Elm Farm Research Centre Bulletin No. 75

Bulletin 75 is a compendium of articles from all areas of EFRC activities. Issue 75 featured articles on Disease varieties and seed treatments in organic cereals, developing participation; minimal cultivation; lupins. The EFRC Bulletin is published on average 6 times per year

Organic research - driven and directed by funders?

This report was presented at the UK Organic Research 2002 Conference. This paper describes and evaluates organic research in general

SOIL, FOOD QUALITY AND HEALTH

It is intrinsic to fulfilling any aspirations that we have to spread the organic concept of health and it is vital to the wellbeing of our society and that of future generations for us to find and practice an alternative to the destructive and iniquitous spread of globalisation. This conference posed the question – “Local and Organic in a Global Food Economy: What is our role? - As farmers, as consumers, as citizens? – What is our role? my perspective of the global food economy is that we have to, in the first place and urgently, develop an alternative to it. A locally based food economy is right for nutritional reasons, for development reasons, and for socio-economic reasons. But more than that, we have no choice if we wish to preserve anything that resembles a democratic and civilised society. We live in world of finite and rapidly diminishing resources: quite apart from being inequitable and a moral abomination, the global growth economy upon which we struggle to base our society is untenable. It is in fundamental conflict with the biological base of our planet and must be replaced as our civilisation's central organising principle

Eating Oil

The food system is now even more based on cheap crude oil. Every time we eat, we are all essentially ‘eating oil’. Virtually all of the processes in the modern food system are now dependent upon this finite resource which is nearing its depletion phase. Moreover, at a time when we should be making massive cuts in the emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere in order to reduce the threat posed by climate change, the food system is lengthening its supply chains and increasing emissions to the point where it is a significant contributor to global warming. The organic sector should be leading the development of a sustainable food system. Direct environmental and ecological impacts of agriculture ‘on the farm’ are certainly reduced in organic systems. However, global trade and distribution of organic products fritter away those benefits and undermine its leadership role. Not only is the contemporary food system inherently unsustainable, increasingly it is damaging the environment. A different approach - focussed on localization not globalisation - needs to be developed in order to ensure “food supply in a changing climate”

100 % organic ration works for organic table birds

Poultry researcher Josie O’Brien and Lawrence Woodward present some results from a series of EFRC trials that are questioning the need for the conventional feed derogation in organic poultry production. Currently the use of up to twenty percent of non-organic components is allowed in the feed ration of organically certified table birds. Although this derogation is supposed to be removed in August 2005, there is mounting pressure to allow it to continue in some form. The derogation was introduced due to concerns that without it the bird’s nutritional needs could not be met by certified organic sources alone and therefore their health, welfare and growth would be compromised. The primary concern relates to amino acid levels and in particular methionine. There was and still remains a perception that the ingredients generally used by the sector to supply methionine do not have a suitable organic substitute; or at least one that is easily accessible at a reasonable price. This trial revealed no overall health or growth or welfare issues when comparing the two rations, contrary to suggestions that there might be due to the assumed nutritional inadequacy of the one hundred percent organic ration. Since the end of this trial we have undertaken further work that is confirming these findings

EFRC Bulletin 77

EFRC's regular newletter covering policy, agricutlural research, policy and advisory wor

EFRC Bulletin 76 January 2005. With technical Updates from the Organic Advisory Service

The regular report from Elm Farm Research Centre - the Organic Research Centre in the UK - covering its own research and information and that of other relevant issue

Engineering Coexistence

A response to the issues raised by the English GM coexistence consultation

Elm Farm Research Centre Bulletin 78

Regular newsletter and technical update

Elm Farm Research Centre Bulletin 82 February 2006

Regular newsletter with technical updates from the Organic Advisory Service Issue covers: organic sector payments, dietary health choices, avian influenza vaccination, tradable quotas, feeding cities, sewage sludge, organic aquaculture, organic poultry, biodiversity and productivity research, organic winter wheat varieties, linking farmers and scientists, Interreg Project, RAFAEL energy use greenhouse gas emissions food and farming