Organic Food Production as a Necessity and Obligation of People in the 21st Century to Preserve Health, Biodiversity, and the Atmosphere the Position of Serbia on a Global Scale

Abstract

Ever since the beginning of the existence of homo sapiens on the planet, from the initial basic diet of hunting, there was a gradual transition to using the gifts of nature from the plant world by collecting natural fruits, so that knowledge would lead man to planned cultivation. The initial primitive methods of land cultivation, including irrigation, did not have negative effects on the natural environment, as did the later cultivation of plants and the promotion of growth and yield with organic fertilizers. Only from the middle of the 20th century, when the race to increase yield became closer to the race for profit, was a negative imbalance observed, which directly affects human health and its environment. The continuous trend of increasing the crop, selection and modification of seeds and the use of nitrogen fertilizers, led to the loss of crop quality, especially from the health aspect, then the impact on the habitus and biodiversity of the wider environment, as well as the reduction of soil characteristics (humus layer). Economic crises also include food production, so the dilemma arises as to whether we should produce large quantities at any cost or rapidly switch to ecologically more justified organic production.

In this modest study, a brief analysis of the relationship to basic foods in the human diet was carried out, with an emphasis on cereals, which were and remain a basic component, because in each historical period they represented the sources of about 20% of the calories and proteins necessary for human health, as well as the impact of healthy (organic) types of this cereal on the human environment. And then the quantity of organic food production in Serbia was analyzed.