Sustainable agriculture mitigates climate change

The USDA has published a report titled ‘Climate Change and Agriculture in the United States: Effects and Adaptation’. The report analyses the effects of agricultural activities on climate change and explores the possible solutions to mitigate the detrimental change.

One of the conclusions of the study is that ‘sustainable natural resource management strategies inform effective adaptation options for US agriculture. The ability of healthy soils to regulate water resource dynamics at farm and watershed scales is widely recognized and particularly critical for the maintenance of crop and livestock productivity under conditions of variable and extreme weather events. Soil conservation practices like cover cropping, diversifying annual cropping systems, inclusion of perennial crops in rotations, changing from annual to perennial crops, organic soil amendments, grazing management, conversion of cropland to pasture, agroforestry and natural areas, and wetland restoration may enhance the resilience of the

US agricultural system to climate change effects.’

                                                                                                         Source:Weekly Harvest Newsletter,February 13, 2013