“The relative yields of organic/agroecological versus nonorganic farming are sufficient to provision the current daily average consumption of calories across the world.” Discuss the rationale behind this statement.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

A 2008 study by the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and the UN Environment Program (UNEP), Organic Agriculture and Food Security in Africa, found that “organic agriculture outperformed conventional production systems based on chemical-intensive farming and is thus more conducive to food security in Africa.”
Analyzing 114 projects across 24 African countries, the study showed doubling of yields where organic (or near-organic) practices were used. The study also found “strong environmental benefits such as improved soil fertility, better retention of water, and resistance to drought in these areas.” In a related study, Catherine Badgley and colleagues examined 293 cases in a global dataset, finding that on average, organic farming in the global North produces 92 percent of conventional agricultural yields, but in the global South organic farming produces 80 percent more than conventional agriculture. Thus, one can agree with the researchers that sufficient food could be produced organically to feed the world, even without expanding farmland, and that leguminous cover crops could provide sufficient nitrogen to replace current applications of synthetic fertilizers. Organic fertilizer is cheap, as it is produced on farms (as compared to chemical fertilizer, which has risen in cost by 300 percent over the last few years). And since most inputs take place directly on farm and replenish soil and watersheds, organic/ agroecological farming uses much less energy.