{"id":6197,"date":"2020-07-17T11:25:20","date_gmt":"2020-07-17T10:25:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.innovationnewsnetwork.com\/?p=6197"},"modified":"2022-12-07T15:57:24","modified_gmt":"2022-12-07T15:57:24","slug":"the-future-of-agriculture-organic-farming-innovation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.innovationnewsnetwork.com\/the-future-of-agriculture-organic-farming-innovation\/6197\/","title":{"rendered":"The future of agriculture – organic farming innovation"},"content":{"rendered":"
COPA-COGECA is the union of the two big agricultural umbrella organisations COPA and COGECA and the strongest interest group for European farmers. Founded in 1962 and headquartered in Brussels, its activity focus is on the Common Agricultural Policy<\/a> (CAP) and other policy areas relevant to farmers and agri-co-operatives, such as: food safety, animal health and welfare, plant health, environment, research and innovation, and trade.<\/p>\n The Innovation Platform<\/em> <\/a>spoke with COPA-COGECA\u2019s Secretary General, Pekka Pesonen, about areas such as organic farming, innovations both present and future (particularly with regard to those that will be necessary to achieve 2030 targets), and the future CAP.<\/p>\n If you look at the three individual components, it is clear that more is needed \u2013 and yet, it is also clear that perhaps there would never be enough. It is therefore more about trade-offs. We need to see how we can develop a comprehensive policy mix in the CAP to satisfy both the objectives and the varied stakeholders and, of course, COPA-COGECA is looking into that.<\/p>\n At a fundamental level, the CAP needs to ensure that farmers in the EU can make an adequate income. In Europe, the agriculture sector follows a family farming model, and we need to understand how that can be made sustainable in the long term because it is practically impossible for European farming<\/a> to become completely industrialised. At the same time, we cannot become completely reliant on subsidised farming either. As such, a significant challenge now is ensuring a stable income for farmers whilst also balancing societal expectations of what farms should be achieving and providing.<\/p>\n There is always more that can be done regarding the many objectives that we put into place \u2013 and not only those concerning farmers themselves. I believe that there should be a clearly defined plan from the EU as to what we should expect \u2013 even if that is difficult for us to swallow. Because if we were to have this, then we would all have something to stick to; we would know, for instance, what the baseline for investments would be.<\/p>\n And the key word here is \u2018investment\u2019; we should not substitute this for the word \u2018change\u2019 because that implies that things are going to happen without a cost, and that is absolutely not the case. We are not going to become automatically more sustainable in an ecological sense, for instance, if we just stop what we are doing. It will take \u2018investment\u2019 into things like modern farming equipment or infrastructure such as farms, barns, and greenhouses. The sector needs that investment and investment, by definition, is predictable.<\/p>\n In an ideal world, this would happen at the international level, with an international set of rules being devised, at least in principle, regarding areas such as environmental and ecological sustainability. These rules, of course, would not be able to go into every detail, but they would at least provide a baseline from which to work.<\/p>\n One area where this is needed, and which also links directly to a quite extensive discussion that has recently been had, is climate and how agricultural efforts here can be used to secure income. However, there are still some question here about how (or if) society will accept that farmers, who are supposed to deliver foodstuffs to the market, can increasingly make a living from things like carbon credits.<\/p>\n This is an area that we are incredibly interested in, but we are also wary about the implications of growing biofuels<\/a>. This is because we were expected to deliver the best return from the market-based approach by decoupling support in early 2000. But once the farmers did that, at least partly, because the biofuels market became available to them, we were suddenly told that this was not societally acceptable because it was seen as taking food out of the poor man\u2019s mouth. As such, we need to be careful about how we approach such areas; even if we are able to take part in what has been termed by some as \u2018societal services\u2019 or \u2018public services\u2019 as a source of income, the fact that they don\u2019t deliver food makes them an extremely contentious issue.<\/p>\n It should be addressed at local level. The link between food production and the consumer food market really needs to be made better. Most people appear to believe that we have industrial farming in Europe, but we don’t; the size of the primary producers has been and continues to be very small; they are actually micro enterprises, most of which follow the family farming model, and while that is not set to change any time soon (and perhaps nor should it) it is nevertheless clear that productivity needs to be enhanced moving forwards.<\/p>\n Indeed, no sector in in economic history has survived without seeing gains in productivity, and so this is something that the European agriculture sector clearly needs to take part in. We need to explain that to society in more concrete terms. And while that does not mean that we will automatically increase output by growing in size, we should explain how we could produce more with less. It is here that areas such as organic farming have a role to play. But for the organic sector to be successful, we need to valorise organic produce, and consumers will need to pay more. Of course, with the economic downturn that is being predicted after the COVID-19 pandemic<\/a>, I am not sure how realistic it is to expect that to happen.<\/p>\nThe CAP is about our food, the environment, and the countryside. Do you feel that it is adequate in all these areas? Are there any elements that you are specifically concerned about (or, conversely, see as particularly positive)?<\/h3>\n
Indeed, a key pillar of the CAP is direct payments to farmers, designed to ensure a viable farm income. What needs to happen to guarantee that farmers receive a fair profit from their work? Has enough been done in the CAP to make sure this happens?<\/h3>\n
How could that be achieved?<\/h3>\n
Indeed, agriculture and forestry are increasingly seen as being able to contribute to the meeting of climate and energy targets, and that, of course, is a significant element of the \u2018food versus fuel\u2019 debate. How would you like to see these facets develop, what support is needed at the policy level for that to happen, and is this an area that should be managed at Member State or even regional level?<\/h3>\n