Would switching to 100% organic farming help the environment? ‘Absolutely not’

organic
(Credit: BT via Straits Times)

Should the world’s farms go 100 percent organic to protect the environment? Absolutely not.

One huge problem is that organic farming requires far more land than conventional farming to produce the same amount of food. According to a study out today, going all-organic would require up to a third more land to feed the world by 2050 (some studies say more than twice as much land would be needed).

But the authors say we should do it anyway because, they claim, massive cuts in food waste and meat consumption mean we could make the switch with no increase in land use overall.

Spot the logical flaws. This is the equivalent of arguing that it’s OK for everyone to start smoking because yet-to-exist medical advances will prevent any rise in the number of deaths caused by smoking.

There’s another big flaw with [the] study: it does not mention that organic farming rejects all organisms produced through modern genetic modification techniques.

All these advances could help make conventional farming far more environmentally friendly by 2050. So yes, let’s change the way we produce our food – but going all-organic isn’t the way forward.

The GLP aggregated and excerpted this article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion and analysis. Read full, original post: If we only ate organic it would be an environmental disaster

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