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Tuesday, September 19th, 2023

Water and Pesticide Use Cut Nearly in Half After ‘Better Cotton’ Helps Farmers Become Sustainable

Author:    
Source:     Good News Network
Publication Date:     17 September 2023
 Link: Water and Pesticide Use Cut Nearly in Half After ‘Better Cotton’ Helps Farmers Become Sustainable
Stephan:  

Here is some excellent good news. This is what the governments of the world, and certainly the United States, should be doing. Here is yet more proof that even in farming, pay close attention to the numbers cited, fostering wellbeing is better in all aspects, except the pesticide corporations that make the toxins don’t make as much profit. Boo Hoo.

Credit: Better Cotton India

It’s everyone’s favorite fabric—and over the last decade it’s become way more sustainable.

Better Cotton just published a major annual impact report highlighting significant progress in India that has slashed pesticide and water use, while making improvements to farmers’ livelihoods.

The world’s largest cotton sustainability initiative charted the performance of Indian farmers from 2014 to 2022 and found overall pesticide use decreased 53%—with water usage dropping by nearly one-third.

Enrolled in the Better Cotton Program, almost a million farmers also saw their costs reduced by 15.6% per hectare of land (equal to about 2.5 acres), since the group launched its India operation in 2011.

The report shows a dramatic reduction in the use of pesticides and highly hazardous pesticides (HHPs) by Better Cotton Farmers as a result of the adoption of capacity strengthening trainings on an Integrated Pest Management (IPM) and the delivery of effective awareness campaigns.

Specifically, the number of farmers using HHPs was cut from 64% to 10%, whilst those using Monocrotophos – a pesticide classed as highly toxic by the World Health Organization – […]

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1 Comment

  1. Marco Kappenberger on Friday, September 22, 2023 at 4:35 pm

    Pesticides are usually misused by using excessive quantities and being very dangerous to all who get in touch with them.
    Samoa’s Government has not yet stopped the import of Paraquat: which is the cause of users’ deaths and misuesed for suicide, decision which all victims greatly regret as soon as it’s active killing them.