Ambiente - Salute - Diritti Umani - Nutrizione - Agricoltura

Small-scale farmers produce food for 70% of the global population. Yet, they are some of the world's poorest and most food insecure people.

Alternatives to conventional farming should be embraced to improve subsistence farmers' yields and to ensure adequate food production for the growing global population. The stark reality, according to the International Food Policy Research Institute, is that the world needs to produce more food with fewer resources.
Agroecology, a farming approach that mimics natural ecosystems, is an alternative method that can produce more food using fewer resources. Small-scale farmers in Africa have used agroecology to more than double crop yields within 3 to 10 years of implementation, according to the UN special rapporteur on the right to food. Farmers also use agroecology to improve soil fertility, adapt to climate change, and reduce farming input costs.
In contrast, conventional farming is characterised by monocropping, green revolution technologies, and synthetic fertiliser. It is resource intensive in terms of capital, land, water, and fossil fuel use. Conventional farming threatens future food production by reducing biodiversity, and contributing to environmental degradation and climate change which lower yields.
Permaculture, a contraction of permanent agriculture, is a promising design system for the application of agroecology. It was developed in Australia in the 1970s based on agroecology and indigenous farming systems. In practice, permaculture farms are organic, low-input, and biodiverse, and use techniques like intercropping trees, planting perennials, water harvesting, and resource recycling. (...)

The article:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development-professionals-network/2013/apr/23/farming-methods-agroecology-permaculture

More about:

http://foodtank.com/news/2014/02/celebrating-the-potential-of-permaculture

http://www.permaculturaitalia.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=featured&Itemid=128&lang=en

Basic information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permaculture
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permacultura
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permaculture
http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permacultura