Organic agriculture is a production system which avoids or largely excludes the use of synthetic fertilisers, pesticides and growth regulators. It can sequester carbon using crop rotations, crop residues, animal manure, legumes, green manure, and off-farm organic waste (Lampkin et al., 1999). It can also reduce carbon emissions by avoiding the use of fossil fuels used in the manufacture of the chemicals used to make synthetic materials.
The introduction of new cultivated species and improved varieties of crop is a technology aimed at enhancing plant productivity, quality, health and nutritional value and/or building crop resilience to diseases, pest organisms and environmental stresses. Crop diversification refers to the addition of new crops or cropping systems to agricultural production on a particular farm taking into account the different returns from value-added crops with complementary marketing opportunities. Major driving forces for crop diversification include:
Crop rotation consists in sequentially producing plant species in a given location by alternating crops every year, every two years or every three years. This diversified production system prevents the build-up of pests and diseases as well as the exhaustion of the soil that usually occur with production of a single crop (or crops of a single family) in successive agricultural cycles.
Agroecology is a holistic production method that works at the agroecosystem level. It is based on adopting integrated management for resource conservation as well as diversifying and enhancing synergies among the components of the agroecosystem, balancing energy and nutrient flows and adapting productive activities to local conditions. It promotes a high degree of interaction among its components to preserve biodiversity and attain sustainable production.