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In the previous post you were told that there were 2 people asked to give their views on organically grown food. The person who favoured what he and others call conventionally grown food (which only means what is happening now) what he thought said that it yielded 4 times as much as organically as though this was the only thing that mattered.

He made no reference to the harmful effects this was and is having on the planet, i.e. our water is being poisoned, our land robbed of the nutrients it needs, so that the food grown on it does not nourish us. Another reason to use conventional methods we are told is that it is cheaper. Against this is the fact that the fertilizer used by is based on oil which is a limited commodity and is increasing in price, which means that organically grown food is, in proportion, decreasing in price.

It can be seen that all the facts are taken into consideration those who want to use conventional methods do not stand up to scrutiny. What about taking up 4 times as much land. This statement assumes that land on which to grow food is limited. But is this true, and if it is why are we in this situation and is there anything that can be done?

Before we do that lets us define terms. The debate was between those who farmed organically and those who farmed conventionally. But what is conventionally? All it means in this context is what the majority are doing now. So what is conventional to us here, in the UK and the US, may not be conventional in other countries. There other methods may apply.

This established let us look at the statement that “It takes 4 times as much ground to grow organically as conventionally”. Here in the UK we have a lot of programs looking at our effect on the planet. Many of them feature the rain forests and the fact that they are being cut down, mostly by logging companies and how this is having an effect on our climate.

It is truly said that those who refuse to learn from history are likely to repeat the mistakes of earlier generations. But it works the other way. At the end of the last century the Jews started to return to what is now Israel and to plant trees, etc and what was malaria infested swamps became prime fertile grown. This, is still going on. Trees are planted and what was desert is now used to grow food which is sold all around the world.

If we learn from them it becomes irrelevant that it takes 4 times as much ground to grow organic. But is there a reverse side to this? Yes there is, the land becomes improverished. We, in the West may be able to overcome this, but what about other parts of the world that do not have our favourable climate?