Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Food & Farming

Fishers Snagged: Not Farmed, Then Not Organic

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According to an article in yesterday’s New York Times the market for organic foods continues to grow with sales reaching US$13.8 billion in 2005 compared with US$3.6 billion in 1997.

But there’s not much ‘organic seafood’ about because of problems with definitions and also what fish eat.

Now I would have thought a wild Atlantic salmon would automatically qualify as organic. But according to the US Agriculture Department to be organic you need to be farmed: read the full story here including that: “Environmentalists rightly argue that many farm-raised fish live in cramped nets in conditions that can pollute the water, and that calling them organic is a perversion of the label. Those who catch and sell wild fish say that their products should be called organic and worry that if they are not, fish farmers will gain a huge leg up.”

Farming in Nigeria: A Note from Russell

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In the following note from Russell, which was originally posted as a comment on a thread about how biotechnology benefits American farmers, he tells us something about farming in Nigeria and how white farmers from Zimbabwe are being invited to settle in Nigeria:

“Several comments refer to the link between agricultural subsidies and the impoverishment of African farmers.

Here in Nigeria (which has 20 percent of sub-Saharan Africa’s population) the two biggest causes of most farmers impoverishment in my opinion are a lack of access to capital, and a reluctance to embrace new technologies. These are two sides of the same coin as farmers have to be risk averse if they have no capital to risk on new approaches.

The cost of a bad yield here is starvation.

Much of the area farmed lies in the Guinea savannah and Sahel zones and rainfall varies in onset, duration and yield from year to year. Each year many farming communities go through a very lean period at the end of the dry season when last years stored crops run out. Off farm income is critical during this period.

Examination of farming practices demonstrates a risk minimisation strategy based upon a long history of subsistence farming within an unpredictable environment. A nice summary is given in Kathleen Bakers book “Indigenous Land Management in West Africa”.

Here in Nigeria the Banks are typically not interested in farmers as a market for loans as they perceive them (rightly) as high risk, and so it is virtually impossible for a farmer to get credit from a bank, and would farmers want credit, with interest rates ranging from 23-28 percednt?

A recent program instigated by the Kwara Sate governor which has invited Zimbabwean farmers to take up land in Kwara State has seen a small cohort of technologically saavy, capital rich white farmers take up the option of farming here.

Even these guys have not been able to get credit locally, but the most interesting aspect of their arrival has been the comments from local farmers over the high cropping densities and the monoculture plantings.

Local farmers consider the approach to be crazy, and from their capital poor perspective it is. However, it is also clear that many of the local farming practices are so deeply inculculated in the local culture that many potential forms of innovation are frowned upon. This may actually be a worthwhile risk minimisation strategy because if a farmer fails it is the other members of the family/clan/village who will have to help.

While there are wealthy landowners here who have the means to farm intensively on a much larger scale, the opportunity from cessation of EU and other subsidies might not have an immediate, or large impact on the greater mass of subsistence farmers without access to the capital required for them to enter the cotton market for example.

In fact the immediate effect of a rise in the price of cotton in this country where the wealthy have the power and influence and the poor have access to land which is not adequately protected by the land tenure system might be to push many subsistence farmers off the land and to lower the amount of land used for local food production.
Of course the economists would say this will create new opportunities, but a look at where the wealthy and powerful Nigerians invest their mostly stolen wealth (oil) reveals it goes overseas.

Against this background, which I suggest is a common feature of subsistence farmers everywhere in the savannah zones of the developing world, I am not sure I can agree with the sentiment that it is EU and US subsidies which keep the African farmer impoverished. Similarly, while I consider that GM foods can (and should) have a useful role in an African context, I am not sure that global acceptance of GM foods would also necessarily lead to a better world for African farmers.“

Best Hamburgers, Have Best New Oils

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In the overall scheme of things, the most significant event for Australian agriculture this week was probably not the newest drought aid installment or the drought-breaking rains in south western Queensland. It was probably the decision by hamburger giant McDonald to change the cooking oil it uses in Australian outlets away from standard Australian canola, to healthier new oil blends with much less trans fat.

One way of creating a low trans fat crop variety is through biotechnology. But our farmers have rejected GM food crops. Indeed while Greenpeace championed the bans on new GM food crops in Australia, the NSW Farmers Association supported the legislation in that state. In Victoria it was the milk processors who came to the support of that state govenment as it gave in to the luddites.

Australian farmers, once trail blazers when it came to innovation and new technologies, are now dealing themselves out of the future. Indeed they still arguing about GM canola, a crop grown in Canada for 10 years now, while farmers in the US look forward to the next generation of GM crop varieties that will not only give superior yields and better weed control but also improved nutrition.

Indeed, and quoting Roger Kalla:

“In USA the labelling of the trans fat content in foods is already mandated by law. The low trans fat oils used in North America are derived from Duponts NUTRIUM™ Low Lin Soybean Oil , Monsantos VISTIVE Soybean oil and Dow Agrosciences Natreon Canola oil. We will see where McDonald’s will be sourcing their low transfat oils from in the future.

The Australian canola crop this year is predicted to be barley enough for domestic use of vegetable oil and the fraction of the crop that is of a suitable quality like Monola , marketed by Nutrihealth, will probably not be enough to meet the new demand. Australian farmers seem to be doubly disadvantaged this year with a major drought affecting yields and not having access to the quality oil seed that large end users of canola oil such as McDonald’s increasingly requires.“

I will be talking about Robert Malthus and banning food crops in my next Counterpoint column. If you live in Australia you will be able to hear it by tunning into ABC Radio National at 4pm on Monday, repeated 9pm on Tuesdays.

Growing Biodiesel In Northern Australia: Roger Kalla

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Outspoken liberal senator Bill Heffernan has suggested that Australia’s farmers move North to the tropical parts of Australia where there is more water.

In two recent blog posts at the GMO Pundit Website Roger Kalla asks: What would farmers grow in northern Australia?

In the first post he considers soybeans for biodiesel and animal feed: http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2006/10/go-north-young-man-go-north-cropping.html .

And in the second cotton for biodiesel: http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2006/10/another-biodiesel-crop-for-northern.html .

Biochar (Part 1)

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Hello Jennifer,
I recently did a google search on ‘biochar’, this would be a useful way to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and at the same time improve soils.
It could be used on woody weeds, crop residue or any other organic waste that was available.
Regards Bruce

What Will Limit Food Supplies?

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The ability of farmers to feed the world is being eroded by three different factors: meat, heat and biofuels. At least that’s according to Gwynne Dyer in an interesting piece entitled ‘How long can the world feed itself?’.

He may be right on meat and biofuels, but I don’t see ‘heat’ as a big a problem. Indeed its my understanding that as the world warms northern hemisphere farms will gain both the advantage of a longer growing seasons and a C02 fertilization effect. As regards Australia, well it might make sense for farmers to move north where there is more water. Indeed I think I would nominate ‘water’ rather than ‘heat’, as the third factor that may limit the ability of farmers to keep up with the growing world population.

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Thanks to Aaron Edmonds for sending in the link to Gwynne’s piece.