organic farming may sound like a solid idea regarding an environment-friendly solution in the food and health industry. But this same thing led to a huge disaster in the economy of Sri Lanka says the experts.
Organic farming is so much in vogue these days as the environmentalists are backing the idea of food free of chemicals and fertilizers. But the reality is that it’s now impossible to switch to Organic farming in a go. As we clearly see the most recent example of Sri Lanka which followed this policy. Today, Sri Lanka is facing its worst crisis ever in terms of economic, social, and political matters.
Lessons To Be Learned From Lanka’s Failure :
According to Ted Nordhans, organic farming is a practical approach when we talk about agriculture activities with respect to climate and the environment. It is a more appropriate process for a small niche and an economically stable population.
But for scaling up organic farming for commercial-level production, it has to be a slow and steady process. Sri Lanka is a prime example of a wrong execution for the correct motive. As we all know commercial farming involves many products obtained from different industries. Like chemical industry supplies products such as fertilizers both synthetic and natural. Then different instruments, machines, and parts are supplied by the steel plastic, and rubber industry.
So when we try to eradicate the process which has been in use for decades, overnight, miracles do not happen. But yes disasters are very much possible. Because through commercial farming we are feeding billions of people everyday. It has taken years of practice to achieve yields that can feed the nations. In fact even after so much success in the agriculture industry, there are nations that are in severe scarcity of food. As such countries do not have the economical, geographical and political situation to favor mass production.
The main motive behind promoting organic farming is climate control. But if we study closely then moving towards this will lead to a high cost of food. Along with that, the yield of organic farming is not as much as it is in commercial ways. So, less production and more prices can send common people into food insecurity. This is what happened in Sri Lanka although it is not the only reason of the humanitarian crisis, the Covid pandemic is also responsible for the financial crisis in Lanka.
Conclusion :
Every environment-related issue needs specific and rigorous experimentation before applying them on a mass scale. So that we can avoid the risk of affecting millions of lives. For example, Sikkim in India is an Organic state, but this is made possible over a period of 15-20 years, not overnight.
Climate control is crucial and doing organic farming can prove beneficial to mankind. But before taking any decision many factors like geographical factors, political, economical, population size, etc are also important to imply any formula. As to achieve one good thing we can not put millions and millions in suffering especially related to food and water issues.
