There is a belief that in comparison to conventional agriculture organic is always better; that it’s friendlier to the environment, that the food that it produces is healthier and safer.

The problem with the argument that organic agriculture is better than conventional farming is that it very often is unsupported by sound scientific proof – it is also an unfounded generalisation. Perpetuating ‘organic myths’ with slogans and clichés designed to inspire confidence is not difficult and that’s why we need to cast a critical eye over some of these messages and enter the debate with data, sound scientific evidence and a bit of common sense.

The European Commission has joined the discussion on organic farming vs. conventional by sponsoring the “Good for nature, good for you campaign” and promoting it with several ‘key messages’. My absolute favourite -“Organic farming. Wickedly good” is too ambiguous to analyse – what does this even mean? Fortunately several of the organic campaign slogans can be understood – let’s take a look at a couple of them.

Green label – red light

The first EC slogan I would like to address is: ”organic products meet consumer demand for authentic, high quality and tasty food”.

Misleading! All food must meet the same inspection and fulfil the same food safety standards before being placed on the market, both conventionally produced as well as organically. You need to know that the organic label does not indicate whether the product is actually of a higher quality, it merely indicates the style of production. With adherence to European legislation all food that reaches supermarket shelves is safe and of high quality. Where taste is concerned, claims that organic produce tastes better are false. The benefits of organic consumption are controversial and there are simply not enough facts to confirm those claims.

In fact current scientific evidence shows that organic food isn’t any safer or more nutritious than conventionally produced goods. Dr Alan Dangour in his recent study revealed that only some out of 162 studies that were included in his analysis didn’t show any distinction between organic and conventionally products. Most of those differences were marginal and as he explained it was mainly due to ripeness of harvest. This variable has little to do with the farming. These studies prove that ‘organics products being more real are not very realistic. The statement is misleading with its claims that only organic food is tastier and better, when evidence shows that conventionally produced goods are no different.

In label we trust

The second slogan is: “organic labeling offers consumers’ confidence that their goods are produced under controlled organic standards”.

Before labelling this label, let’s consider, in the first place, the main purpose of product labelling. EU legislation on food labelling has three main aims. The first is to protect the consumer from buying products which might not be good for his or health; the second is to enhance free movement of food products; the third is to inform and thereby enable well-versed choices.

Now the statement of the Commission does not in itself constitute a misleading claim. Organic labelling denotes adherence to organic standards. That is, at first glance, pretty straightforward. But to see the political baggage loaded onto that sentence one must concentrate on the key association which is being made here: that between organic labelling and consumer confidence. In essence the hidden message is that organic labelling elicits confidence. But surely all labelling – if done correctly – must elicit consumer confidence!

Generally speaking, it may have been better to say that: “labelling offers consumers confidence that their goods are produced under controlled standards.” The campaign statement emphasises the confidence generated by organic labelling, and in doing so shows us its hand.

Organic and conventional foods both have to meet the same legal food safety requirements and in both cases the label informs consumers on the product ingredients. Unfortunately the fact that the vast majority of consumers don’t understand what organic standards mean has created a loophole which can be exploited.

Studies show that when the average shopper is asked about his or her understanding of “organic” he or she immediately answers – “more expensive and chemical free“. The first part of the response is correct – organic is more expensive. But “chemical free”? Not quite. The truth is that organic food is produced with restricted use of fertilizers and pesticides. And even one of the strongest voices of the organic industry – the Soil Association – has admitted that “without pesticides” was amended to “minimal means with minimal dose”.

In conclusion, labels elicit trust. If that trust is abused what we get is manipulation; not information.

Don’t judge food by its label

On another note we trust labels and it often can mislead us. We assume that the professor with wavy grey hair is a serious scientist. We believe that the smartly dressed woman is a successful professional. We trust that the organic label is healthier than any other brand on supermarket shelves. The tendency to unconsciously link positive attributes to sexy stereotypes influences our every day choices.

It is on the basis of such human behaviour that Cornell University researcher Jenny Wan-Chen Lee tested the effects of labeling on consumer perceptions. This is the health halo effect speaking. Lee gave the experiments participants’ yoghurts, chocolate and potato chips fixing organic labels onto half of the products – the other half had regular labels. Yet what the participants were not aware of was the fact that all of the products were organic produce. At the end of the experiment participants were asked about their preferences.

The majority of participants preferred the products with the organic label. Explanations for their choices included claims that the food was lower in calories, higher in nutritional value and containing more fiber; of course this was neither true nor verifiable with only a taste-test. The experiment successfully exposed the power of ‘organic suggestion’.

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.

Lost

By controlling the impacts of pests and diseases pesticides allow us to maximise agricultural productivity and ensure food supply meets the demand of a rapidly growing population. As much as 40-80% of crop yields can be lost to pests and disease – this is the reality of pesticide free agriculture. Organic farming might be considered proof that an alternative to pesticides exist, but in reality organic crops are also protected with pesticides – without them yield loss is too great.

Plant more

If we want to farm pesticide free, but still produce the required quantities of food, we simply have to plant more crops to compensate for expected losses. If we want ten potatoes, we will have to plant 20 because we anticipate pests and disease will claim up to half of them. This approach could theoretically rid us of the need to use pesticides, but at what cost?
 

Space, the final frontier – not least for biodiversity

Biodiversity needs space to survive, areas for habitats that support the wildlife upon which agriculture relies. Europe uses around 40% of its land for agriculture, so it is not surprising that demand for agricultural land is cited as the single biggest contributor to biodiversity loss in Europe.

If the biggest threat to biodiversity is the loss of habitats to agricultural land, then perhaps the key focus for biodiversity conservation should be to support the implementation of modern agricultural practices that maximise output on the existing agricultural land base. Fact: inefficient farming practices require more land to produce the same yield.

Save biodiversity

So we return to the paradox of pesticide use. Pesticides can be harmful to biodiversity, but they also provide a means to save biodiversity by making best use of existing agricultural land and avoiding continued loss of natural habitats.

As populations continue to grow, demand for food rises, and so do concerns about food security. Today, farmers are required to increase productivity and at the same time protect nature and biodiversity to ensure we have continued means to feed ourselves.

Pesticides are frequently cited by environmental groups as something nature and biodiversity could do without – but is the opposite true – could modern agricultural practices be the savior of biodiversity?

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One last thing…

It is important to note that the presence of agriculture does not always result in less biodiversity – in many cases the opposite is true, for example, land abandonment of extensive farmland in Central and Eastern Europe has resulted in a regional loss of biodiversity.

In ‘Food for Thought: Organic Grub Worth Buying?’ we hear that as US organic sales increase, so do consumer questions about what ‘organic‘ actually means. Answers to this same question in the UK met with surprise early this year, as a report explained that organic does not mean ‘pesticide free’ – perhaps as shocking to some as an earlier report published by the UK Food Standards Agency, claiming that organic food ‘has no health benefits‘ over conventionally grown produce. Essentially this is good news for the consumer – you can receive the same health benefits from conventionally grown (and mostly cheaper) fruits and vegetables.

 

Organic pesticides

It is true that organic farmers, faced with the loss of their crops, often use ‘conventional’ pesticides, but there are more tools in the organic farmers toolbox, so called ‘organic’ pesticides (sometimes referred to as ‘green’ or ‘ecological’ pesticides). Organic pesticides are claimed to be naturally derived rather than synthetically produced, but this does not tell us anything about their relative safety or impact on the environment. We must also remind ourselves that the most toxic substances known are found in nature: in other words, natural does not always equal safe. Steve Savage, who keeps a blog at eatdrinkbetter.com last week posted ‘The “Pesticide From Hell” (oh, by the the way, its “Organic”)‘, an interesting article on one the oldest and still most used ‘organic’ pesticides – Sulphur (sulfur). Steve points out that sulphur compounds must be used in considerably higher quantities than effective and highly targeted ‘manufactured’ crop protection products; in addition to being one of the most common causes of pesticide user health complaints, there is also an association with bird mortality. Copper sulphate, another commonly use organic pesticide, combines copper and sulphur in a form that is permanently destructive of soil if overused. In terms of the regulation of use of crop protection measures, in the European Union organic pesticides are subject to the same strict regulations as conventional products.
 

Overlooked

The fact that organic farming often makes use of pesticides (of the organic and conventional varieties) is largely overlooked or poorly communicated – reinforcing misconceptions about crop production and crop protection. Recent media coverage of organic agriculture does suggest that the public is beginning to question their understanding of the term ‘organic’. The current economic crisis will have no doubt contributed; with less disposable income it is perhaps no surprise that consumers pass on some of the more expensive items on their shopping list. Rightly or wrongly, organic is often considered something of a ‘niche market’ – with products being more expensive than their conventionally grown alternatives they are unlikely to feature in a ‘recession diet‘.
 

Unsustainable

The reality of agriculture is that pests must be managed to avoid devastating loss to crops, something independent of the ideology of farmer or consumer. Whilst some loss is indeed expected, without crop protection measures a loss of over 40% yield is possible – this is unsustainable.
 

An ecological way

Integrated pest management (IPM) is a good practice approach to crop protection. IPM is an integrated strategy for crop management, designed to solve ecological problems when applied in agriculture. Performed in three main stages: prevention, observation, and intervention IPM combines pesticide use with biological and sophisticated management techniques to manage pest populations in an ecological way. IPM can be used by both conventional and organic agriculture.

In the video below, Professor Sir Gordon Conway of the Centre for Environmental Policy, Imperial College London, explains Integrated Pest Management (IPM) and how it helps farmers. He goes on to tell us how pesticides can be used in conjunction with natural enemy controls, such as parasites and other predators, to help protect farmers’ crops from losses.

Fresh water is a renewable resource, but our supply of clean fresh water is decreasing – a problem aggravated by a steadily increasing demand for food as the worlds population grows.

The availability of fresh water

The Food and Agriculture Organisaton of the United Nations (FAO) estimates that by 2025, 1,800 million people will be living in countries or regions with absolute water scarcity. 2025 may appear a distant horizon, but trends are already worrying – you may not immediately associate Europe with water scarcity, but, in 60 percent of European cities with populations greater than 100,000 people, groundwater is already being used at a faster rate than it can be replenished.

We’ve had several big water shortage stories in Europe over the last few years. In 2008 Barcelona had to ship water into the city as regional reservoirs were down to quarter of their usual levels. There are even concerns in the UK (a location often considered to receive more than it’s fair share of rain), leading hydrologists are warning of major water shortage that could leave the country unable to produce enough food to feed a growing population.

UNESCO calculates that to ensure our basic needs, we all need 20 to 50 litres of water free from harmful contaminants each and every day. This includes not only water for drinking and bathing, but also the water used to grow our food. Per head, farmed cattle consume around 4,000 cubic meters of water during their life, with cereals requiring in the region of 1.5 cubic meters to yield 1kg of crop. Agriculture consumes a staggering 69% of global fresh water (pdf) for the irrigation of crops, and it is estimated that between 15-35% of this fresh water extraction is unsustainable.

Global Environment Outlook estimate that the developed world will see water consumption demands rise an additional 18% by the year 2050 (ca. 40% in the developing world). The contribution of irrigation to world crop production is expected to increase in coming decades – the irrigated area in developing countries is expected to increase by 40 million hectares (20%) by 2030. This is less than half of the increase over the last 35 years (99 million hectares), although the reasons for this slowdown are themselves a cause for concern, namely the increasing scarcity of areas suitable for irrigation and the rising cost of irrigation.
 

More crop per drop

The FAO notes the essential role agriculture has in resolving global water problems (a statement of the obvious when the numbers are considered), stating that agriculture must achieve more ‘crop per drop‘, through improving the efficiency of rain-fed production, and the modernisation of irrigation technology. Producing more ‘crop per drop’ is a pressing requirement, as water resources dwindle and population grows – we have also to consider the inconvenience of climate change and the impact of shifting patterns of rainfall and drought.

The sizeable impact of agriculture on fresh water usage confirms the crop protection industry as a stakeholder in the challenge presented by our requirements for fresh water. This challenge extends from the production of more ‘crop per drop’ to include the sustainable use of plant protection products – to avoid the unnecessary pollution of waterways.

The crop protection industry has of course developed crop strains that are stress-tolerant and drought-tolerant, improving yields in dry climates and reducing water use; but this blog is about pesticides, so that will remain our focus.
 

Optimising water use

CropLife International upholds the optimisation of agricultural productivity as a key contributor to improving fresh water management. Optimising the yields from existing crop production would enable farmers to grow more food with similar water volumes. CropLife describe the need for effective dissemination of agronomic knowledge, and allowing for farmer access to inputs including good quality seed and crop protection to reduce pre- and post-harvest losses to pests and disease. Simply put, irrigating crops that will be lost to pests or disease is inefficient water management.

Plant protection products (pesticides) also offer scope to increase water efficiency in agriculture. Improving crop yield (or rather reducing crop loss) is one contribution to more sustainable fresh water management, another is reducing the water required to grow a crop. CropLife International explain that herbicide use with biotech crops enables conservation tillage, this improves soil water retention, reducing water loss through evaporation, and in-turn protecting against soil erosion. These particular qualities offer valuable solutions for areas that currently experience drought conditions, or due to climate change might expect to in the coming years. The Director General of the European Crop Protection Association (ECPA) has said “Climate change is predicted to make water an increasing concern across southern Europe where most of our fruits and vegetables are grown utilizing intensive irrigation.”
 

Water quality

Pesticides and other plant technologies offer solutions that support an optimised volume use of fresh water resources for agriculture – but not without potential risk. Pesticides are frequently cited as a contributor to water pollution. The responsible and sustainable use of pesticides is high on the European agenda, industry backed initiatives and a comprehensive legislative framework provide the backdrop for improving the sustainability of European agricultural practices.
 

Frameworks for sustainability

The EU Directive on the Sustainable Use of Pesticides provides a framework to regulate the use-phase of pesticides at EU level, setting rules for the use of pesticides and encouraging sustainable practices in the European Community – in order to reduce risks to human health and the environment. This of course includes measures targeted at avoiding the contamination of fresh water. In addition to this, the European Water Framework Directive describes a set of objectives addressing both water quality and water scarcity issues. Europe is well covered.

The European Commission has also supported crop protection industry initiatives for preventing the pollution of water sources. One example is the TOPPS program (Train Operators to Prevent Pollution from Point Sources). This LIFE funded project focused on raising the awareness of farmers of the need to adopt sustainable practices when using crop protection products, to prevent avoidable pollution of water sources. Other industry initiatives include the ‘Safe Use Initiative’, coordinated by the European Crop Protection Association (ECPA), this example of training and best practice looks towards providing for best practices for all stages of the use of pesticides, including their transportation, storage, preparation for use, application, post application, and preventative measures – essentials for worker health and safety and avoiding negative environmental impact.
 

The challenge

As population grows, so will demand for food; agriculture is already the largest consumer of fresh water and this is unlikely to change. Agriculture will need to find ways to produce more food, with less water – more ‘crop per drop’. To complicate matters, climate change will present an increase in drought conditions and a rise in extreme weather events – we need to find ways to cope with the extremes of water availability – we might expect more drought conditions and more flood events.

Advancements in agricultural technology (and better use of the technologies we already have) offer scope for sustainable solutions to fresh water use – a solution that allows us to grow the food we need, ensure the continued availability of fresh water and avoid unnecessary environmental impact.

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This post is considerably longer than planned, if you are still with me at this point, I thank you. As always, comments are encouraged. I’ve linked quite a few resources from this post – hopefully all of them informative and useful, if you think I’ve missed something important, please let me know in the comments.

French activists MDRGF (Movement for Rights and Respect for Future Generations) are preparing for their annual ‘Week without pesticides’ (20th-30th March). Since its debut in 2006, this event has seen some growth in popularity across France and a handful of other European countries.

The ‘Week without pesticides’ aims to educate the public on health and environmental risks of pesticide use, and prove that viable alternatives to chemical treatments exist. You can follow the activities of the ‘Week without pesticides’ at their campaign website.

Providing information to the general public on the realities of modern agriculture is an important and challenging task (there are indications that the general public has limited knowledge of modern agriculture). Without all of the information, how are we expected to make informed decisions – the right decisions?

One reality is that most weeks are ‘without pesticides’. Pesticides are used only when they are needed to fight pests and diseases – they are not applied on a daily basis or without good cause. The impact of reducing pesticide use to zero would be dramatic – Europe would suffer an approximate loss of 50% of food crop from pests and diseases without the intervention of pesticides. CropLife America state that up to 40% of the world’s potential crop production is already lost annually because of the effects of weeds, pests and disease – these crop losses would be doubled if existing pesticide use was abandoned. Pesticides are even used in organic agriculture, so the bio sector would also suffer considerably.

CropLife America estimate that crop protection products preserve upwards of $45 billion of produce worldwide each year. Failure to protect our crops would have enormous implications on the global economy, and would seriously impact on food security. Earth will be home to an estimated 9 billion people (around 2 billion more than today) by the year 2050. We are already struggling to feed 7 billion – can we feed 9 billion without effective crop protection measures? The FAO estimates that, even with improved food distribution, food production will need to increase 70% by 2050 to cope with a 40% increase in world population.

European agriculture must find a sustainable way to feed a growing population, adapt to climate change, limit greenhouse gas emissions, minimise impact on the natural environment, continue to operate within strict European guidelines, and produce food which is affordable.

Faced with the challenge of improving agricultural production, modern agriculture looks to technology for sustainable solutions. One solution is maximising food production on the existing agricultural land-base – this is considered beneficial as it limits expansion of the agricultural footprint, reducing the need for deforestation and the destruction of natural habitats. It is pesticides that allow us to maximise yield and avoid the geographic expansion of agricultural land.

If we want to produce more food on the existing agricultural land-base and ensure food remains affordable, it seems pesticides will have an important role to play – if this is indeed the case, focus should continue to be on ensuring their safe and sustainable use.

Food production, food cost, food security, health and the environment (to name a few) are all influenced by crop protection – they are themes which concern all of us. The ‘Week without pesticides’ is an opportunity to join the debate on these important issues – issues plural, because it’s not just about crop protection, it’s not that easy.

MDRGF and WWF France have recruited singing garden gnomes (’Les Pestes Acides‘) as part of their ‘Week without pesticides’ information campaign. Innovation may have overtaken information in this video, but I do see good Eurovision Song Contest potential - enjoy!

Everybody loves bees, and so do we. Bees pollinate our plants so that we can grow food, they fulfil a valuable role in ecosystems – they even make honey. As a species, the honey bee is suffering a reported global decline in population, a phenomenon termed ‘Colony Collapse Disorder‘ (CCD). The disappearance of honey bees is an issue that receives regular media attention – coverage that all too often feeds speculation and fails to deliver fact.

CCD is a problem; bees are a major contributor to the pollination of the plants that feed us. The world will have around 9 billion mouths to feed by the year 2050 – you don’t need to be a scientist or mathematician to realise that the sum of less food plus 2 billion extra mouths is an equation that does not balance in our favour.

Scientists and researchers continue to investigate the cause(s) of CCD, and many theories have been presented.Parasitic mites, pesticides and climate change are among some of the more frequently cited causes of CCD.

Some also suggest that bees are disappearing as a result of poor handling. Did you know that bees are commercially farmed? The commercial bee industry is worth an estimated 2.6 billion EURO and is quoted as being responsible for the pollination of 14 billion USD of seeds and crops in the US alone. There are an estimated 2.4 million bee colonies shipped around the US for commercial pollination – impressive numbers.

We cover CCD on this blog because of the frequent links made between the use of certain pesticides, and the disappearance of bees. Below we offer another round-up of recent online coverage of CCD, and in the spirit of encouraging debate, the search for facts, and seeing the whole truth, we present a range of opinions on the causes of CCD.

• Greenish pesticides bee-devil honey makers
• Bees and pesticides
• Researchers seek ’super’ bee cure for a deadly disorder
• Vitamin Bee (deserving of a special mention for it’s fantastic title)
• Bouquet for busy bee Mary after stinging Dail attacks
• Climate change linked to death of 90% of Vancouver Island honey bee population
• Ontario’s major bee losses blamed on varroa

If you have additional news to share, or you want to bee part of the debate, drop us a line below. Maybe you think CCD is not real, or perhaps exaggerated – maybe you have an entirely different view on the subject. Let us know.

If you didn’t know it already, we use Twitter, and we now have more than 700 followers – for this we would like to say a big thank you to all.

If you don’t use Twitter, you might not be aware of how useful it can be as a resource for information and good ideas. Here’s a collection of pesticide information from tweets from us, and tweets we’ve re-tweeted from the past few days. Enjoy!

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Via @cropprotection

News of the EU’s ‘REAL Fake’ competition to raise awareness of the dangers and problems associated with counterfeit and fake products – recognised as a great opportunity for EU agricultural schools to explore counterfeit pesticide issues.

Read more: http://bit.ly/an1svn

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Via @pdjmoo

Germany: New sensing technology from bats and insects helps farmers reduce fertilizer and pesticide use – impressive.

Read more: http://ow.ly/1bQ0D

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Via @ThePhoenixSun

An article exploring the health implications of pesticide drift, and the problems of regulating drift.

Read more: http://bit.ly/9xFbmx

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Via @pesticideinfo

Food organisations form working groups to tackle impact of pesticides legislation – a response to the UK consultation for the Sustainable Use Directive.

Read more: http://bit.ly/9F4Zqk

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Via @pesticideinfo

Food Scare Over Toxic Cowpeas Spreads in China – reporting on the detection of harmful chemical residues on Chinese produce.

Read more: http://bit.ly/cZUcmO

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Via @TheAngryindian & @GMWatch

Is WWF the only international green group to be picketed by its peers? An article describing critism of WWF for their involvement in spy production in Latin America.

Read more: http://bit.ly/c2wXPF

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Via @cropprotection

Pesticide red tape may prove ‘a blight on potato sector’. UK concern over the potential impact of new pesticide legislation on potato yeilds.

http://bit.ly/ci5RuK

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Via @pesticideinfo

Colony Collapse Disorder: the real crisis ahead, ‘agricultural collapse disorder…’. A view that bee Colony Collapse Disorder is infact casued by the nature of bee farming.

Read more: http://bit.ly/bzGcJg

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Via @canadaguy

Children in Latin American countries found exposed to DDT – a legacy of anit-malaria pesticide use.

Read more: http://www.enn.com/health/article/41028

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Via @pesticideinfo

Tomatoes that taste like Holland, farming with scorpions, & at least one goodreason why you should not taste pesticides. Actually the previous post on this blog – when you’re done here, why not have a read.

Read more: http://bit.ly/aDuR1Y

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Via @HealthandEnv

NGO facing legal challenge after apparently discovering unacceptable pesticide levels in wine.

http://bit.ly/dcUiVS

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Via @scgardeningnews

Cultural controls are best, but if you must spray, use less toxic insecticides. Some basic advice on home and garden pesticide use.

Read more: http://bit.ly/LpNYO

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Some of our followers…

The debate around organic has boiled up over the week after the release of the FSA’s study (see our last post below.) Here are some articles published this week on the topic. Do feel free to comment or recommend other news and articles.

Press

• Argument is about capitalism, not food (The Guardian)
• It’s wrong to believe that nature is always best (The Guardian)
• Organic food debate boils over (The Independent)
• BBC snubs organic food as it teaches us how to eat well (The Daily Express)
• Les défenseurs du bio rapellent son role écologique (Le Monde)
• Misleading claims on the credentials of food marketed as organic (The Daily Telegraph)
• Organics sector hits back in nutrition row (Freshinfo)
• Organic food contains toxic natural pesticides (The Times)

Blogs

• UK FSA’s organic study confusing and inconclusive? (The Green Room blog)
• Slate: Organic vs. Conventional? Too Complex… (Organic Nation)
• Organic food has no health or nutrition benefits, FSA study finds (VitalRead)
• Study Finds Organic Foods Not More Nutritous (Pays to Live Green)
• Nature’s Path CEO Responds to Organic Food Study Results (DailyBlender)
• Is There a Change Afoot in How Organics Are Marketed? (GreenBiz)

Please find below some recent articles on pesticides and related topics. Do feel free to recommend more articles by selecting “Recommend a page or site” above or access a more comprehensive list of articles by using the Delicious cloud in the right-hand colmumn.

• The Three A’s of Food Security (Sciencebase blog)
• Differing patterns in food price falls (BBC)
• French village goes organic one day a week (3News)
• EU survey reveals poor state of biodiversity (Euractiv)
• EU farm subsidies ‘inconsistent’ with global food security (Euractiv)
• Sweden introduces climate labelling for food (Euractiv)
• World food prices: Whatever happened to the food crisis? (The Economist)
• Agriculture Demand Outpacing Honeybee Increase, Researchers Say (Bloomberg)
• EFSA publishes report on pesticide residues in food (Food Production Daily)
• Forum on the Future of Agriculture goes on the road… (Blogactiv)

Some recent articles on pesticides and related topics. Feel free to recommend more articles by selecting “Recommend a page or site” above or access a more comprehensive list of articles by using the Delicious cloud in the right-hand colmumn.

• Agri-food sector to assess its environmental footprint (EurActiv)
• Is Local Food Better? (EurActiv)
• Vote for future of farming in EU (Farmers Guardian)
• Co-op donation creates buzz around British black bees (Guardian)
• Green Revolution Key to food Security in Africa (European Water News)
• Climate change ‘killing coral triangle’ (Telegraph)
• Threat to European biodiversity ‘as serious as climate change’ (The Optimum population trust blog)
• Pesticides: Operator Safety Is Paramount (ScienceDaily)
• Consumers are savvy about organic food (Financial Times)
• EU agricultural research to tackle food security (Euractiv)
• French organic food sales rise 25 pct in 2008 (Reuters)
• Demand for emergency food rises (BBC)