The Soil Biodiversity Aricle I Have Never Seen....

Much has been written about soil bio-diversity.  The basic premise is that intensive agriculture and intensive use of pesticides, herbicides and fungicides leads to less soil biodiversity and this is bad for the overall ecology.

I am not disputing that typical organic agricultural practices provide better soil biodiversity, the question I have is this:  Is this a result of the pesticides or is this a result of the higher density agriculture?  Does anyone consider that in an organic agricultural environment, more acreage needs to be planted per bushel so that if production is converted to organic agriculture, some land that is currently fallow (with rich biodiversity) has to be put to the plow.

In other words, the real comparison between organic and conventional agriculture methods in the area of biodiversity is to look at comparing organic fields with the combination of conventional and fallow fields that would need to be cultivated if the fields were converted to organic production.

Said differently:  Organic agriculture can claim that their farms have higher biodiversity but one must factor in the additional amount of land needing to be put the plow.  If the organic agriculture has a 20% lower yield, than the comparison should include 20% (or more) of woodland included in the conventional tally.  In other words it makes no sense to compare the biodiversity within an acre of farmland farmed conventionally vs. organically unless one considers that more fallow land will need to be put to the plow for organic agriculture for the same amount of OUTPUT.  It is really a question of biodiversity across full ecosystems for feeding whole populations, not an acre vs. acre comparison.

My making this point should seem obvious and it is shocking that no one makes writes an article that considers the whole ecosystem.  Is it because they are trying to spin an article to support their biases by ignoring this point or are they just that naive?

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Its Tough To Make Comparisons

It amazes me how difficult some comparisons are.  Here I try to focus on the comparison between organic and conventional agriculture and the more I look at it the more I see incomplete comparisons and faulty methodologies.  If I can see these issues as an outsider, how can those who are supposed experts not see them or not address them.  It is generally shocking to me how few books on agriculture are available on places like Amazon, how few blogs there are, and how little discussion and debate there is.

I came across a few interesting blogs and articles recently that highlight this issue of being able to make a good comparison.  The first article is a comprehensive comparison of the costs and benefits of having a artificial vs. natural Christmas tree.  It should be simple, right?  Plastic trees are reusable and should be better for the ecology right?  Not so simple, take a look.

 Christmas Tree Article

So much of the analysis depends on how many years the Christmas tree is in use and what is done with it at the end of its useful life. Natural trees contribute to carbon sequestering right?  Not so fast.  Do yourself a favor and just read the executive summary.  So much has to do with what is essentially the weighting factors in the analysis.

The same issues are at play with the discussion of whether it is better for the environment to use paper vs. plastic bags.  I like this blogs covering of the topic.

 Plastic vs. Paper

Bottom line is this:  Paper really doesn’t biodegrade in a landfill so the biodegradability issue is really off the table.  Both bags are resource intensive for their single use and a lot has to do with where you bags come from and the trade off of fossil fuels vs. water with paper needing much more water to be produced and, of course, plastic being a fossil fuel.

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Higher Nutritional Value of Organics?

I came across this interesting show on NPR's Science Fridays show:
NPR Show

Based on this paper:
Paper

In short it discusses a study where conventional vs. organic strawberries were compared for nutritional value and soil diversity.  The finding was that the organic berries had about 10% more vitamin C and other anti-oxidants per unit of measure (pound or whatever) of produce and that the organic fields' soils had greater "healthiness" as measured by their bio-diversity and bio-activity.  Finally, they were also able to show that the organic berries stayed fresh longer and had less phosphorus in them.

Here is what the study didn't talk about:
1) What was the yield difference of the conventional farms vs. the organic farms - this is important because in a sense we should be considering vitamin content per acre of strawberries, not just per pound.  In other words if it is so much lower yield to grow organic strawberries than the amount of berries CONSUMED by the consumer will likely be lower due to the high cost.  Consumers will CONSUME more vitamins because they will and can buy more.  Furthermore, without a study of yield there is no consideration of the reality that a lower yielding agricultural method like organic will require a greater number of farm fields or an over farming of existing fields and that affect needs to be considered.

2) Another point of discussion about yield is that with few plants or fewer berries per plant in an organic field, it is not that the organic process yields more nutrition, it could just be that the over density of conventional methods leads to lower nutrition.  If the conventional fields were planted at lower (equivalent) density, than the results would be different.  Likewise about the soil health.  Perhaps it is just the higher farming densities that are creating the soil health issues, not the methods.  This is a HUGE point that is not mentioned.  Maybe any nutritional or "taste" differences are based on lower plant densities.

3) Pesticide Residue Public Policy Considerations - If there are pesticide residues in the crops but the crops are much cheaper, the policy question comes down to whether we want people eating more produce that might have a bit of residue or possible risk, or whether we prefer that people eat less (because it is more expensive and we don't have the farm land) of organic produce with no residue.

4)  Berry Size -  In the discussion of that there were higher vitamin levels in the organic strawberries pound for pound there is no discussion of vitamin levels berry to berry.  The likelihood that the conventional berries are larger (don't we all see this at the supermarket?) do to the intensity of the conventional fertilizer may mean that the berries have the same vitamin content but since the conventional ones are larger, the conventional berries have less vitamin content per pound.

5) There is nothing to suggest that any findings regarding strawberries in California are generalizable to other crops or even the strawberries in other significantly different climates.

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He is a little fast and loose with the facts

I think this guy has captured a good measure of the criticism of the "organic agriculture" movement but may be a bit fast and loose with the details.

Article

He isn't backing up what he is saying but this is representative of what and how many people in this debate handle information...too often it is all about making unsupported facts!!

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Organic 'has no health benefits'

UK's Food Standard Agency has done a comprehensive review comparing organic produce to conventional produce and they have concluded that there is no difference between the health benefits of organically produced produce vs. conventional produce.  Here is the BBC summary:

BBC

And here is the agency announcement that links to the paper and other resources:

Agency and paper

I will spend some time reviewing the paper and post on it soon.

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Organic does not mean free range

Thanks to reader Lisa from Phoenix that forwarded me this article from Huffington Post that talks about how organic eggs, dairy and meat are only organic in their feed and that there is no implication about their treatment. In other words, chickens can be treated as "cruely" as conventional chickens, it is just their feed that is organic.

Article here

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Organic vegetables are not without pesticides

I read an interesting article the other day about so called organic pesticides which are certified for use on organic food.

Article

For some reason, I thought that all farmers could use were things like ladybugs but apparently that isn't the case. There is now the question whether these organically certified pesticides may be as bad for the environment because they may not be so biodegradable, pH reactive and they may be adding to the salt levels of the soil. It is worth a read.

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