Farmers across the developing world are throwing away their ploughs in a dramatic example of 鈥渟ustainable鈥� farming, a practice that is now sending crop yields soaring on millions of farms.
The findings come from the largest ever study of sustainable agriculture, released at a conference in London on Monday
The report鈥檚 author, Jules Pretty of the University of Essex, says sustainable agriculture is now defying its reputation as a worthy enterprise with little chance of feeding millions of starving people. He says sustainable farming has been the most effective way of raising farm yields in the past decade and that farming without tilling is among the most widely adopted forms.
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Pretty says the growth is very exciting: 鈥淚f it spreads we can make substantial inroads in reducing hunger.鈥�
Sustainable agriculture deliberately lowers manmade inputs such as chemicals, while maximising nature鈥檚 input. It replaces fertilisers with plants that fix nitrogen in the soil and pesticides with natural enemies of pests.
And it is catching on. It now covers three per cent of third world fields, an area the size of Italy. Its methods are having big impacts on farm yields, with typical increases of 40 to 100 per cent.
鈥淪ustainable farming has grown in the past decade from being the preserve of a few enthusiasts into a broad movement involving governments and the private sector鈥�, says Pretty, whose study collected data on 200 projects in 52 countries and was commissioned by the UK government鈥檚 Department for International Development.
鈥淚t is cheap, uses locally available technology and often improves the environment,鈥� he says. 鈥淎bove all it most helps the people who need it 鈥� poor farmers and their families, who make up the majority of the world鈥檚 hungry people.鈥�
In Latin America, small farmers left behind by past farming revolutions have seen yields of grain and beans rise by two-thirds using 鈥済reen鈥� methods, says Miguel Altieri of the University of California, Berkeley.
The most widespread new technique is farming without ploughing. In Argentina a third of fields now never see a plough 鈥� farmers get rid of weeds by planting off-season crops that kill them.
Besides relieving them of one of the most tedious jobs on the farm, abandoning the plough improves soil quality and raises crop yields. It even helps curb global warming by accumulating carbon in the soil.
鈥淚n a short time, farmers saw reduced costs and greater productivity, increased income and a better environment,鈥� said Lauro Bassi, an agronomist from Santa Catarina in southern Brazil, where zero-tillage has been widely adopted 鈥淔or us zero-tillage is like a social movement.鈥�