Organic Foods and Farming Practices in India

Abstract

Indian agriculture continued following path of green revolution even in the twentieth century extensively utilising intensive farming practices with synthetic fertilisers and pesticides application leading to micronutrient mineral deficiencies in soil, water and food. At the same time, many countries—mostly European Nations—used to leave the path of conventional or intensive agriculture. The diversion or deviation from intensive agricultural practices today implies minimisation or elimination of synthetic fertilisers and pesticides in farms with the concomitant use of natural manures, mainly compost manure, and natural pesticides like neem leaf juice. This concept of organic farming works a little in the state of deforestation or loss of biodiversity due to mineral deficiencies in soil and water, while in ancient India soil fertility was considered as the function of biodiverse forestation. Indian crops partly suffer from immune system weakness and are prone to bacterial and fungal growth. India is on the way of following integrated farming practices along with organic farming; however, India sometimes faces certain difficulties because of the high number of rejections at EU borders, mostly due to the presence of Salmonella spp. or aflatoxins beyond limits. Therefore, discussions on environmental factors and land use polity are relevant in India.