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Post by Deleted on May 12, 2009 13:52:37 GMT
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Post by basilseal on May 12, 2009 13:56:38 GMT
........ I can't understand why people get so hostile to organinc farming, BFF is full of post slagging organincs off, but i'd chalenge you to find a single post from any of the numerous organic farmers who post there slagging off conventional farming........... Are you kidding? The entire concept is based on 'slagging off' conventional produce as somehow contaminated and inferior when there's little evidence for it. The only area where residues might be a problem is fruit &vegetables - and then with imported stuff mainly. Perhaps you could provide some evidence of this 'slagging off' then?
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Post by jc on May 12, 2009 19:26:37 GMT
[quote author=ford4000 board=general thread=118 post=1144 Every time I hear the soil assoc. on the media they are slagging me and my produce off,they are as harmful to normal farmings public image as compassion in world farming,RSPCA and the likes.Maybe the soil assoc. farming members should tell them to tone down the level of attack [/quote] One of the reasons we left the SA and moved to OF&G was the constant slagging off of conventional farmers. As I have said before nearly 100% of farmers farmed conventionally before converting to Organic production. How did farmers farm 100 years ago? Was it conventional or organic? It was a business decision for us and we do not slag off conventional farmers because we have been there, done that and got the t-shirt!
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Post by tj on May 12, 2009 20:14:50 GMT
As to whether it tastes better, that of course is a matter of opinion, in some cases it undoubtedly does. We find our organinc potatoes to be far superior in taste to oe bought in the supermarket, then again veg grown for the supermarkets will be grown for appearance rather than taste, and with potatoes they may have been over irrigated to improve the skin quality at the expense of taste. We certainly get alot of repeat custom because people prefer the taste of our potatoes.
That's just one example but there are others. I can't understand why people get so hostile to organinc farming, BFF is full of post slagging organincs off, but i'd chalenge you to find a single post from any of the numerous organic farmers who post there slagging off conventional farming.[/i]basilseal
Tastes can be difficult to quantify. I buy freshly lifted pototoes from a local farmer and they taste much better than supermarket potatoes, particularly earlies. But he is not an organic farmer. So could the taste be more to do with freshness ??
I think you are right in that there is a lot of hostility towards organic farmers on BFF. The problem here is not organic farmers, they are just producing a product to satisfy a market, and nobody can blame them. The problem is the 'organic movement' and its band of media and celebrity followers who have successfully branded the word 'organic' into the public psyche as being superior having monopolised words like 'tastier', 'natural' etc whilst demonising words like 'chemicals', 'fossil fuels' and 'intensive' and associating them with conventional agriculture. The Soil Association see themselves as the Prima Donnas of the agricultural industry, and when dear old Auntie BBC are doing something on agriculture, the SA are often given pride of place, and their views taken very seriously, but in actual fact organic food accounts for less than 2% of the UK retail food market. The hype and exposure that goes with it food is out of all proportion the actual size of the market. I think this is what causes so much annoyance among the UK's conventional farmers. The SA have recently published their market report for 2009 and you can read it on this link: www.soilassociation.org/marketreport Very interesting.
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Post by grainman on May 12, 2009 20:30:17 GMT
Make up your own minds. She doesn't sound very supportive of conventional methods to me.
"Loads and loads of chemicals."
And here was me thinking that our chemical regulations were among the most stringent and responsible.
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Post by grainman on May 12, 2009 20:40:28 GMT
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Post by tj on May 12, 2009 20:55:24 GMT
When you have read the Soil Association's annual market report (see link in previous post), read this from 'The Grocer': www.thegrocer.co.uk/articles.aspx?page=articles&ID=198223The SA are saying organic food sales increased by 1.7% in 2008, and apart from a few minor blips, everything was hunky dory. They make great play of the fact that Asda increased their organic food sales by 25%. But from what to what they don't say. TNS Market Research on the other hand are saying that in the 52 weeks to Jan 09 organic bread sales were down 29%, fruit down 20%, vegetables down 8% whereas non-organic food sales up 7%. The say that the organic food share of the grocery market slipped from 1.4% to 1.3% overall. So who's telling the porkies then ??
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Post by Deleted on May 12, 2009 21:51:47 GMT
And, of course, the price of organic milk is in steady decline.
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Post by basilseal on May 12, 2009 21:57:51 GMT
And, of course, the price of organic milk is in steady decline. and the conventional milk price isn't?
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Post by tj on May 13, 2009 8:57:54 GMT
Interesting to hear Ms Browning of the SA's comments. From what I can make out she was saying that the developing world are making enormous strides in improving soil fertility and production without the use of 'expensive nitrogen fertilisers'. 'Production in developing countries has improved quite dramatically, increasing production by 2 or 3 times', or words to that effect.
The following figures may be of interest. They show global urea nitrogen production of around 155 million tonnes in 2007/08 increasing to around 185 million tonnes in 2011/12 :
Global Urea Production - Million Tonnes 07/08 11/12 North America 11.2 11.3 Latin America 6.5 8.3 W Europe 5.1 5.4 E Europe 5.9 5.9 Eurasia 13.7 16.2 Asia 105.6 125.4 Africa 6.5 9.4 Oceania 0.4 2.6 Total 154.9 184.5
Most of the 30 million tonne capacity increase will take place in the developing world. There is huge expansion, and this is only for urea nitrogen. Hardly organic is it ??
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Post by Deleted on May 13, 2009 9:13:12 GMT
organic lamb sold as chemical free when it has been dosed for worms,less than other lamb and only when it was needed granted, but the lamb has been drenched with chemicals contrary to the claim not to have been. Met the Shepard on a local organic farm last year buying enough dose to treat 10,000 lambs. Sold no doubt as organic-chemical free. i can recall a fella from wales saying they could use a igr for fly control others drenching and then haveing longer withholding times not realy organic in my mind FFS if 90% of hill sheep farmers stoped putting on maintance fert they would be classed as fully organic .. organic has it's good points like useing clovers etc etc but it's not realy inventing the wheel as some people are lead to belive in the press and telly show alot of farms are doing the same thing and have been for years and years .. i spray gorse don't spray any other weeds apply maintance fert and lime a bit of N to make up feed shortages not as a year in year out thing .. animal health in the way of vax's and try to provent fly strikes etc etc just must do kinda jobs gets on my wick a tad when some of the green /vegan movements brain wash people with lies and twisted info .. intresting ya saying a lot of the organic growers ya sayng are ex convental growers they any thing like ex smokers the smokers on here will know what i mean HAHA
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Post by jc on May 13, 2009 13:10:03 GMT
When you have read the Soil Association's annual market report (see link in previous post), read this from 'The Grocer': www.thegrocer.co.uk/articles.aspx?page=articles&ID=198223The SA are saying organic food sales increased by 1.7% in 2008, and apart from a few minor blips, everything was hunky dory. They make great play of the fact that Asda increased their organic food sales by 25%. But from what to what they don't say. TNS Market Research on the other hand are saying that in the 52 weeks to Jan 09 organic bread sales were down 29%, fruit down 20%, vegetables down 8% whereas non-organic food sales up 7%. The say that the organic food share of the grocery market slipped from 1.4% to 1.3% overall. So who's telling the porkies then ?? Well all I know is that it is getting increasingly difficult to get cattle into slaughter. Heard of a 'welsh' man outside an abattoir yesterday well fed up that he had just converted - taking the grant money offered in Wales - and now he can't get his animals booked in to sell as organic. As I understand it there are a great many Welsh farmers just coming to the end of conversion or will be in the next 12 months and all that extra produce will be going conventional.
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Post by basilseal on May 13, 2009 15:58:09 GMT
[ Well all I know is that it is getting increasingly difficult to get cattle into slaughter. Heard of a 'welsh' man outside an abattoir yesterday well fed up that he had just converted - taking the grant money offered in Wales - and now he can't get his animals booked in to sell as organic. As I understand it there are a great many Welsh farmers just coming to the end of conversion or will be in the next 12 months and all that extra produce will be going conventional. It's very difficult to find a market for organic beef and lamb these days. Really, it's a niche market and like all niche markets needs some research and planning if one is going to exploit it successfully. It's a typical farmer mentality to simply produce something and hope that someone somewhere will want to buy it. At the moment, with conventional beef cattle and sheep making top money on the open market there's little or no advantage to being organic if you're a 'price taker', infact you're probably worse off as you've paid twice as much for any concentrates used and kept the animals for longer. Some farmers who already ran extensive systems have taken advantage of generous conversion grants, and now find they can't market their animals, however, they've had the sub and will still get a decent price for them on the conventional market. As for organic dairying, it's had its ups and downs but overall it's been better for us than a conventional system, the current price is holding up resonably well, where it will be in 12 months time is another matter. i tend to think in the future that direct marketing is the way to increase margins, though this is the case for all classes of produce, and organic status may become of less importance in the future, though at the moment it is one way of impressing that food has been grown in a responsible way. It is posssible that as organics has traded on its premium nature in the past, in a recession we may see a backlash against it as organic is seen as expensive, even though the majority of organinc veg on the farmers' markets we attended was cheaper than conventional veg in the supermarkets, and fresher. it's all a matter of perception.
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Post by tj on May 13, 2009 16:57:17 GMT
How did farmers farm 100 years ago? Was it conventional or organic? JCJust before the First World War, the population of the UK (incl Rep of Ireland) was around 40 million and agriculture at the time could be loosely defined as 'organic', although there was use of bought in fertilisers e.g. superphosphates, basic slag, guano etc and some chemicals were also used for weed and pest control. The population of the UK is now over 60 million and expected to rise to around 70 million by 2030. In addition there is now less farmland available due to road building and urbanisation etc. If we reverted to agricultural systems that fed this country 100 years ago, (i.e. largely organic) we would have to feed another 20 - 30 million people. The SA have stated that this can be done. IMO not possible.
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