Organic Farming - Is it just playing games?

Deep down I believe that a key solution for a better planet is the transition from intensive farming to organic agriculture, which includes permaculture, forest gardens and the like. Through not using pesticides and herbicides there will be a greater abundance and diversity of insects and wildlife, which will mean pests are picked off by the greater abundance of birds, or companion planting with species which repulse pests.  Diseases such as avian influenza and swine flu which are created through the unnatural conditions found in factory farming will be eradicated.  Overall a more complex, resilient and beautiful system of farming could emerge. Such a system requires more man power, but this would have associated health and well being benefits.

The above are largely hypotheses, whilst I believe them to be true, public perception is that organic food is a luxury and typically organic farmers are simply 'playing' and when I consider it my experience supports this.  However, given the wide variety of organic products in shops it must be profitable?  

Here I hope to investigate this question to better understand whether organic farming can be adopted by the mainstream?  

In non-organic farming around 31,000 tonnes of chemicals are sprayed in the UK each year to kill weeds, insects and other pests that attack crops, and tax payers fork out over £120m annually to remove chemicals from drinking water mainly as a result of pesticides. Contrastingly, organic farmers rely on natural methods to manage the land. They encourage natural predators and develop nutrient-rich soil and healthy crops which have natural resistance to pests and diseases, in addition to maintaining natural habitats such as hedgerows which encourage wildlife. 

A whopping 20% of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions come from food and farming, so choosing organic, local and seasonal food is a fundamental step in reducing our carbon footprint. Given that the government has agreed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050 it will be necessary to derive fertility from sunshine and organic matter – as organic farmers do – rather than from fossil fuel-based chemical fertilisers.

The Soil Association's 2009 Market Report shows that organic food sales have been hit across all sectors, as consumers tighten their belts in the face of the economic downturn. Although overall UK sales of organic products increased by 1.7% in 2008 to over £2.1 billion, this statistic must be seen in the context of overall food price rises rather than sales volume increases.

Additionally, rising fossil fuel costs now and in the long term mean the price differential between organic and non-organic products is diminishing (and is in some cases is non-existent, where consumers buy directly from producers), offering further strong potential for future growth in the organic market.

www.soilassociation.org

The UK is heavily reliant on imported organic fruit, vegetables, grains and protein crops(1).  This is not sustainable as it requires more energy to transport the food and does not foster the benefits of buying local seasonal produce where possible. 

1. Soil association Organic Market Report 2009.

There are 628 thousand hectares of organically managed land in the UK(2), equivalent to 3.9% of the UK's agricultural land area (1).

2. http://statistics.defra.gov.uk

The Soil Associations 2009 report covers organic farm incomes, and here I felt I would find my answer.  The chapter begins positively, "the farm business income for all farms was good... and, organic farms of all types continued to achieve a higher  net income in comparison to non-organic farms".  Whilst financial data is presented for livestock, the farming of vegetables has no data associated with it.  Given that the report comments that 2007 and 2008 were two of the worst growing seasons on record and that farmers are having to reevaluate which crops to grow it seems incredible high profits could have been recorded.