the world of organic agriculture - Organic Eprints

17 Organic Farming in the Mediterranean Region
Lina Al-Bitar 1
17.1 Introduction
Recently, agricultural practices are being re-evaluated due to the awareness for environmental
degradation, human health, animal welfare and scarcity of fossil fuel, and organic agriculture is
receiving special attention worldwide and is getting a bigger share on the market. Nevertheless,
the force of attraction has been always centralized in the north despite the high production
potential in the South.
From time immemorial, the Mediterranean diet and traditional products have always been very
appreciated and were introduced in different diets giving them a highly value added. This might
probably be an opportunity to be explored for organic products that could become an important
tool for the economic development of the region. Organic production could be competitive at
the international market, at least in countries where these products cannot be found or where
off-season products are requested.
In fact, the conclusions of the first Euro-Mediterranean ministerial conference on agriculture that
took place in Venice on the 26th of November 2003, identified the high quality of agricultural
products and organic agriculture as the main factors of the economic development for the
countries of this region (Lacirignola, 2004).
As envisaged by the Barcelona Declaration of 28th November 1995 (European Commission,
1995), the Euro-Mediterranean shared prosperity will be reached by the year 2010, through
the establishment of the “free trade” zone between the EU and the Partner countries 2 . In fact,
the latter have known in the last years a radical change in their production and agricultural
development system, like the market opening and the constant amelioration of relations between
the public and private sectors.
The Mediterranean basin has always been an agricultural center known for its widely diverse
nature due to its microclimates. In fact, the Mediterranean region is made of different
heterogeneous realities, not only between the north and the south but also within the Southern
shore itself. This region has a great variation in agro-ecosystems, economies, politics, cultures
and languages, but the common denominator is the Mediterranean Sea. Some of the countries
are not even touched by the sea but are conventionally called Mediterranean countries. The
1 Dr. Lina Al Bitar, Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Bari (CIHEAM-IAMB), Via Ceglie, 9, IT-70010 Valenzano
(BA), Italy, Internet www.iamb,it
2 The Mediterranean countries Algeria, Cyprus, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, the Palestinian Authority,
Syria, Tunisia and Turkey have entered a Euro-Mediterranean partnership with the European Union. Further info see
“Barcelona Declaration and Euro-Mediterranean partnership” at
http://europa.eu.int/scadplus/leg/en/lvb/r15001.htm
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