The Sri Lankan food crisis may have been a direct consequence of its President Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s decision to shift from chemical to organic farming. But using the crisis to question the benefits of Organic farming is digging in the wrong direction.
The Sri Lankan President obviously underestimated the drop in farm yields, which is typical of the transition to organic farming methods. Also, according to a survey in July about 90% of Sri Lanka’s farmers use chemicals, and the highest dependence on chemical fertilisers was among cultivation of rice, rubber and tea.
Mayank Parihar, Chief Operating Officer, Sikkim IFFCO Organics recalls, “When Sri Lanka started facing this issue, they reached out to India. Sri Lanka had plans to take help from India for organic agriculture. At that time, they did not have any standard requirements for organic fertilisers. Later in August, the Sri Lanka Govt. started facing issues with the guidelines regarding nonchemical agri inputs. During the interaction, they asked for IFFCO’s help. IFFCO said that if the island country intended to go ahead with the conversion to organic, then Sikkim IFFCO would try to establish an organic input production unit in Sri Lanka by partnering with the Sri Lankan Government. But later, IFFCO found that there were a few vested business interests involved (the chemical fertiliser giants) who also wanted to take total charge of the agri input system. They obviously do not prefer the farmers switching to organic.”
To make matters worse, the Sri Lankan Govt. issued a standardisation, in which a requirement of minimum 5% nitrogen in organic agri input was specified. “This is not possible in organic agri input since the entire product is based on protein. This matter was discussed with scientists and experts who came to the conclusion that the maximum amount of nitro possible in organic agri inputs is only 3.5%. Companies who work on both chemical and non chemical agri inputs were ready to provide 5% by fortification of the product. This complicated the situation as Sri Lanka was importing organic agri inputs from India on a very large scale,” shares Mayank.
Too fast, too soon
Having worked with Sikkim’s organic sector for a long time, Sandeep Bhargava, CEO, OneCert International feels that Sri Lanka failed to do the conversion in a systematic way. “In Sikkim, from 2006 to 2010, we first experimented, engaged a few farms into turning organic, trained local people, analysed the situation and called people from all over India, had a discussion/debate and then started the conversion to organic partially. It was not done in a fortnight!”
Sandeep added that converting tea gardens into organic is one of the toughest jobs. “It can be done only in a systematic manner. This is something which Sri Lanka did not realise. The conversion of India’s Tata Tea Garden and getting it organic certified took all of 5 years.”
Mayank points out that Sri Lanka’s main cultivation is rice. “They have to produce rice to feed their entire country since it’s their staple food. So the sudden conversion to organic impacted the overall production of Rice, leading to a shortage in the country. The farmer union in Sri Lanka is very strong and there is a vehement opposition to organic from their side,” he shared.
Creating a balance is very much required. During the transition, both conventional and organic farming have to go hand in hand. Conversion can only happen in a planned and strategic way. It is a slow process and does not happen overnight. In Sikkim, it was a gradual process and it was also a place where less chemicals were used from the beginning. It was always on the terms of natural farming in Sikkim. The process started in the early 2000s and took them 15-16 years to complete. And it was only in 2016 that the state declared itself fully organic.
Industry experts in India feel that the Sri Lankan President’s vision to fully convert to Organic is on the right track since the land has been exposed to a huge amount of chemicals and pesticides. So that was the objective behind this conversion. But a sudden change could not have solved the problem.
According to Professor Priyantha Yapa, Lecturer at the Sabaragamuwa University, Sri Lanka, “Agrochemical giants in Sri Lanka are so strong that they spend billions to disrupt the organic program. They have been able to pocket scientists, politicians and even some fake organic farming groups to go against organic farming. The most pathetic situation is that the only leftist political party in active politics, the JVP also ha e been pocketed by the agrochemical giants and the JVP now play the leading role to gather poor farmers and general public against the organic agriculture. However, it is not surprising that the leftist JVP has used prominent agricultural scientists in Sri Lanka to develop its agriculture policy. The other point to be noted is that the Faculty of Agriculture, the University of Peradeniya has been always taking the lead to discourage organic farming in the country. The campaign is led by a leading Professor who has been serving for agrochemical importers in Sri Lanka. But despite all these hurdles, we are striving to create a successful model organic country in the world. We would always love to share our experience and special technologies developed on organic agriculture with India as well.”
The problem of agri inputs
Commenting on the allegations that organic farming will not be able to support the world food supply, Mayank asserts, “That is not correct. In most of the countries, balanced fertilisation is used even in the organic sector. Because crops need nutrients. A number of countries have more productivity with organic agriculture than non organic/chemical agriculture. Sikkim does not use any argi inputs. That is why production is less. Now IFFCO is working towards educating the farmers and FPOs on the same and compelling them to use organic agri inputs to improve their yields.”
Sandeep adds, “Secondly, every crop cannot be converted into organic. Certain crops can easily be converted into organic and some crops take a long time and are difficult to convert to organic. Rice cultivation can be done easily depending on the land. If the land has a past usage of chemicals, then it will take time for the crop to be certified organic. Since soil needs to be rejuvenated. You cannot change the soil structure and soil fertility within a short period of time. So if the entire process is done systematically, then the crops can easily be organic Certified.”
In India, we are struggling for nearly 20 years to get more land under organic cultivation. This is not happening even with the support of the govt. Indian govt. has identified the land areas where no chemical has been used. But in the case of Sri Lanka, in tea gardens the usage of chemicals is on the higher side. Without chemical spray, production drops up to 30-40% and production is very less in the first 2 years.
Sandeep also points out that Sri Lanka does not have easy access to organic agri inputs. Organic farming will be never promoted on the basis of external agri input. In case of Sri Lanka, it should be done on a long term basis and in a planned manner. They did everything too quickly and too fast.
He opines, “If you can plan it for 5-10 years, it is definitely possible. Trying for an overnight conversion will not take place. Secondly why convert completely to organic in one step? Because we need to feed people. Do it systematically. Take one step at a time. IFOAM says there is no need to convert fully to organic right in the beginning. It will be a gradual process. But people are not ready to wait for long.”
Another issue is that chemical pesticide can control many kinds of pest but this is not possible with an organic agri inputs. A lot of research is required based on the local soil conditions as well as local climatic conditions and local available inputs, says Sandeep. “There is no such technology as of now that will give good, all purpose organic agri inputs which will take care of weed and pest problems,” he asserts.
