Ukraine’s organic sector is in the news this week with the
Minister of Agriculture opening the snappily titled first International
Congress "Organic Ukraine 2017. Organic market development in Ukraine -
from production to implementation."
The Minsters opening speech highlighted Ukraine’s organic
sector has grown 90% in the last five years although 90% of very little is still
not much but it does perhaps indicate a trend particularly now the government
has identified organic as one of the key pillars for development.
I don’t think I would be giving anything away if I was to
say I was a bit of fan of organic farming; it’s a great marketing opportunity
for farmers around the world and it makes us question how we farm in the
conventional systems which always has to be a good thing.
I used to teach an undergraduate module on organic farming
in the breadbasket region of the UK and it would be fair to say I had my work
cut out.
It was a challenge to get participants to even consider that
organic farming could be an opportunity for some and that if their neighbour
converted to organic it wasn’t a threat to their business so they should
probably best just calm down a bit.
The usual argument was that we won’t be able to feed the
world with organic produce because the yield just isn’t there.
Well yes and no. Organic wheat in the UK might yield
considerably lower than a conventional system but that’s not necessarily the
case in somewhere like Ukraine where the yield penalty would be small because
conventional farming already is, in the main, a low input, low output extensive
system.
And as we invest into organic farming research we will develop new techniques and technologies that will improve yields, it's not magic it's science.
Ukraine currently cultivates about 400,000ha of organic land
and the Minister believes this will increase several fold on the back of increasing
demand for organic produce.
He might just be right.