Eco-issues are fortunately becoming more and more common, and in recent years have been given increasing consideration in all areas. After having been ignored globally for too long, there is now a gradual opening up to environmental awareness and a steadily increasing number of sectors, companies and individuals feel connected to green issues and decide to support and perpetrate them.

Among the many sectors, agriculture is also undergoing significant changes of this kind in recent years: an area that has certainly always been linked to nature and coexistence with it (and how could it be otherwise), but is undergoing profound transformation.

What is sustainable agriculture?

To begin with, we need to lay the foundations for this reasoning by starting from an assumption: a real definition of eco-sustainable agriculture. An agriculture that actually respects nature, without simply exploiting it. When we use this term we are talking about an entire sector of this gigantic scientific, working and practical field that has embraced certain concepts.

In particular, this type of agriculture in the last decade has taken note of the climate changes taking place all over the world and the conditions of the animals, and the need to strongly modify them. This has led to the emergence of this current within the sector, whose objective is to meet the need for food and textiles (just like traditional agriculture) but without compromising the ability of future generations to meet these needs in the same way.

In order to achieve this goal, sustainable agriculture, working closely with the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), has devised five principles that form the ideological basis of this strand. These are: changing practices by reducing water and energy consumption; helping to preserve the environment by reducing pollution; promoting inclusive economic growth; increasing the resilience of people, communities and ecosystems; and adapting to new challenges.

Eco-friendly solutions

Having defined this set of principles, let’s look at how they can be put into practice in everyday life. To begin with, there are a few basic guidelines for achieving these goals: constant technological innovation leading to a substantial renewal of systems, techniques and possibilities.

These are then applied in order to create an ever healthier agriculture. This complex can be defined as precision agriculture, i.e.: calibrating the techniques and substances to be used according to the specific characteristics of each individual soil. Technological innovation also makes it possible to optimise production thanks to real-time monitoring of soils, crops and weather conditions. The final consequence of this process is a reduced impact on the planet due to minimised waste.

We have talked about electric tractors, but the use of electricity as an energy source instead of fossil fuels is certainly a decisive step forward made by the whole sector, in the most varied possible applications: from solar panels as power elements to a whole range of electric vehicles and cars. Whether these are stationary and stable machines, part of the factories themselves or of the cultivation and production process, or even those used to move around the fields.

There is also another decisive element in reaching out to green issues and respect for the planet: sustainable water management. This new way of managing a primary resource that is fundamental for the environment has the great advantage of saving a considerable amount of water, considering the effects this has at a global level.