the world of organic agriculture - Organic Eprints

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Statistics and Emerging Trends 2006
• Annual subsidies over a five-year period to cover the inspection and certification
fees, equivalent to 70 percent of the cost, provided that the overall value of the
subsidies does not exceed 5’000 TD 16 .
17.6 Research, Training and Extension
17.6.1 Research
Despite the market expansion, systematic research on organic agriculture is still lacking. The
review of present research projects put forth that organic agriculture is comparatively ignored and
the ones that can be compatible are not related to any coherent strategy or analysis of farmers’
need. Climatic peculiarities sometimes limit the applicability of research results to a wider region
or to a specific ecosystem. Taking into consideration the large share of horticultural crops in
the Mediterranean and the potential of organic farming systems in securing a sustainable and
environmentally friendly agriculture and ground water resources, there is an urgent need to carry
out multidisciplinary applied research work.
No real organic research is being undertaken, except in Turkey, Tunisia and Israel where the
Ministries of agriculture also support research. In most of the countries, research is being
conducted by the organic associations and is carried out on-farms.
In Morocco (Kenny, 2004), research in organic farming and related aspects is currently undertaken
by farmers themselves as well as at some public institutes. At the academic level, two programs of
applied research are currently undertaken at the Hassan II Institute of Agronomy and Veterinary
Medicine (IAV) and the National Institute of Agronomic Research (INRA).
In Tunisia (Ben Kheder, 2004), many national and international research results were adapted to
organic agriculture and are being applied at experimental stations and in organic farm trials (i.e.:
fertilization, plant protection etc.). Some research projects dealing only with organic agriculture
and related to plant and animal production are under way at the university and research
institutions. The major lines of testing are:
• variety testing (e.g. vegetables),
• compost quality, use of various organic matters (farm by-products and manure),
• cultural practices (e.g. grafting),
• disease and pest control (e.g. olives, date palms, vegetables),
• animal production techniques.
In Turkey (Aksoy and Can, 2004), since 2001 the Turkish Ministry of Agriculture MARA
promotes and funds research projects on organic farming in many of its NARs (National
Agricultural Research Institutes) through a framework project supported by SPO. A number
of research projects focus on a crop or on optimization of a technique, mainly on maintaining
soil fertility through organic fertilizers and manure. The agencies that fund research proposals
on organic agriculture based on competition are the State Planning Organization, the Turkish
16 5’000 Tunisia Diners = 3’109.83 EUR = 3’681.89 USD (per 31.12.2005)