Organic farming, Why?

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Agriculture or food production that uses farming systems that are environmentally friendly and sustainable, and avoid the application of man-made/synthetic fertilisers and growth promoters, pesticides, genetically modified ingredients, etc., is broadly categorised as organic agriculture and organic produce.

Organic fields are nurtured using natural resources, such as plant and animal manures, composts, biological pest control methods, decoctions, etc.

This has to do much with the state of soil and its various components that, having borne the brunt of decades of manipulation in the form of chemical farming, have become impoverished and are unable to sustain themselves or the crops being grown on it.

Soil is a living entity, with its natural cycling-recycling systems and processes (where the soil, its microorganisms, trees and plants, bugs and animals, water bodies, and even the weather systems, all act in tandem and as part of a cohesive whole) more than capable of replenishing itself, when left untouched.

However, years of human intervention and, often, the illogical and needless application of chemical fertilisers and pesticides in our fields have meant that these natural systems have been destabilised enough or the linkages broken at various points in the cycles, so that the soil has lost its ability to regenerate itself.

Suffice it to say that this is a vicious cycle, one that feeds on itself and gains in manifold strength with each passing growing season, leaving the soil barren and unfit to support viable farming activities irreversibly in a few years' time.

Conversely, organic farming is based on 'feeding the soil'…

It aims at allowing the soil and the local ecosystem a 'free hand' to regain its natural self-healing, self-sustaining potencies – sans the application of any uncalled for artificial modifiers – while accelerating its journey back to health by supplementing the fields only with inputs that would otherwise be found in the natural environment.

Organic farming is an extremely tedious, time-consuming enterprise.

It necessitates year-round attention to detail; a proactive and reactive approach to pest attacks and their management; understanding the conditions that these pests and other disease-causing microorganisms exploit; working to outsmart them at their own game by creating a microenvironment that they cannot live or thrive in; researching effective organic farming practices and inputs that can be safely used in the fields; putting in the extra man-hours necessary to work the soil manually and laboriously in order to remain in constant touch with all that is happening in the fields day after day, and much more…

An organic farmer achieves all this while not resorting to any of the easy fallback options that conventional farmers avail of – be it chemical fertilisers and pesticides, or growth promoters and regulators – or, at least not as much.

That is to say that, for a genuinely organic farmer, to successfully bring his produce to the market place in a growing season is in itself a victory of sorts, a testament to his diligence and perseverance…

Since moving to organic cultivation of green cardamom in 2016, we've strived conscientiously to develop in-house organic farming practices, including for soil nourishment, pest and microorganism control, etc.

There was no pre-existing knowhow or system for growing organic green cardamom that we could pick up from elsewhere, so we searched wide for traditionally Indian organic agricultural practices that had been in use over the centuries but were lost due to the en masse shift to chemical farming in recent decades.

We painstakingly collated information from many different sources, identified suppliers who could provide the many natural raw materials necessary, developed and fine-tuned custom decoctions and preparations, as well as determined alternative biocontrol agents that could be used to effectively protect our crops without compromising on the organic nature of our produce.

It is because of this that, today, we are able to confidently send our organically grown green cardamom samples for pesticide residue tests at NABL-accredited laboratories in Kerala and present to you test results that indeed demonstrate a near-nil pesticide profile.

It would be easy to misconstrue all the attention that organic farming has been garnering in recent times as merely the latest food fad or rage that is in vogue on account of the very wealthy or pretentious among us.

These misconceptions gain much sway from the high prices that organic produce generally command.

However, what this impression glosses over, quite conveniently, are hard-hitting facts about the foods that we eat, even take for granted, such as -

It is not just about the money we spend on our monthly groceries or the taste of food on our plates; our food choices have other far-reaching consequences as well.

A big part of lifestyle factors on human health is due to the effects of food on our bodies.

Conventionally grown fresh foods that make their way to the markets are often laced with very high levels of multiple, potent chemical pesticide and fertiliser cocktails.

Many of these fertilisers and pesticides, when consumed, would cause cumulative harmful effects in our bodies, much the same way that they do in the pests and microorganisms they were designed to eradicate.

Conventionally grown foods may also contain growth hormones, antibiotics, genetically modified additives, etc.

The environmental costs and impacts of chemical farming, which while financially lucrative due to its intensive farming methodologies, are too high to consider paying in the long term.

By making conscious organic choices, we could substantially reduce our risk of exposure to many different harmful substances in our foods.

And, more compellingly, organically grown foods are held to higher standards of traceability, so that one can be more assured about the farm inputs that would have been used while growing them.