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FAO Report says organic farming fights hunger, tackles climate change, good for farmers, and more...
Sept. 14, 2007
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.

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