Organic farming is defined as producing crops without the use of synthetic chemicals in insecticides, herbicides, or fertilizer; instead, farmers rely on their knowledge of their land and soil conditions to devise their ecological farming techniques. They use many types of natural and alternative methods, such as planting two or more companion crops together so that they protect each other from pests, using green manure (which is a crop that is tilled into the soil to provide natural compost), and breaking the chain of pests by rotating crops (growing different crops in succession on the same plot of land). In addition, crops themselves tend to be more varied and diverse, so that the farmer need not depend on the success of one single monocultured crop. ...