It should be necessary to think the ecological agriculture (I do not agree with the term “organic agriculture” because there is no such a think as “anorganic agriculture”) as an activity producing food and industrial resources, including oxygen, coming from the classical agriculture by reintroducing the natural models of feeding and defending the plants, and by getting high yields for all people, not only for a limited group of people possessing high financial resources.
I wonder who is feeding the forests? That One could feed with nutrients the crops too. This would be a revolution that could be named „the greening of the green revolution”. (See also www.bercamihai.ro ).
You are true the way you defined ecological agriculture. As forests are not being fed externally, crops could also be grown in similar way. Thats perfectly ecological system without much external intervention. But I think we consider agriculture as the domesticated enterprise and it is being influenced by human activities. Say for instance, there are several thousands of farms in Nepal in which agro-chemicals have never been applied yet farmers do apply farmyard manure and control pest whatsoever through their indigenous knowledge. Unlike forest system, here human activities within the production systems are discerning. Now how could we say this as an ecological agriculture. I don't understand clear theoretical underpinnings behind ecological agriculture. However, if we treat forest as ecological system, agriculture don't.
Berca I do agree with your comment about 'no such thing as 'anorganic agriculture'" However, when it comes to who is feeding the forests, they are feeding themselves through nutrient recycling. Leaf litter, fallen debris eventually make it back into the soil to feed the next generation.
One reason we must apply fertilizers to crops is because the harvested portion of the crops usually have the highest concentrations of nutrients. Take for example a grain from maize or soybean (both annual crops). The primary purpose is to expend all energy into forming those grains. We (as humans) harvest these grains, which then deplete the soil of those nutrients because those grains do not fall locally, whereas some of the grains will decompose and return nutrients back to the soil if left unharvested.
While farmers can rotate crops such that the rotation supports returning nutrients back to the soil, this reduces overall profits for the farmer compared to those who maintain a rotation with a more profitable crop and applying fertilizers.
Thank you for your comments and I agree with them. Without the human intervention, the agriculture, the crops would be less productive or very less productive. What I do propose is that the intervention model to be different. For example: Is the wheat in need of nitrogen? Then it would be necessary to study all the natural models of nitrogen fixation (In the case of wheat the associative fixation with Azospirillum braziliens, but there are probably others as well) which could bring to wheat 40-100 kg/ha N, exclusively from the air and not from the bag (industrial synthetis) and implemented in the agrosystems. The bidimensional models, plant-mycorrhiza, plant-bacteria, can be completed with tridimensional models: plant-bacteria-fungi (mycorrhiza). Taken from nature (See the ecological laws), the above models bring us nitrogen, but also phosphourous, potassium and microelements from the geological subtrate of the soil. For the implementation of the models we need ecologised soils, with a large quantity of living organisms, 20-30 to/ha, otherwise the system will not work. At over 40-50 earthworms/m2 it is possible to rennounce the tillage and you can sow directly, without yield loss. And another issue. If it’s necessary to apply industrial nitrogen it is then better to apply it when the plants need it and not when some farmers want. I see that in Nepal the circuit matter – soil – plants – animals – soil, returns to the last one an important quantity of nutrients. It is obvious that is necessary to return to the soil the nutrients which we take as main yield, but is also important how and with what we do it, in order that the soil becomes more and more fertile and with smaller and smaller costs. If you somehow have a finance minister which aim to apply taxes on the atmospheric nitrogen, then this models will become unimplementable.