ARS | Publication request: FUTURE HARVEST: PESTICIDE-FREE FARMING

Submitted to: Journal of Environmental Quality
Publication Type: Other
Publication Acceptance Date: November 15, 1995
Publication Date: N/A

Technical Abstract: Future Harvest Pesticide-Free Farming is a review of a book written by an organic farmer, Jim Bender of Weeping Water, Nebraska. Bender describes difficulties he encountered in converting a 640 acre farm which intensively used pesticides and commercial fertilizers to one which uses no pesticides. .The book details the general requirements for organic farming and a strategy for achieving that goal. The author strongly criticizes current research efforts for their support of pesticide use and economic studies which support use of pesticides as a means of controlling weeds, insects, and diseases. The book serves as an example of the thinking which leads the sustainable farming and organic farming movements in today's society.