Servane Penvern

Organic Farming, Prototype for Sustainable Agricultures

> Qualified authors involved in organic research (projects), from various disciplines and countries > Wide range of topics addressed, relevant for the development of organic and sustainable agricultures > Updated results and references, thematic index Various stakeholders have shown a growing interest in organic food and farming (OF&F), which has become a widespread issue at all levels of society. However, much debate still arises about the value of OF&F as a model for sustainable agriculture. Rather than questioning whether organic farming performs better or not than conventional farming, the main question addressed in this book is how and under what conditions OF&F may contribute to sustainable agricultures. Multiple forms are emerging today, among which OF&F represents a prototype, evolving in strong interaction with them and tackling the multiple challenges facing sustainable agriculture. This book presents 25 papers divided into three main sections. The first section investigates OF&F production processes and the capacity of OF&F to benefit from ecological regulations and system functioning to achieve a greater degree of self-sufficiency. The second one proposes an overview of organic performances that provide commodities and public goods in response to societal demands. The third focuses on how to mainstream different forms of organic agriculture, including development pathways for organic farming and up-scaling within agri-food systems and territories. In addition to a strong theoretical component, this book provides an overview of the current challenges facing OF&F. It questions the successes and limitations of organics, with particular emphasis on bottlenecks and lock-in effects at various levels, highlighting recent innovations and presenting a critical appraisal of the state of the art of existing knowledge. It contributes to our understanding of the perspectives and future challenges for research in organic farming in France and in Europe. Each area of OF&F is examined, with papers from leading experts who have been involved in organic research projects and partnerships for many years and who provide complementary insights into the key issues facing organic agriculture and research worldwide.

Impact of crop protection strategies on natural enemies in organic apple production

Organic farming is mainly viewed as a homogeneous production system. Organic farming is also commonly thought to favor natural enemies of pests for crop protection. However, organic farming involves very different management practices and, in turn, various protection strategies. There is little knowledge on the influence of protection strategies on natural enemies in organic agriculture. Here, we analyzed crop protection strategies of 24 organic apple farmers in Southeast France. We also analyzed natural enemy communities in 12 apple orchards. We measured the impact of strategies on natural enemies using the International Organization for Biological and Integrated Control (IOBC) toxicity index. We identified four protection strategies: (1) the ecologically intensive strategy which promotes natural enemies by habitat management, (2) the substitution strategy mainly based on the use of pesticides, (3) the technologically intensive strategy which uses innovative technological methods such as exclusion nets and the integrated strategy which mobilizes a wide range of different practices. The IOBC toxicity index was 78.8 ± 23.0 for the substitution strategy, 60.75 ± 15.0 for the integrated strategy, 37.4 ± 11.9 for the ecological strategy, and 31.25 ± 1.7 for the technological strategy. We also found that the four strategies have different natural enemy communities such as the higher abundance of Forficula pubescens in the ecological strategy.

Agroecological Crop Protection in Organic Farming: Relevance and Limits

Plant protection is one of the major issues in organic farming. Organic crop protection (OCP) strategies often rely on a limited number of methods that provide only partial control of pests and that induce lower yields and economic performances. As a result, farmers hesitate to adopt these strategies and doubts are cast on the ability of organic agriculture to feed the world. This chapter questions how agroecological concepts may contribute to OCP, while taking the different alternative schemes already developed to manage, integrate and design crop protection strategies into account. As demonstrated by a bibliographic analysis, Integrated pest management (IPM) remains the leading paradigm in crop protection. It also provides its foundational basis, giving priority to bioecological processes and alternative techniques to reduce pesticide use. Beyond IPM, agroecology is characterised by a holistic approach and the importance given to the design of a “healthy” agroecosystem. In practice, all these concepts are subject to various interpretations, and organic farming includes a variety of practices, ranging from intensive input-substitution to a comprehensive integrated approach. This paper provides key elements for crop protection in OF on the basis of the adaptation of the agroecological crop protection approach. Based on a successful case study of fruit fly management in OF in Reunion Island (France), we highlight three major pillars to design pest management strategies: sanitation, habitat manipulation and conservation biological control. Finally, in the field of crop protection, this paper shows that organic farming can be both a prototype for designing innovations and a source of practices to be extended to other types of agroecosystems.

Organic Food and Farming as a Prototype for Sustainable Agricultures

Many agricultural models claim to serve as a foundation towards sustainability. This introductory chapter examines how research results in organic food and farming (OF&F) may contribute to meaningful innovations and transitions for sustainable agricultures. To support this, we refer to three different interpretations of the concept of prototype. Each of them is developed in the three sections of the book. First, prototype theory is used as a mode of graded categorisation in cognitive sciences where categories are relative and boundaries may be fuzzy, making it possible to confront OF&F to other agricultures. The first section addresses production, protection and agro-ecological processes with the aim of increasing self-sufficiency. It addresses the validity domain of research findings for other agricultures. The second interpretation of OF&F as a prototype refers to its ability to outperform existing agricultures. This could also serve as a basis for outcome-based OF&F, which is currently mean-based. Three main challenges are developed in the second section: environmental issues, animal welfare and the quality of organic products. The third interpretation refers to OF&F development pathways. OF&F internal dynamics can be seen as enabling transformations. The third section combines two implications: renewal of an organic framework open to other stakeholders and identification of transition pathways for OF&F systems, including the territorial level. The prototype concept is useful for tackling the multiple challenges of the dynamic relationships of OF&F with other forms of agriculture. If OF&F is more than a niche, shifting from a prototype to a generalisable model still remains an issue.