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ISIS Report 10/09/07
FAO Promotes Organic Agriculture
FAO Report says organic farming fights hunger, tackles climate change, good
for farmers, consumers and the environment. Sam
Burcher
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FAO favours organic agriculture
The United Nations Food and Agricultural
Organisation (FAO) has come out
in favour of organic agriculture. Its report Organic
Agriculture and Food Security explicitly states that organic agriculture
can address local and global food security challenges [1].
Organic farming is no longer to
be considered a niche market within developed countries, but a vibrant commercial agricultural system
practised in 120
countries, covering 31
million hectares (ha) of cultivated
land plus 62
million ha of certified wild harvested areas. The organic market was worth US$40 billion in
2006, and expected
to reach US$70 billion by 2012.
Nadia Scialabba, an FAO official, defined organic agriculture as:
“A holistic production management system that avoids the use of synthetic
fertilizers and pesticides, and genetically modified organisms, minimizes
pollution of air, soil and water, and optimises the health and productivity
of plants, animals and people.”
The strongest benefits of organic agriculture,
Scialabba said, are its reliance on fossil fuel independent, locally available resources that incur minimal agro-ecological stresses
and are cost effective. She described organic agriculture as
a “neo-traditional food system” which combines modern science and indigenous
knowledge.
The FAO Report strongly suggests that a worldwide shift to organic agriculture
can fight world hunger and at the same time tackle climate change. According
to FAO’s previous World Food Summit report [2], conventional agriculture,
together with deforestation and rangeland burning, are responsible for 30 percent
of the CO2 and 90 percent of nitrous oxide emissions worldwide.
Organic agriculture overcomes paradox of conventional food production systems
The new FAO Report frames a paradox within
the conventional food production systems as follows:
- Global food supply is sufficient, but 850
million are undernourished and go hungry
- Use of chemical agricultural
inputs is increasing;
yet grain productivity is dwindling to seriously low levels
- Costs of agricultural
inputs are rising, but
commodity costs have been in steady decline over the past five decades.
- Knowledge is increasingly provided
through fast information technologies, but nutritionally related diseases
are rising
- Industrialised food
systems cause deaths through pesticide poisonings and high numbers of farmer
have committed suicides, while
millions of jobs have been lost in rural areas.
In contrast, organic agriculture offers an alternative
food system that improves agricultural performance to better provide access
to food, nutritional adequacy, environmental quality, economic efficiency,
and social equity. This is crucial if agricultural production in developing
countries is to rise by 56 percent
by 2030 to meet nutritional needs, as stated in the Report.
Researchers recommend a shift to organic agriculture especially for poor developing
countries
Evidence presented
to the FAO by the Danish Research Centre for Food and Farming
confirm the potential of a new
organic farming paradigm to secure
more than enough food to feed the world, and with reduced environmental
impacts [3]. The results,
using a computer model developed by the Washington DC based Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), show that a fifty percent
conversion to organic farming in sub-Saharan Africa would not harm food security.
Instead, it would help feed the hungry by reducing the need to import subsidised
food, and produce a diverse range of
certified organic surpluses to be exported at premium profit.
The conversion of global agriculture to organic farming, without converting
wild lands for agricultures and using N-fertilizers, would result in a global
agricultural supply of 2 640 to 4 380 kcal/day/person. These conclusions came
from a research team led by Catherine Badgley at the University of Michigan
[4], based on extensive review of the evidence from both the developed and developing
world (see Scientists
Find Organic Agriculture Can Feed the World and More, SiS 36 [5]).
The
fact that sustainable intensification of organic agriculture could increase production by up to 56 percent is good news, as despite gains in food
production and food security in some countries, sub-Saharan Africa produces
less food per person than it did 30 years ago; and the number of chronically
malnourished people in the region has doubled since 1970, from 96 million
to over 200 million in 1996 [2].
This reflects the wider picture that developing countries have registered
outright declines in yield increases under conventional agriculture between
1972-1992.
In
contrast, the current FAO Report presents evidence that organic management systems have doubled
yields in arid and degraded soils in Tigray, Ethiopia. (See The Tigray Project [6] and
Organic Production for Ethiopia [7], SiS 23). Alexander Mueller, the
FAO assistant director-general praised the research, and noted that as the effects of climate change
are expected to hurt the world’s poorest, a shift to organic farming could
be beneficial to cope with the rising number of global hungry.
Recommendations arising from the FAO report feed directly into the framework
for the Right to Adequate Food and also into the Millenium Development Goal
(MDG)1 for reducing hunger and poverty, MDG7 for environmental sustainability,
and MDG 8 for global partnerships with emphasis on hidden, acute or chronic
hunger.
Environmental and economic benefits of organic agriculture
The Danish researchers [3] suggest that
a 50 percent organic conversion by 2020 in the food exporting regions of North
America and Europe would have little impact on the availability and prices
of food. Converting
from chemically intensive farming to organic farming can initially decrease
yields, but the adjustment evens out over time and provides numerous non-material
benefits such as land improvement.
The
FAO Report points to further benefits such as better
animal welfare, wildlife protection, avoidance of GMOs and pesticides, more jobs and less energy used. Results from studies carried out by the US Department of Agriculture
[8] support the FAO findings; showing that organic crops are
worth more than conventional crops on the market, and on average, farmers
could net $50-$60 more per acre by going organic, even with the highest transitional
costs.
The
expansion and intensification of conventional farming is harmful not only to the environment, but also to the very resources
essential to farming. Over the past two decades, some 15 million
ha of tropical forests are lost each year to provide land for agriculture,
and at a tremendous loss of genetic diversity [2]. During the same period,
soil erosion and other forms of land degradation cost the world between 5-7
million ha of farming land every year;
a further 1.5 million ha are lost to waterlogging and salination,
and an additional 30
million ha damaged.
Organic agriculture has the potential to reverse
those trends, and reduce carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane, greenhouse gasses (GHG)
that contribute to global warming [1]. Organic agriculture could double soil
carbon sequestration in livestock based systems and decrease GHG by 48-60
percent. For example, organic systems have decreased the use of fossil fuels
by between 10-70 percent in Europe, and 29-37 percent in the USA.
On organic farms, increasing soil organic matter and microbial biomass is
a fundamental principle to support agro-ecosystem stability. Mandatory crop
rotation, the use of seeds and breeds that are adapted to local conditions,
and the regeneration of functional biodiversity all contribute further to ecological balance.
Organic networks meet local food demands and benefits farmers
The FAO gives
top priorities to agricultural production that targets local food needs in
local markets, allowing imports only for items not grown locally, and exporting
high value produce.
In developing countries, food quantity, quality and availability
in urban areas are enriched by organic market gardens where local produce
is sold to international markets and domestic supermarkets. This reduces dependence
on cheap subsidized imports, which are projected to rise to more than 160
million tonnes by the year 2010. For example, a food network in Argentina
that covers 3.5 million people reports 70 percent self-sufficiency in vegetable
production through organic urban garden networks.
A successful conversion to organic agriculture
has occurred in parts of Egypt where scarce or polluted water supplies
led to the development of thriving local markets. In China, the awareness
of environmental pollution and the need for environmental and health protection
resulted in organic-managed land rising from 342 000 ha in 2003 to 978 000
ha in 2005, and increasing local farmers incomes nine-fold. Cuba is an inspiring
example of how food crises can be averted by drastically reducing chemical
inputs and relinquishing dependency on fossil fuels [9]. National food security
was maintained with some help from food aid, by re-localizing organic food
production, and ensuring food access through food rationing and social safety
nets such as food and nutrition surveillance systems. Furthermore, organic
urban gardens create a healthy environment for the inhabitants and supply
local restaurants, markets and shops with nutritious foods.
As
organic produce enters the mainstream, consumers are willing to pay higher
prices in exchange for truthful labelling and absorb some of the extra
costs of organic agriculture. Demand for organic produce has
encouraged countries like Brazil (fast becoming a world leader in organic
farming) and India to reconcile their local food demands. The main challenge
to international markets is bringing producers together to create value chains
of fair trade, informed choice and traceability [1]. And, as Catherine Badgely
argues [4], food security depends as much Government policies and market price
as it does on yields.
Producing organic food has distinct benefits for farmers
too. Farmers’ rights to local seeds and varieties are strengthened, knowledge
sharing is promoted, incomes are raised, production increased, environmental
and health protection is improved, natural resources are conserved and outward
rural migration is reversed. As organic farming is highly knowledge intensive,
the FAO recognises that the organization of organic farmers and growers associations,
co-operatives, enterprises, and community groups is crucial to research and
development. Farmers converting to organic methods also increase incomes by
minimizing chemical inputs and other industrial interventions and thereby
break the cycle of indebtedness that has devastated hundreds of thousands
of farmers livelihoods (See Stem Farmers’ Suicides with
Organic Farming, [10], SiS 32). Ensuring farmers well-being and increasing
national and regional self reliance in food production methods that meet key
environmental and animal welfare standards will not only enhance food security,
but will also reduce the use of fossil fuel use for food transportation and
production. (See Food
Miles and Sustainability, [11] SiS 28)
Health benefits of organic agriculture
As the FAO
Report points out, organic foods tend to have higher micronutrient
content that contributes to better health, lower incidence of non-communicable
diseases and boosts plant and animal immunity against disease (See Organic Farms Make
Healthy Plants Make Healthy People, [12] Organic Strawberries Stop Cancer Cells,
[13], SiS32). The UK Soil Association carried out a systematic review of the
evidence comparing trace minerals in organic and non-organic food, and found that on average, organic food contains higher
levels of vitamin C and essential minerals such as calcium, magnesium, iron,
and chromium [14]. An independent study found higher levels of all 21 nutrients
in organic crops, particularly potatoes, cabbage, spinach and lettuce [15].
Evidence suggests that organic crops contain up to
fifty percent fewer mycotoxins (toxins produced by fungi) (See Increased Mycotoxins in Organic Produce?
[16]), and have a longer shelf life.
Organic farmers produce good food from developing
a balanced living soil and using only as a last resort four of the hundreds
of pesticides on tap to conventional farmers. Non-organic fruits can be sprayed up
to 16 times with 36 different pesticides [17]. In 2003 the UK Food Standards
Agency (FSA) conceded that: ”…buying organic is a way to reduce the chances
of your food containing these pesticides.” [18]. Pesticide residues used in
conventional farming such as organophosphates are linked with cancers, foetal
abnormalities, chronic fatigue syndrome, and Parkinson’s, [19] as well as
allergies, especially in children [20], and breast cancer in women [21]. The
US Government linked pesticide residues to the top three environmental cancer
risks. A study in Seattle [22] found concentrations of pesticide residues
6 times higher in children eating conventionally farmed fruits and vegetables. The restriction on synthetic
inputs by organic farmers prevent pesticide poisonings that cause around 20
000 deaths each year in conventional agricultural practices, (see Picking Cotton Carefully
[23]); and stop
phosphates and nitrates leaching into drinking water.
Organic agriculture provides long term solutions
The FAO Report concludes that a broad scale
shift to organic agriculture can
produce enough food on a global per capita basis to feed the
world’s population over the next 50 years. Workable solutions to pressing
problems such as the growth in population and consumption, oil
peak, fossil fuel dependence, food transport, and agricultural sector employment
are all built in holistically to the organic agriculture paradigm. Therefore,
as the myth of “low yield organic agriculture” recedes [24], it is up to
the agricultural researchers, officials and Governments to invest in long-term
alternative agricultural systems such as green manures that can provide enough
biologically fixed nitrogen to replace all the synthetic nitrogen currently
used on the planet [4]. Despite scepticism at the potential of organic agriculture
to feed the world [25], if conventional farmers adopted only some of its principles
such as soil health and ecology, the results would strongly benefit farmers,
consumers and the environment.
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