically active soil . Diversify Production Systems
Overspecialization (monoculture) is biologi cally and environmentally
unstable. Independence -- Organic farming contributes to personal and
community indepen dence by reducing dependence on energy-intensive
agricultural production and distribu tion systems. Antimaterialism --
Finite resources and Nature's limitations m

9.  Organic farmers use various combinations of
technological and cultural practices because of
certain underlying values and beliefs. The
organic agricultural spectrum ranges from so-
called pure organic farming on one extreme to
more liberal interpre tations of organic
philosophy on the other. At this latter end of the
spectrum, organic agriculture begins to merge
with so-called conventional agriculture. At this
point the two systems share many common
agricultural practices and organic and con
ventional farmers express a number of common
concerns. Here, the merging and over lapping of
the two systems causes some difficulty in
arriving at a concise definition for both organic
and conventional agriculture.