China’s farms pollute as much as its factories, survey finds
The Hindu
By Ananth Krishnan
2/10/10
For every tonne of chemical effluents that factories dump into China’s rivers and lakes, a comparable amount of harmful waste finds its way into this country’s water bodies from green fields and farmhouses.
A first of its kind pollution survey has found that farms have contributed as much to a growing pollution crisis in China as its famously unclean factories and industries.
The study, released by the Ministry of Environment and Forests this week, indicated that widespread agricultural pollution caused by the overuse of fertilizers has led to a level of pollution far higher than what has been previously stated in official reports.
Agricultural sources were found to account for 43.7 per cent of all COD discharge. The pollution stems from widespread overuse of fertilizers, with farmers using 40 per cent more fertilizers than required, according to a recent Greenpeace report.
The use of fertilizers and pesticides has enabled China to increase grain production eight times in the past four decades. But the use of nitrogen fertilizers has increased by 55 times, and has begun to seriously impact water pollution, the Greenpeace study found.
Mr. Zhang said the prevention and control of pollution from agricultural sources had now become China’s “top priority for environmental protection to resolve the problem of water pollution in China at the root”. Read More
If only there was a way to ensure that farm fields don’t get over-fertilized. Oh wait, there is! It’s the modern technology that we have implemented in this country to ensure that doesn’t happen. These systems manage our fertilizer needs on a field down to the square foot or better. In addition to that, we use new varieties of crops that do a better job of utilizing the resources available to it in the soil. All of these great technologies are under attack though. We have people like Michael Pollan who actively promotes US agriculture use technology equal or even lesser to that being used in Chinese agriculture. His reckless ideas would put us right into the position China is experiencing.
Showing posts with label fertilizer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fertilizer. Show all posts
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Nutrient Management
December 29, 2009
Down on the Farm, an Endless Cycle of Waste
By HENRY FOUNTAIN
GUSTINE, Tex. — Day and night, a huge contraption prowls the grounds at Frank Volleman’s dairy in Central Texas. It has a 3,000-gallon tank, a heavy-duty vacuum pump and hoses and, underneath, adjustable blades that scrape the surface as it passes along.
In function it is something like a Zamboni, but one that has crossed over to the dark side. This is no hockey rink, and it’s not loose ice being scraped up. It’s cow manure.
Lots of cow manure. A typical lactating Holstein produces about 150 pounds of waste — by weight, about two-thirds wet feces, one-third urine — each day. Mr. Volleman has 3,000 lactating Holsteins and another 1,000 that are temporarily “dry.” Do the math: his Wildcat Dairy produces about 200 million pounds of manure every year.
Proper handling of this material is one of the most important tasks faced by a dairy operator, or by a cattle feedlot owner, hog producer or other farmer with large numbers of livestock. Manure has to be handled in an environmentally acceptable way and at an acceptable cost. In most cases, that means using it, fresh or composted, as fertilizer. “It’s a great resource, if used properly,” said Saqib Mukhtar, an associate professor of biological and agricultural engineering at Texas A & M University and an expert on what is politely called manure management. Read More
Most people don’t realize how much effort is put in to correctly handling the valuable nutrients that are obtained from livestock. It seems many get the impression that farmers and ranchers haphazardly handle the manure. The fact of the matter is that the system’s being used have been designed by engineers and approved by various government agencies. Along with that, the operators have every incentive to make sure everything is being done right. If you haven’t been around a nutrient handling system, I would encourage you to do so. It really helps you understand the full relationship of plants, livestock and food.
Down on the Farm, an Endless Cycle of Waste
By HENRY FOUNTAIN
GUSTINE, Tex. — Day and night, a huge contraption prowls the grounds at Frank Volleman’s dairy in Central Texas. It has a 3,000-gallon tank, a heavy-duty vacuum pump and hoses and, underneath, adjustable blades that scrape the surface as it passes along.
In function it is something like a Zamboni, but one that has crossed over to the dark side. This is no hockey rink, and it’s not loose ice being scraped up. It’s cow manure.
Lots of cow manure. A typical lactating Holstein produces about 150 pounds of waste — by weight, about two-thirds wet feces, one-third urine — each day. Mr. Volleman has 3,000 lactating Holsteins and another 1,000 that are temporarily “dry.” Do the math: his Wildcat Dairy produces about 200 million pounds of manure every year.
Proper handling of this material is one of the most important tasks faced by a dairy operator, or by a cattle feedlot owner, hog producer or other farmer with large numbers of livestock. Manure has to be handled in an environmentally acceptable way and at an acceptable cost. In most cases, that means using it, fresh or composted, as fertilizer. “It’s a great resource, if used properly,” said Saqib Mukhtar, an associate professor of biological and agricultural engineering at Texas A & M University and an expert on what is politely called manure management. Read More
Most people don’t realize how much effort is put in to correctly handling the valuable nutrients that are obtained from livestock. It seems many get the impression that farmers and ranchers haphazardly handle the manure. The fact of the matter is that the system’s being used have been designed by engineers and approved by various government agencies. Along with that, the operators have every incentive to make sure everything is being done right. If you haven’t been around a nutrient handling system, I would encourage you to do so. It really helps you understand the full relationship of plants, livestock and food.
Monday, September 14, 2009
The Passing of Norman Borlaug
The Father Of the Green Revolution
By Joe Holley and J.Y. Smith
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, September 14, 2009
Norman E. Borlaug, 95, an American plant pathologist who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for starting the "Green Revolution" that dramatically increased food production in developing nations and saved countless people from starvation, died Saturday at his home in Dallas.
"More than any other single person of this age, he has helped provide bread for a hungry world," the Nobel committee said in honoring him. "Dr. Borlaug has introduced a dynamic factor into our assessment of the future and its potential."
Edwin Price, director of the Norman Borlaug Institute for International Agriculture at Texas A&M University, said his mentor died of cancer. Since 1984, Dr. Borlaug had been a distinguished professor of international agriculture there.
From the 1970s until his death, he increasingly took the politically incorrect view that environmentalists were hampering world food production by indiscriminately attacking the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides.
"They claim that the consumer is being poisoned out of existence by the current high-yielding systems of agricultural production and recommend we revert back to lower-yielding, so-called sustainable technologies," he said in a speech in New Orleans in 1993.
Unfortunately, he said, it is not possible to turn the clock back to the 1930s, when the population of the world was 2.2 billion. It was estimated at 5.6 billion in 1995 and was projected to rise to 8.3 billion by 2025. Read More
One of the great heroes in the history of agriculture, Norman Borlaug passed away this weekend at the age of 95. During his career, Borlaug always believed in using modern technology to end hunger. He believed in the proper use of fertilizers and chemicals as well. Those beliefs and his determination and hard work led to saving millions, if not billions, of people from starvation. He moved us away from the type of agriculture that many people like Michael Pollan and others want us to go back to. With a growing world population we have to continue moving forward with our ability to grow food, not backwards.
By Joe Holley and J.Y. Smith
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, September 14, 2009
Norman E. Borlaug, 95, an American plant pathologist who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for starting the "Green Revolution" that dramatically increased food production in developing nations and saved countless people from starvation, died Saturday at his home in Dallas.
"More than any other single person of this age, he has helped provide bread for a hungry world," the Nobel committee said in honoring him. "Dr. Borlaug has introduced a dynamic factor into our assessment of the future and its potential."
Edwin Price, director of the Norman Borlaug Institute for International Agriculture at Texas A&M University, said his mentor died of cancer. Since 1984, Dr. Borlaug had been a distinguished professor of international agriculture there.
From the 1970s until his death, he increasingly took the politically incorrect view that environmentalists were hampering world food production by indiscriminately attacking the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides.
"They claim that the consumer is being poisoned out of existence by the current high-yielding systems of agricultural production and recommend we revert back to lower-yielding, so-called sustainable technologies," he said in a speech in New Orleans in 1993.
Unfortunately, he said, it is not possible to turn the clock back to the 1930s, when the population of the world was 2.2 billion. It was estimated at 5.6 billion in 1995 and was projected to rise to 8.3 billion by 2025. Read More
One of the great heroes in the history of agriculture, Norman Borlaug passed away this weekend at the age of 95. During his career, Borlaug always believed in using modern technology to end hunger. He believed in the proper use of fertilizers and chemicals as well. Those beliefs and his determination and hard work led to saving millions, if not billions, of people from starvation. He moved us away from the type of agriculture that many people like Michael Pollan and others want us to go back to. With a growing world population we have to continue moving forward with our ability to grow food, not backwards.
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