The term Compost Quilt refers to early frontier experience of American pioneers who colonized the United States of America. The quilt was a symbol of their hardscrabble existence, for it was composed of leftover cloth scraps. Food was also hard won and not a scrap went waste. Leftover food either found its way into soups or into the compost pit. No item of existence was wasted; everything was recycled. However, this phenomenon is not unique to the early American settlers. Similar thrifty behavior is observed among people on African, Australian and Asian Continents. Fabric scraps were fashioned into quilts that reflected the natural world. The quilt became a social register that recorded nature's seasons and nature's bounty.

Social Practices:

As the quilt emerged as a social and cultural activity that wove a community together, it shrank the vast distances between frontiersmen on the North American continent. Quilting has continued to mirror the social conditions of the times; for instance the AIDS quilt is the symbol of modern times. Quilting was an activity undertaken to utilize scarce resources and transform them into useful warmth-giving bed coverings. Maximizing scarce resources was the only certain way to survival in harsh conditions. Hence food leftovers were prudently saved to be recycled into nutrient-rich compost which fertilized the early small farms of the American settlers. Composting as an integral adjunct to survival came into existence in response to scarce resources. Everything was reused and recycled to maximize resource use.

Composting has therefore existed for countless generations. It has been passed down as a useful social practice and has survived to modern times because of its intrinsic merits. Composting simply relies on nature to break down organic material into nutrient-rich fertilizer for reuse. Earlier this compost was used on small farms, now it is every gardener's delight. It is instructive to remember that composting is now seen as an answer to mounting human waste and landfill shortage problems. Composting diverts this waste, even human feces, into a usable commodity. Compost is proving to be more nutrient-rich and infinitely more nature-friendly than commercial fertilizer. Quilting and Composting have proved to be of positive value for humankind; therefore they are still in vogue and extensively practiced.

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