Problems With Claims That Organic Farming Can Mitigate Climate Change
January 20, 2010 in Green by 8ify.com - Green
In November of last year, two writers working for the Soil Association (the major Organic organization in the UK) published a 212 page document titled: “Soil Carbon and Organic Farming: A review of the evidence on the relationship between agriculture and soil carbon sequestration, and how organic farming can contribute to climate change mitigation and adaption.” Yesterday I posted an “open letter” to the authors of this article on SCRIBD and also emailed it directly. I pointed out how the massive conversion to Organic that they advocate would actually be a driver of climate change, not a solution. I hope they will respond.
The Claim
The Soil Association authors made the case that because Organic farming methods have been shown to build soil organic matter, major expansion of Organic farming would be a great way to sequester lots of atmospheric carbon dioxide and thus reduce the risk of greenhouse gas-driven climate change. This was essentially the same argument that was made in 2007 in a publication from the Rodale Institute titled, “Regenerative Organic Farming: A Solution to Global Warming.” In both of these cases, the claim to sequester large amounts of carbon in agricultural soils is based on repeatedly applying many tons/ha of compost to the fields.
