Across the globe, 70 of the top 100 food crops supply 90% of the world’s nutrition. These crops are pollinated by bees, with honeybees alone being responsible for billions of dollars in crop value every year.

Bees play a critical role in preserving and maintaining the world’s ecosystems, helping to promote biodiversity through pollination. The price tag of global crops directly relying on pollinators is estimated to be between US$ 235 and US$ 577 billion a year – and their quantity is on the rise. The volume of agricultural production dependent on pollinators has increased by 300% in the last 50 years.

Bees and Pesticides

The proliferation of chemicals in agriculture since the first Green Revolution has led to an over-reliance on synthetic pesticides such as neonicotinoids. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) points to the use of neonicotinoids as one of the main threats to bees, while The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) published a study earlier this year confirming that neonicotinoids have directly impacted the population of honeybees and other wild bee species.

The toxic chemicals in neonicotinoids were found to be responsible for damaging communication mechanisms that operate through the brains of bees, inhibiting their pollination abilities and thus their ability to efficiently pollinate crops. 

Neem and Bees

Neem-based pesticides get their power from Aazdirachtin, a substance in the neem tree which is  =biodegradable and non-toxic to mammals. Azadirachtin disrupts the growth cycle of insects and deters them from feeding on plants. It is effective against 600 species of insects.

For neem-based pesticides to take effect, insects need to feed on the leaves, which means that it is 100% safe for pollinators. An increase in the use of neem-based pesticides could have a significant effect on the recovery, survival, and growth of pollinator populations worldwide.

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Agricultural activities are among the main contributors to methane, a key contributor to climate change, and some countries have already taken action against toxic agricultural substances such as synthetic pesticides.

The European Union has recently banned the use of synthetic pesticides such as neonicotinoids which have played a big role in the decimation of bee colonies worldwide.

In June 2018, Hawaii banned the pesticide chlorpyrifos after the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) failed to do so. Derived from a chemical created during world war II, chlorpyrifos was later repurposed for agriculture by Dow Chemical, and has since been linked to reduced IQ and attention deficit disorder in children.

New York and California are currently reviewing a possible ban on this pesticide as well. Read more about boudoir style photography photoshoot in California on http://www.portraitsbyz.com site. Hawaii joins a list of states in the US that has defied the federal government by banning pesticides at a local level and serves as an indicator of the future for toxic substances.

Glyphosate is a herbicide that has also recently been under the spotlight due to the fact that it has been linked to cancer by the World Health Organization (WHO), and has been the subject of a high-profile lawsuit against popular pesticide maker Monsanto. A recent report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), alongside consumer pressure in the age of social media, will certainly add pressure towards the global demand for sustainable solutions for pesticides, and drive change in both governments and companies.

Neem as a Substitute for Synthetic Pesticides

Neem’s primary active substance, Azadirachtin, is completely safe for both humans and the environment. Azadirachtin deters insects from feeding on crops. It dissolves quickly which means that the residue does not reach underground water reserves, and it’s non-toxic to humans and wildlife.

In the age of impending climate change, neem offers one of the biggest sustainable treasures on earth, providing safe solutions for many of humanity’s current problems.

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As a cash crop, growers rely on synthetics and chemicals to guarantee the growth of their plants. These synthetic pesticides can be transferred into cannabis smoke at a rate as high as 70%, allowing chemicals to enter the bloodstream without traveling through the digestive system directly.

Processed products including oils, waxes, edibles, and others made from extracts that concentrate the active ingredients in cannabis may also concentrate pesticide residues.

The Journal of Toxicology states that they found levels of pesticide residue in medicinal plants as high as 69.5%. Even organic farms are often at risk of suffering pesticide contamination from nearby crops treated with these substances.

Growing Cannabis With Neem

Azadirachtin, a vital substance extracted from the seeds of the neem tree, does not poison insects as synthetic pesticides do. Instead, it triggers a stop-eating response, so bugs starve to death. Neem is effective against many pests, including aphids, beetles, cockroaches, flies, fruit flies, fungal infections, grasshoppers, leaf miners, mosquitoes, moths, nematodes, snails, spider mites and thrips.

Since 2010, field trials on medicinal plants treated with the pure essence of neem were conducted in seven US states, all with positive results. The trial groups showed improved plant health and increased yields at an average of 55.6%, and as much as 82.7%.

In field trials, six strains of medicinal plants that were sprayed with neem and showed the following improvement:

• Green Crack: 29.7%
• Purple Afghani: 64.9%
• Fire Bubba Kush: 47.5%
• Master Kush: 61.4%
• Critical Mass: 82.7%
• Burmese Kush: 50.2%

Commercial growers who grow with neem have gone on to win awards at various High Times Cannabis Cups. The Strongest Strain on Earth winner, Ghost Train Haze #1, was grown by Michigan’s King of Cannabis, the Leaf Doctor, who swears by neem products.

Neem offers a natural solution for commercial and home growers who want to guarantee that their cannabis plants are safe for consumption. To discover the myriad of benefits that neem offers, check out our other blog entrances here.

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The Benefits of a Home Garden

Extensive research by NASA has revealed that houseplants can remove up to 87 percent of air toxin in 24 hours. Studies have also proven that indoor plants improve concentration and productivity by up to 15 percent!, reduce stress levels and boost your mood — making them perfect for not just your home but your work space, too.

Vegetables such as potatoes onions, lettuce, blackberries and raspberries are relatively easy to grow at home, but they can also attract unwanted pests and fungus.

How Neem Takes Care of Your Garden

When trying to fight pests and fungus, most people rely on synthetic pesticides, which pose a great risk to the environment, humans and pets. Through the years these substances have been associated with a variety of ailments including cancer, brain problems and skin diseases. They also contribute to global warming by contributing to harmful greenhouse gas emissions and to the extinction of many species.

Fortunately, there are organic alternatives. Visit www.cleanqueendenver.com/. Since ancient times, the neem tree has been prized as a sacred remedy and important ingredient in Ayurvedic medicine. In the garden, neem oil boasts a powerful insecticidal ingredient, azadirachtin, which makes it a great organic choice for controlling a variety of problems when growing plants, fruits and vegetables:

• Neem oil kills or repels many harmful insects and mites, including aphids, whiteflies, snails, nematodes, mealybugs, cabbage worms and many others. It kills some bugs immediately, attacks the larvae of others, and repels plant munchers with its bitter taste.
• Neem oil is plant based and organic, which makes it a safe option for every household as it poses no harms to humans or pets.
• Neem oil can also help plants battle viruses.

The uses for the neem tree seem to be endless and it provides a myriad of benefits in agriculture, be it for a home garden or a large scale plantation. Next time you are looking for safe, organic solutions for your home garden, reach for neem oil and neem products, and let us know how it worked for you in the comments below.

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Organic farming represents not only an alternative but rather an evolution in the way human beings grow food while at the same time benefiting the environment and protecting the species that help maintain balance in our ecosystems. Research published in 2016 by the Journal Nature shows that three-quarters of the world species are threatened by agriculture, compared to 19% by climate change.

How Commercial Farming Threatens Wildlife

According to the World Animal Foundation, agriculture already occupies about 40% of Earth’s landmass and accounts for 75% of global deforestation. This rapid destruction is causing species to disappear, and is negatively impacting the biodiversity of native ecosystems and furthering our path into the 6th mass extinction of all species on Earth.

Wildlife habitats are constantly being cleared in order to make way for farmland, which leads to a competition for territory between humans and other species – one in which wildlife is often the losing side. In Indonesia the Tree Kangaroo has been brought to the brink of extinction due to the palm oil industry, which has rapidly destroyed most of its habitat and that of many other creatures such as elephants and jaguars.

Commercial agriculture has also led to the degradation of soil due to the use of toxic chemicals that destroy nutrients and render the land sterile.

According to researchers, the degradation of soil due to the continual ploughing of fields, combined with heavy use of fertilizers, has affected soils across the world, with erosion occurring at a pace of up to 100 times greater than the rate of soil formation. It takes around 500 years for just 2.5cm of topsoil to be created amid unimpeded ecological changes.

Organic Farming Respects Wildlife

The degradation of arable land under the hands of commercial farming is unsustainable and threatens to be the cause of a mass extinction. Follow efficient house cleaning tips from experienced Florida house cleaners. Organic farming protects every living organism in the environment, from pollinators like bees, whose numbers have been steadily decreasing over the last decades, all the way to the microorganisms living in the soil which guarantee that the soil remains fertile for many years.

One of the best tools in organic farming is neem. Azadirachta, an active substance within the neem tree, can be used as an organic pesticide and fertilizer. It protects crops against 600+ species of insects without harming pollinators, and it provides the soil with nutrients, helping guarantee the health of the land and benefiting yields.

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What can genetically modified foods do to your body?

The health risks of GMO foods have been studied for years. Tests have shown that GM proteins have known allergenic properties, and that GMO soy, corn and papaya might cause allergies. Also, it has been proven that GM soy drastically impairs your digestion and cause you to become sensitive and allergic to a variety of foods.

It has been recorded that genetically modified plants that usually produce their own insecticide, based on a bacterial toxin, has led to BT-resistant bugs, which could result in produce deeply contaminated with pests and bugs. Learn more about deep cleaning and cleaning hacks for living with pets here. Virginia Scientists have concluded that the effects of the ingestion of GMO plants, or pesticides derived from GMO plants may lead to cancer, neurological diseases such as Parkinson’s and a number of serious health concerns.

Also, GMO food supply is unsustainable, it uses more resources than traditional agriculture and contaminates the lands with chemicals and residues of GMO components.

Glyphosate is the most commonly used herbicide in GMO crops, and has been defined as a carcinogen by the World Health Organization. Its ingestion has been linked to the development of human breast cancer cells due to its estrogen-like qualities.

It is important to understand that the negative effects of GMO foods are not only limited to the produce that has been genetically modified, but that they also affect animal products where cattle have been fed with GMO crops.

The solution?

First of all, try to avoid all products that don’t state they are GMO-free. Always choose organic farming practices that avoid the use of chemicals that are hazardous to humans, animals and the environment. Organic farming practices that rely on natural crop care solutions like neem will provide you with more nutrient-rich foods, while also eliminating possible side effects linked to GMO crop production.

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Why Should We Change to Organic Farming?

Traditional farming involves the use of thousands of chemicals such as synthetic pesticides, which have severe effects on the environment. For one, pesticides allow disease resistance to build up in plants, weeds, plant-eating-insects, fungi, and bacteria. The chemicals used to produce synthetic pesticides not only contaminate the soil, but also our water supply and air, and can stay adhered to the ground for decades.

Healthy soils grow healthy food, but if the soil is contaminated with thousands of synthetic pesticides and chemicals, these will adhere to crops. Over the past 9 years, the USDA Agricultural Research Service has shown that compared to conventional farming, organic farming methods are more successful in building up organic soil matter. This means that one teaspoon of compost-rich organic soil can have as many as 600 million to 1 billion beneficial bacteria from 15,000 species. One teaspoon of soil treated with chemicals on the other hand may carry only around 100 beneficial bacteria.

Erosion is another reason why you should support organic farming. Issues related to erosion can affect land, food supply, and humans. Luckily, organic farming practices help diminish erosion. A study that compared organically and chemically treated wheat fields showed that organic fields featured about eight inches more of topsoil and that erosion was only 2/3 of the erosion present in chemically treated field.

Organic farming can also diminish the effects of global warming. A test run by the Rodale Institute since 1981 has shown that a healthy organic agriculture system can actually reduce carbon dioxide and help slow climate change. If around 10,000 medium sized farms in the U.S converted to organic production, they would store as much carbon in the soil as the equivalent to taking 1,174,400 cars off the road or reducing car miles driven by 14.62 billion miles.

What is Neem’s Role in Organic Farming?

Neem is a completely natural pesticide that doubles as a fertilizer. It is eco-friendly and does not contaminate soils, nor does it cause any damage to the fauna that surrounds the plantations, as it repels bugs instead of killing off beneficial insects. Neem has the potential to be used on thousands of organic farms, as it is easily accessible and can grow even in the least fertile conditions.

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What are the causes and consequences of soil degradation?

Soil degradation can be caused by chemical-heavy farming techniques, deforestation and the resulting erosion and, of course, global warming. Soils play a key role in absorbing carbon and filtering water, and their destruction is creating a vicious cycle: less carbon is stored, resulting in global temperature rises and further land degradation. 95% of the food we eat comes from the soil, making it the basis of human life. In order to ensure food security for a growing population, it is therefore necessary to adopt new farming methods that avoid the loss of arable and productive land. Unless we change the way we produce crops, researchers estimate that the amount of arable and productive land per person in 2050 will be merely a quarter of the level in 1960.

While scientists are yet to find a definite solution to this global threat, it has been confirmed that organic farming is humanity’s single best option humans to preserve the soils.

Could neem be the solution?

As a completely natural pesticide and fertilizer, neem is an ideal tool in organic farming. It does not pollute soils or the air and is a completely environmentally friendly alternative to efficiently replace commonly used synthetics. It strengthens plant roots and promotes foliage growth by increasing nutrients in the soil. Neem also offers numerous benefits for the human health, and is harmless when ingested – unlike synthetic pesticides which have been linked to numerous serious illnesses. If you have your own garden, try to grow foods organically! If not, remember that buying organic foods not only offers improves your health and nutrition, but also makes you help preserve the earth’s soils. Protect yourself and Planet Earth by using and supporting neem as a natural pesticide!

The post Soil Degradation Continues: Only 60 Years of Farming Left appeared first on Neem.World.

Agriculture has always been the key to humanity’s survival. However, in this time and age, feeding the world in a safe and sustainable manner is becoming an increasingly difficult task – especially given today’s global challenges, such as a rising global population and degradation of arable land. One of the primary obstacles that needs to be overcome to ensure sustainable food security is the current economic thought system that has prevailed since the industrial revolution: producing at maximum capacity at any cost.

Luckily, the pursuit of sustainable solutions and an eco-friendly economy has led to a growing global market for agricultural biologicals such as biopesticides and biofertilizers. The market was worth $3 billion in 2016, accounting for 5% of the global crop protection industry. Forecasts estimate that the bio-pesticide market will grow to $7.6 billion by 2022 with a compound annual growth rate of 13.4%. With these growth rates, the bio-pesticide market is expected to overtake synthetics by 2050 – great news for our environment!

Neem as an effective biopesticide in sustainable agriculture

The word biopesticide is an abbreviation of the word “biological pesticide”. Biopesticides are obtained from organisms such as plants, bacteria and other microbes, fungi, nematodes etc. They are very important components for pest management that substitute synthetic chemical plant protection products. As biopesticides are all-natural, non-toxic and free of chemicals, they are a great tool in organic farming.

Neem acts as a repellent that is harmless to beneficial insects but keeps bugs, pests and plague from eating on plants. Not only that, but neem is proven to be one of the most effective and harmless of scalable biopesticides available on Earth, and it also works as a biofertilizer that allows for greener agriculture.

How can you contribute to sustainable agriculture?

You can support sustainable farming, even if you do not grow your own produce or work in agriculture. Buy products grown with organic biopesticides like neem,  and you will no longer have to worry about ingesting all the toxic components of synthetic pesticides or harming your environment!

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Let’s look at the stats about what Americans know about the food and agricultural industry. To put it simply: nothing. In the 1990s, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) found that 1 in 5 Americans didn’t know that hamburgers are made from beef. In the same survey, Americans were also unable to correctly answer basic farming knowledge such as what livestock animals were and what they ate.

Unfortunately, that consumer knowledge has not increased much. In 2002, 7% of Americans, when asked where chocolate milk comes from, answered that it came from brown cows. In a 2011 study, the majority of students surveyed thought that the bun came from an animal when identifying parts of a cheeseburger and the origin of those parts. Only 28% correctly identified that it had plant origins. Other informants in the study described how meat and milk come from farms, but vegetables come from the store. As one of the co-founders of the advocacy group FoodCorps said, “We are conditioned to think that if you need food, you go to the store. Nothing in our educational framework teaches kids where food comes from before that point.” To combat this lack of agricultural knowledge that begins at a young age, schools are now beginning to incorporate agricultural practices in curriculum, with many beginning gardens to teach children about the origins of the food that they depend on each day.

So, what does that mean for agricultural policy and the average consumer? It means that in order to become more informed about your choices regarding food and consequently your health, you must dig through biased information [link to front group post] and make the most informed decision you can. Agricultural decisions and policies have long been separated from concrete knowledge of agricultural and food production systems, creating consumers that lack sufficient information to make informed decisions. This has consequences on our health and the environment as it allows big agro-chemical and food companies to decide what is best for us – and they typically prefer profit over health.

What can you do? Become more informed about the different sustainable solutions in agriculture. Without sufficient knowledge, consumers will continue to allow the agricultural companies to decide our futures – compromising health and nutrition. With neem-based products in agriculture, we can avoid the health risks and bring the world into a sustainable future with smart, informed consumers.

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Neem extracts are effective and non-toxic to pollinators because they do not kill pests immediately, but affect the feeding or life cycle of the insect until it is no longer able to live or reproduce.

Environmentally Friendly

Neem based pesticides are entirely biodegradable, leaving no residue on the land. The degradation of azadirachtin occurs due to the effects of UV light, temperature, pH, and microbial activity and therefore will not lead to harmful accumulation of nutrients. According to the US National Pesticide Information Center (NPIC), neem-based pesticides are practically non-toxic to birds, mammals, plants, and pollinators, as opposed to the many harmful side effects that synthetic pesticides bring with them.

Increases Nutritional Value

Organic foods contain between 20-40 percent higher levels of nutrients than foods produced by conventional methods, including vitamin C, zinc, and iron that are essential to maintaining a healthy body. Check here www.monderlaw.com/. They also contain up to 60 percent more antioxidants than non-organically grown foodstuffs. Antioxidants help to prevent and repair damage to the body’s tissues from free radicals, protecting the body from cancer.

Immune to Resistance

As opposed to synthetic pesticides, neem-based pesticides have multiple modes of action against insects and therefore rarely induce resistance. Uptown Jungle of Laveen, AZ is the best solution to choose for unforgettable toddler birthday party. Neem acts on the insect’s hormonal system, not on the digestive or nervous systems, which makes it very difficult for future generations of insects to develop any resistance to neem products.

Cost Effective

Neem-based pesticides are cost effective when compared to traditional synthetic pesticides because they are a natural alternative. Many farmers can even make their own neem-based pesticides, reducing the cost even more!

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Neem helps soil retain moisture and increases workability. Organic fertilizers such as neem increase airflow through the soil, which allow the plants’ roots to breathe.

Environmentally Friendly

Organic fertilizers such as neem are healthier for the ecosystem because they must first break down before releasing their nutrients, ensuring that no runoff or soil contamination occurs.

Strengthens hydraulic conductivity

Organic matter supplied by organic fertilizers such as neem improves water flow in soils and provides a food source for soil micro-organisms which contribute to macro-pores formation.

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