13 Jul 2005
Organic farms produce same yields as conventional farms

I honestly wouldn't have believed this if it wasn't backed by Cornell research. With livestock and vegetable operations I can attest personally to the fact that organic is every bit as productive as standard methods, but grain farms around here get some pretty spectacular yields with "Green Revolution" techniques - lots of herbicide/pesticide use. Going organic is generally dismissed around here by grain farmers as completely impractical for their crops. But this seems to prove otherwise, and is supported by some hefty data, and could help lower the cost of production. All those chemicals get expensive ...

For corn and soybeans, organic farming yields the same size crop with a lot less fossil energy input and impact on the environment than conventional farming, according to a new study whose lead author is David Pimentel of Cornell University. Bioscience (Vol. 55:7, 2005).

(link) [EurekAlert!]

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