Organic fertilisers in Cane Farming
For the past few years, the focus of cane farming has been on the production of organic foods using organic fertilisers. The two reasons that explain this new tread in cane farming is that the public awareness of need of environment protection has increased and that several benefits in using renewable resources and organic fertilisers have been uncovered.
Why use organic fertilisers in cane farming?
There are several benefits involved in using organic fertilisers for cane farming. Some of these merits are stated below:
Using organic fertilisers in cane farming is environmentally friendly. It is common knowledge that chemicals can kill the many beneficial insects and microorganisms needed for healthy cane farming. The chemicals found in inorganic fertilisers can cause environmental degradation and decrease crop yields in cane farming.
Inorganic fertilisers can also cause leaching and groundwater pollution due to contamination from pesticides. Those kinds of threats are eliminated if organic fertilisers are used in cane farming instead of inorganic fertilisers. In an organic cane farming system, natural pest control is used and practiced. In fact, in cane farming, the focus in pest management is not through cure but through prevention.
In cane farming, pest prevention can be achieved in many ways. The first step is by using organic fertilisers in order to build up healthy soils in a cane farming system. The process of adding organic fertilisers into a cane farming system is done to ensure that sugar cane plants are adequately nourished. Organic fertilisers such as cover crops, composts, and the like are the best since they are widely available in cane farming system and are also much cheaper than inorganic fertilisers.
In addition, some organic fertilisers act as natural pest control. Organic fertilisers made from powdered crab shells have high amounts of chitin that can protect it from harmful fungi and prevent plant diseases.
Aside from being environment-friendly, the use of organic fertilisers in cane farming increases consumer acceptance of the cane farming product. Customers prefer organic products because they believe that they are healthier, tastier, and safer. With a cane farming system that utilizes organic fertilisers as nutrient-enhancers, consumers can be assured of eating foods that are not genetically modified or enhanced.
The third benefit of organic fertilisers in cane farming is that going organic has good market potential. As of the moment, organic fertilisers and products harvested from organic farming methods like cane farming only represents a small fraction of total food sales in the market so far. But despite this, the world market for more organic fertilisers and other products are steadily increasing each year. It is expected that crop yields and product sales of cane farming are going to reach 5-10 percent of food sales in the world market in the next few years.
Currently, the sales estimate of all organic fertilisers and cane farming products sales amount to about US$20 Billion. Fish emulsions, seaweed extracts, bone meal, blood meal, and bat guano are only a few of the organic fertilisers that are being exported all over the world. Sugar cane produce from cane farming systems has also increased dramatically after the implementation of organic fertilisers into their fertilising programs.
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