Healthy soil and sustainable growing

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The new organic farming revolution starts here
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/sep/27/organic-farming-revolution-jay-rayner
Farmers need to refocus if they want to sell their organic food


It has not been a good few days for fans of organic food. Last week, Neil 
Stansfield, a company director, was jailed for selling repackaged 
conventional Tesco pies as organic to Fortnum & Mason. For those of us 
suspicious that many people buy organics in the pursuit of some affluent 
lifestyle rather than because of the quality of the products, it was 
compelling evidence.

At the same time as the judge was handing down the sentence the biggest 
players in the organics world – including Green & Black's and Yeo Valley – 
were meeting to discuss launching a generic advertising campaign bigging up 
the virtues of organics. Their panic was understandable. According to recent 
data from supermarket analysts TNS, the overall sector has dropped 13% in the 
past year. Organic fruit sales are down 16%, and vegetables by a whopping 
third. You can say you read it here first. Last December, this newspaper 
predicted that 2009 would witness the first fall in organic food sales in 15 
years. Indeed, I was the one who made that prediction, though I didn't 
exactly need the powers of a soothsayer. The recession was upon us and it was 
obvious that sales of premium goods were going to tank. What I didn't 
anticipate was just how far those sales would tumble.

No recessionary slump is ever to be celebrated. There are the livelihoods of 
hard-pressed farmers at risk here. Curiously, though, it's possible this 
recession will be the making of the organic sector. It will finally mean they 
have to work out what the point of their business is. Arguments raged this 
summer over a report from the Food Standards Agency stating there were no 
significant health benefits to eating organic food. Its champions attempted, 
unconvincingly, to pick holes in the science. The reality is that, even if 
there are health benefits, they are bound to be marginal.

So how should the organic movement position itself? The Soil Association, 
which accredits organic farmers, has been clear in its goal to see all 
British agriculture move from conventional to organic farming. That's tilting 
at windmills. Sales have never risen above 1.5% of the £160bn food market in 
this country, so even a tenfold increase would still leave them massively off 
their goal. It is also not a solution to our food needs. The government 
finally announced this summer that, in the face of global food security 
pressures, we have to increase the amount we produce at home, to counter an 
8% drop in self-sufficiency to 60.5% over the past decade. As the yield from 
organic farming is lower than that from conventional farming, we would 
inevitably end up importing more food, which is less environmentally sound 
than farming it conventionally here.

Instead, while pursuing modest growth, organic producers should position 
themselves as a political movement, arguing their point not on the fragile 
grounds of health benefits or taste, but on issues of environmental 
sustainability and ethics. Organic producers can be the conscience of British 
farming, using media interest in their products to push industrial food 
producers to ever cleaner and more viable methods. It should not be about 
getting them to sign up to every single line and letter of the code, as if 
organic farming were some fundamentalist religion. It should simply be about 
better. It is the only way forward. As recent sales statistics have proven, 
the alternative is oblivion.