Facts and Myths of Feeding the World with Organic Farming Methods - Principles of Sustainable Soil Management in Agroecosystems - page 87

4 Facts and Myths

of Feeding the
World with Organic
Farming Methods

Bobby A. Stewart, Xiaobo Hou,
and Sanjeev Reddy Yalla

CONTENTS
4.1 Introduction .................................................................................................... 87
4.2 Organic Farming............................................................................................. 88
4.2.1 Soil Productivity of Organic Farming ................................................ 89
4.2.2 Safety of Organic Crops Compared to Crops Produced with
Chemical Fertilizers ........................................................................... 92
4.2.3 Quality of Organic Crops Compared to Crops Produced with
Chemical Fertilizers ........................................................................... 94
4.3 Limitations of Organic Farming ..................................................................... 96
4.4 Need for Better Management of N Fertilizers ................................................ 99
4.5 Intensification of Animal Agriculture and Translocation of Nutrients ........ 102
4.6 Integrating the Use of Organic Materials, Biological Processes, and
Chemical Fertilizers ..................................................................................... 103
4.7 Conclusions ................................................................................................... 105
Abbreviations ......................................................................................................... 106
References .............................................................................................................. 106

4.1 INTRODUCTION
During the past few years, two issues have somewhat dominated the future of world
agriculture. The first is that the world population that has passed 7 billion people in
2011 is expected to reach more than 9 billion by 2050. Even more daunting, while the
world population is expected to increase by about 30%, food production, particularly
cereals, is expected to increase 70% or more because of increasing prosperity that is
resulting in changing diets that include more meat, eggs, and dairy products. At the
same time, an increasing number of people think our global food system is rapidly
approaching, if not already in, a condition of crisis, and a conversion to sustainable

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