ORGANIC ACTION PLAN: the bare minimum.

What will the launch of the Organic Action Plan 2013-2015 mean for the organic sector in Ireland? Let's take a look. 

It is certainly a positive to have an action plan in place. There are however major and minor issues with this plan.

Nowhere is any significant recognition given to the fact that all previous Organic Action Plans have failed and failed miserably.

Using the same structure – stakeholder consultation and a forum to drive it - as previous action plans have used reflects that famous quote often attributed to Einstein (and others such as Mark Twain): the definition of insanity is doing something over and over again and expecting a different result.

Why not bring in, in a comprehensive and leading way, experts from organic sectors where growth has actually occurred, experts who would be neutral and objective in all things to do with the Irish organic sector? Wales, Austria and more recently France are obvious examples.

While this need not be the only methodology, it would certainly be a useful addition to the failed methods of old. Acknowledgment of past failures and evidence of learning is important if improvements are to be made.

So why not do what Bord Bia did in bringing in Harvard Business School experts to help develop the notion of co-opetition, which shaped Pathways to Growth, which in turn became Harvest 2020?

Harvest 2020 in turn includes Origin Green, the vision for a sustainable agri-food Ireland which incidentally seems very close to a pr version of 'organic lite'.

According to the action plan processors pointed to fragmentation, which makes consistency and thus sectoral growth difficult to attain. This, it says, informed much of the plan.

Processors are undoubtedly important in make up the stakeholder mix. However there are hardly any of them. Many producers feel that competition - i.e. more processors – might improve prices and thus bring more into the market. While organic producers in Ireland are paid good prices by European standards, this price is defined largely by conventional prices, which have been quite strong in Ireland in recent years.

Another issue with this action plan is that there are plenty of references to budgetary constraints - “A more realistic focus based on current resources” - but ring fenced budget provisions are absent.

Yet, as the Irish Organic Milk Producers, Mossfield, Good Herdsman and many others prove, export markets that are there are tapped into. So why not make investments to generate increased revenue?

Instead of investments however, the organic sector has seen cutbacks - of the numbers of Teagasc organic advisors, of national organic week and of the national organic awards, to name three.

The language too is extraordinarily aspirational for a plan that's supposed to be devoted to action. “Encourage” “seek to” “support” “attempt to” “it is hoped” - this language is peppered liberally throughout the document. In fact, many sentences in the actions part of the document start with or are defined by a non committal phrase of this type.

Growth for organic poultry and pork has been officially sidelined for 2013-2015, according to this document. Despite the success of operators like the Crowes in Tipperary – last year's National Organic Awards winners - and the Aherns in Cork, poultry and pork are now considered “much more challenging” after investigation. In fact, the only reference to pork and poultry in the entire 20 page document is in the above reference to the situation as challenging.

There are positives cited : provisions in the new CAP and public procurement primarily – but even here aspiration and practical reality may end up poles apart.

While certainly not overly ambitious, the fact that this action plan is so strong on aspiration and so devoid of commitments of resources does not necessarily auger well for its success.

How does the recently launched Organic Action Plan 2013-2015 perform sector by sector?

Cross Sectoral recommendations 
The Cross Sectoral recommendations are very general. Statements like “Support SMEs and artisan producers to develop to their full potential” are generic to the point of vapidity: how could the relevant stakeholders not do this?

The one place the cross sectoral section shows any teeth is on public procurement: “Attempt to achieve a baseline commitment for organic produce under public procurement contracts”.

This may sound weak, but is aggressive by the standards of the document. And this is a key battle ground in developing the organic sector. All over Europe -  in France in particular -  this is one way that the organic sector has grown rapidly recently.

The problem however, is that a massive portion of Irish agrifood is supposedly green by default and thus fine for green public procurement: Bord Bia Quality Assured may be enough to qualify. Not of course the idea of green public procurement at EU level, but that's agri-food in Ireland. Score: 4/10

Beef and lamb

Beef and lamb has some noteworthy elements: a short term plan to assess income forgone with a view to increasing payments under the Organic Farming Scheme is very positive. Likewise, encouraging processors to establish a base price is very important, and would have an impact were it to occur. Winter organic demonstration walks is also a positive suggestion.

Some other recommendations are repetitive  - both within the document itself and a repetition of earlier research done by Teagasc. In general the broad attempt to improve efficiencies, training and supports in many of the recommendations in the beef and lamb section are fine, provided of course resources are put in place for this to happen. A dedicated organic equivalent of the BETTER farms initiative could work here. Score 4/10

Dairy

The diary section is very short indeed. Lack of cereal and the upcoming end of quota are cited as concerns. There is reference made to developing critical mass to develop export markets, but Irish organic dairy does well already re exports, considering how small the sector actually is.

Instead, as the document itself states, the issue is a complete lack of new entrants, and nothing in this section suggests these may be arriving any time soon. Score 2/10

Horticulture

Horticulture has a large section. The home market is the key untapped market here, and fragmentation is the key challenge for retailers.

If you are a current organic horticulturist, expect a lot of surveys coming into your inbox or postbox - for establishing current production and import substitution levels is listed as key. More mature organic growers will of course have filled these in many times before, which might impact on the reply rate.

Nevertheless there are some interesting suggestions for training, grower trials and research. A reference to “establish potential to provide funded specialist short term advice” will certainly be Organic growers of Ireland (OGI). This, it seems, is as close as hort will get to its dedicated organic advisor. While this is more than the other sectors are getting, the point is hamstrung again by aspirational language. Score 5/10

Organic aquaculture gets a large section, reflecting its increasing market relevance. However there can be other limits to growth, as the Galway Bay organic salmon farm débâcle points to. Score NA

As a farming readership has little interest in aquaculture, we'll jump to the final section on cereals.

Cereals

Its a tiny section, but introduced by a very upbeat preamble, about “clear” potential animal feed businesses, and about “insufficient supply” .

The points, few as they are, are interesting. Encouraging establishment of one course feed manufacturing by large scale organic tillage operators; researching imports with a view to replace them, and also actually doing (not endeavouring to, or some other aspirational language) research and cropping trials, and also equipment trials. Score 5/10

Overall: 20/50 (a bare pass)

beef cereal crowes dairy department good herdsman horticulture lamb mossfield organic organic action plan

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