Innovation Appeal

16 February 2012

How governments invest in agricultural research and innovation plays a pivotal part in shaping what types of food we produce and consume. Given the challenges our global food system is likely to face in the coming century, it’s crucial that we ensure organic and agro-ecological approaches are at the heart of innovative and progressive farming.

Ours is a radically different approach from that of the system dominated by large industrial interests and science labs and reliant on GM crops, chemical pesticides and synthetic fertilisers.

Our vision starts with the real needs of farmers and the public, and works to fully involve them in finding humane and workable solutions. As Churchill said, the science should be ‘on tap, not on top’.

Sometimes it might seem like our work is mainly on blocking the worst products of a broken research system – our campaigns against GM, the over-use of antibiotics in livestock farming or mega-farms. Of course, these campaigns are vitally important. Yet, throughout our history, we have also been committed to building something better.

Organic farmers have always been creative, willing to experiment and to learn from each other and from nature. Instead of relying on industry-funded boffins and salesmen for the next short-lived wonder product, organic farmers have been among those championing innovation in farming, building a viable market against heavy odds. Yet this independence, coupled with a commitment to the kind of ecological thinking that has, until recently, been unfashionable among scientists, has seen organic producers typecast as ‘anti-science’.

Dispelling the myth that we’re stick-in-the-muds – validating and helping others to learn from the best examples of organic farming, land use and food systems – is crucial, but only part of the task. We must also be clear that we have much to learn in our own systems. We need to improve the total productivity of organic systems, making the most of their potential and ensuring that we can bank on them to feed the world fairly, humanely and sustainably.

Organic standards need to act as part of a ladder, not a ceiling, and we need to be certain that meeting them guarantees better outcomes for the planet, people and animals. We need to find common ground with non-organic farmers and scientists so that we can learn from their experience, share ours and answer our critics. Ultimately we want to see all agricultural research begin with farmers’ needs and knowhow, and take an ecological approach to farming, food and health.

Huge potential

It’s a big task ahead, but a worthwhile one. The potential of organic and agro-ecological systems is still to be fully realised, due in part to under-investment in appropriate research and knowledge sharing. For example, most funding, including public funding, has focused on delivering ‘wealth-creating products’. Organic innovation usually entails adding value through improved management techniques rather than purchasing new products, and so it provides less incentive for investment.

Where public money has been invested in organic research, it has tended to concentrate on comparing how organic systems perform against non-organic. This has helped to make the case for the benefits of organic, for example on biodiversity, but does not help organic methods evolve and improve. As a result innovation in organic systems is happening informally at a farm or business level. As such, practitioners are rarely centrally involved in research programmes. Their innovation is often unrecognised, rarely built upon and they have little opportunity to identify and steer the work that would be of most value to them. Partly because they are seldom involved, knowledge transfer from research to farms is generally slow and sometimes non-existent.

A final barrier to research in organic agriculture is that measuring, modelling and evaluating complex systems is difficult and expensive. As a result, research has tended to focus on the jigsaw pieces that are more easily isolated, or that show the clearest patterns, without fully questioning what the pieces tell us about the overall picture. This has left ecological and organic approaches, which emphasise the real-world importance of complex whole systems, relatively neglected by funders and in decision-makers.

A new approach

What we propose is an approach that makes real, practical progress through on-farm research and knowledge exchange; and uses that to engage science and innovation policy-makers and earn long-term support for agro-ecological and organic approaches.

The Soil Association already promotes work of this kind through our own activity – projects we are involved in such as AssureWel and Low-carbon Farming, or our own continuing scrutiny and development of our standards are good examples.

Yet we are keen to do much more, and encourage others to do likewise. A first step will be to work more closely with the 2,400 organic farms that certify with us to help identify ways of farming that have the best outcomes for people, animals and the environment. We also want to step up our involvement in research and innovation policy, trying to open up decision-making so the farmers and consumers at the sharp end of the challenges facing our food system have a real voice. This is not only fairer, but essential to ensuring that the effort and ingenuity of scientists and entrepreneurs are focused where it is needed most.
 

This is why we are asking you to support our appeal. The funding provided by the generous donations of our members and supporters allows us to continue and increase our work to put innovative, sustainable and practical solutions back at the heart of research. Please, support our work with a donation today.