Organic farming livestock husbandry

Livestock husbandry is not explicitly addressed in the historical concepts of organic farming. Livestock provided manure and was therefore an important link in the crop and soil fertility chain. Livestock played a major role on its own only in biodynamic farming, especially cattle whose organs are described as important catalysts of processes and transmitters of cosmic energies (Steiner, 1929). Nonetheless, even the pioneers of biodynamic farming did not consider livestock husbandry from an ethical or animal welfare point of view. 

On the farm, a crop can be labeled as organic if it is produced on land where no prohibited substances have been applied for a minimum of three years prior to harvest. Animal products labeled as organic must come from livestock that have been fed organic feed, raised using humane animal husbandry systems, and that have not be treated with synthetic medications, except under very limited conditions set forth in the national list. 

Reksen, O., Tverdal, A., and Ropstad, E. 1999. A comparative study of reproductive performance in organic and conventional dairy husbandry. Journal of Dairy Science 82 2605-2610. Rodenburg, T.B., Arkel, M.C.V. and Kwakkel, R.P. 2004. Campylobacter and Salmonella infections on organic broiler farms. NJ AS-Wageningen Journal of Life Sciences 52 101-108. Roderick, S. and Hovi, M. 1999. Animal Health and Welfare in Organic Livestock Systems ... 

Animal husbandry is the main source of organic wastes in agriculture. It covers particularly excrements of farm animals which are, partly uncontrollably introduced into waters directly at the site of origin, and partly after their application to the fields in the form of fertilizers used for plant production. It is supposed that about 10% of this organic waste is introduced into streams. In Czechoslovakia, for example, the total quantity of wastes from livestock is higher than the amount produced by humans. 

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