Intensive farming is an agricultural system that aims to maximise the yield in available land through heavy use of pesticides and chemical fertilisers. It is characterised by the will to increase the immediate yield. Corn, soybeans, wheat, and rice are major crops for intensive cultivation.
Farmers employ intensive farming in small land areas, which is an efficacious solution to meet the agricultural needs of growing populations. Intensive farming also improves labour dynamics by utilising technology to reduce manual, labour-intensive farming, thereby increasing profits for farmers.
Negative impacts on the environment are multiple. The lack of care and the overreliance on synthetic fertilisers, such as ammonium nitrate (NH3NO3), contribute to rising global temperatures. Nitrogen fertilisers, such as ammonium nitrate, are responsible for nearly 60% of nitrogen oxide emissions, and over 74% of the US nitrous oxide emissions come from inefficient agricultural soil management practices. Like other greenhouse gases, nitrous oxide traps heat and radiation from the sun; however, it is 300 times more threatening than carbon dioxide and methane.
Intensive farming also contributes to soil degradation, as land is often planted repeatedly without allowing the soil to recover its nutrients. This continues the unsustainable cycle of using increased amounts of fertilisers to compensate for the lack of nutrients, leading to natural hazards such as landslides, flooding and growing deserts. Unlike natural fertilisers, most synthetic ones tend to run off and volatilise (convert from a liquid or solid to a gaseous state), contaminating the soil, water, and air and potentially reaching far-flung places. It can also alter the soil’s pH in the long-term, making it a substandard environment for useful microorganisms, including bacteria, protozoa, and fungi.
Synthetic fertilisers can also leak into streams and other bodies of water, which leads to algal blooms, dead zones and the loss of ecosystems. This is mainly caused by significant nutrient pollution (nitrogen, phosphorus) caused by excessive nutrients from fertilisers and wastewater. Once in the water, the waste’s high levels of nitrogen and phosphorus feed algae, resulting in blooms that grow faster than the ecosystems can handle. This proliferation leads to HABs, or harmful algal blooms, resulting from this growth. Extremely high algal growth also degrades water quality.
One real-life example can be seen in the Gulf of Mexico, where, every summer, the overgrowth of algae forms the largest dead zone in the United States. This is because the algae block the sunlight from reaching the aquatic plants, which prevents oxygen from being released into the water. This lack of oxygen causes all aquatic life to perish, creating a “dead zone” of around 17,000 square kilometres. This is due to nutrient pollution from the Mississippi River Basin, which supplies more than half of the US’s agricultural land. At the same time, intensive farming occupies approximately 30% of its land area, primarily consisting of corn and soybean fields.
However, scientists and farmers are continuously finding new ways to make this process more eco-friendly. Some include using organic fertilisers such as manure or composts, which release nutrients slowly, are less concentrated and are non-toxic, making them an ideal fertiliser. However, in organic fertilisers, it is hard to control the amount of primary nutrients (phosphorus, nitrogen, potassium), which means healthy soil results will take longer than those of chemical fertilisers. This is because organic fertilisers rely on the beneficial microbes to convert these elements and feed the plants. Nonetheless, in the long term, it is better for the soil.
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