“Organic production contributes to a high level of biodiversity and the preservation of species and natural habitats.”
A misleading statement, and part of the European Commission’s official organic campaign. Organic production can in fact lead to the destruction of natural habitats; and a loss of habitats will usually result in a loss of species.
Their tiny size and underground existence keeps them out of sight and out of mind; their other-worldly appearance, their crawling, squirming, gnawing, conspire to render them unattractive; but what they lack in beauty, they make up for in numbers and worth. The mites, lice and bacteria that inhabit the world beneath our feet are vital for maintaining balanced ecosystems and agricultural production – quite simply, we could not live without them.
The Biodiversity World Tour is a global campaign to engage citizens from around the world in a discussion on how agriculture can protect and preserve our natural resources.
Pesticides are used to kill the bugs and diseases that destroy agricultural crops. These bugs and diseases are part of ‘biodiversity’, the variety that exists between life forms. Paradoxically agriculture needs biodiversity – relies on it in fact. Biodiversity pollinates plants, it purifies water, prevents soil erosion, it even helps control the climate through the sequestration of carbon dioxide. Without biodiversity there would be no agriculture, but left to the mercy of biological diversity, and the hard knocks rule of survival of the fittest (Darwin’s ‘natural selection’) we would struggle to feed ourselves – pests and plant diseases taking food from our mouths.
