An option for hill farmers: Organics with Altitude!

Organic with Altitude May Save Uplands
from Farming Examiner Thursday June 19th 2008

�The situation for hill farmers at present is dire�. So says Joe Condon, a certified organic hill farmer from Tipperary. But Joe�s story is a positive one, one with innovation, opportunity and sustainability at its core. However, before telling you about Joe�s plans for improving the lot for hill farmers in Ireland, the situation these farmers find themselves in needs to be outlined.

This situation is one of ever dwindling numbers, ever more restrictions on their farming practices, and very little light at the end of the tunnel.

Neilie O�Leary is the chair of the IFA�s hill farming committee. I spoke to Neilie about some of the issues facing the sector.

�Without a doubt, the biggest issues are the price of the hill lamb, and the fact that the numbers of farmers are dropping constantly. For the last 3-4 years, the lambs aren�t worth anything�.

The hill farming committee have a specific request. �Mariann Fischler Boel agrees that she would pay a coupled payment on environmental grounds. Our committee is looking for �35 a ewe. Unless it�s substantial, people won�t go back�.

One of the many consequences of the current situation could be the loss of native breeds: �The loss of our native breeds would be terrible. There is only one type of sheep fit for the hill, and that�s the Scottish blackface. There are a whole lot of lowland crossbreeds, which leads to undergrazing, because these breeds won�t feed.�

Many of the moves designed to improve the environment in the countryside, and to improve how the countryside interacts with urban areas and people, have had negative effects on the opportunities for hill farmers to make a living.

Gerry Gunning is also on the hill farming committee: �New problems have been created. The nitrates directive limits animal numbers because of a lack of housing facilities. And you can�t out-winter unless your stocking levels are below a certain level.�

I asked Gerry if there was a naturally lower stocking rate in hilly and commonage areas anyway: �There can be, but on good land, one of the requirements is that the land can only hold so many animals. A requirement of the nitrates directive is that there cannot be poaching of land.�

There has been some welcome progress around the whole area of recreation walkers. After years of protracted discussions, there seems to be a rapprochement which is keeping most people happy for now.

�There is a hill walking scheme in operation, and it is being rolled out in various places across the country. Its voluntary, but it is working � farmers are getting �2,000 a piece in some cases. Certainly, that has moved in the right direction.�

However, being nice to look at and recreate in can come at a cost for farmers: �It is also difficult to get planning in some areas where farmers might want to build housing, as they are scenic areas. There are also planning issues if some of these areas are near rivers - suitable sites can be hard to find.�

There has been destocking because of the Nitrates directive, but also because of the Special Areas of Conservation (SAC) legislation. �Because some of the areas were overgrazed, there has been a programme of destocking over the last 8 years through the Commonage Framework Plans. Sustainable stocking levels have been set for the � million hectares of commonage in Ireland.�

One of the effects of this has, ironically, been negative for biodiversity. Scrub encroachment has become a major issue in hilly areas, because of the reduction in animal numbers. Scrub literally chokes and smothers all other growth. In Special Areas of Conservation, as the name suggests, this is a major conservation issue.

According to Gerry �the balance between over and undergrazing is very narrow. When farmers destock their sheep, the hills become overgrown. Hill fires can emerge, as we�ve seen. Farmers need proper incentives to maintain the correct numbers in hilly areas�.

Along with all of this, like other farmers, there are problems with rising costs and reducing returns: �Sheep are being fed concentrates in the wintertime, and the price of concentrates is going up all the time. Even hay has to be brought in. The expenses are killing us,� according to Neilie.

The above obstacles and more exist for cattle, whose numbers are under even greater threat. The REPS poaching prevention requirements hit cattle farming harder, driving many to drop cattle altogether.

According to Gerry �if they have sufficient lowland, farmers can keep cattle, but in some of the hilly areas, the land mightn�t be that good for keeping cattle. But cattle farming in these areas is difficult because very few can finish the animals to slaughter. Many hill farmers depend upon trade.

�So the ban on Brazilian beef would be of serious significance to those farmers. Its important that prices are held up, and that dubious quality imports aren�t competing unfairly with our products. And in the case of hill farmers, the standard is as near to organic as you would get. So quality product is synonymous with the hill area.

The bigger Continental breeds favoured by farmers over the last 20 years or so poach the land more than traditional breeds, so are more specifically unsuited to hill, with the current set of its restrictions it faces.

All taken together, with the exception of progress with regard to rural tourism through the recent walkways agreement, this is a bleak picture. Enter Joe Condon.

Joe and his wife Eileen run an organic farming and food production business called Omega Beef Direct from their upland farm in south east Tipperary, at the foot of the Knockmealdowns. Joe has both upland commonage and some lowland. The terrain is in places tough, with heath, scrub, dry heath and dense bracken. Yet the Condons manage to not only survive but thrive.

They stock a Galloway heard, and sell direct to their consumers through two routes: farmers� markets in Dungarvan and Waterford, and a direct delivery scheme run through his website.

The Galloways are an alternative to the heavy Continentals � less poaching coupled with good scrub prevention. And far from struggling to maintain a price, Joe is getting an organic mark up, avoids winter feed, finishes his own cattle and has managed to develop a very high profile for his product.

Many of the countries� most prominent chefs and food writers such as John McKenna and Tom Doorley feature on the homepage of his omegabeefdirect.ie website. He has featured on Corrigan knows Food and just this month received more glowing reports in both the Irish Times and the Irish Independent.

Joe�s commonage has never been subjected to intensive agri-industrial treatment. And under the SACs, commonage can�t be subjected to synthetic fertilizers, herbicides and the like.

Joe has knowledge of and a stake in each part of the production of his meat: breed, butchering, distribution, marketing and consumer feedback are all part of what he does.

This is a heartening story, but it gets more heartening again. Joe has just received funding from the Organic Unit in the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food for a feasibility study into extending his farming model for others to emulate.

�I�ll be writing a production protocol, from conception to consumption, and have mapped out a programme of activities for myself for the summer. Over the summer, I�ll be assessing whether what I do could be done elsewhere, in a co-ordinated fashion, complete with its own branding and marketing� according to Joe.

Joe feels that there is a market for meat from traditional breeds, and that there may also be specific nutritional advantages to this meat. There is research to suggest that Galloways, and that outdoor, grass fed animals, may have higher levels of omega 3. �I�m having my own meat tested in the Ashtown food research centre at the moment, and the preliminary findings are excellent so far�

Joe intends publicising the plan to all relevant players, all of whom he feels may hold a (pardon the pun) steak in the project: �So far, a good and relevant range have expressed an interest.� This includes the local branch of the IFA, some progressive farmers he knows himself, the National Parks and Wildlife Services, and bodies involved with organic certification and training such as the National Organic Training Skillnets and the Irish Organic Farmers and Growers Association, IOFGA, which Joe sits on the board of.

Simply put, Joe�s farming system works. He has control from breed to the kitchen table, encompassing all the important elements in between. And he gets a good price for his product. �With the consumer, the organic dimension is key� according to Joe. �It provides the reassurance they often want � I know from the feedback at the farmers� market stalls�.

I asked Joe why, if this is working out so well for him, would he risk upsetting the apple cart as it were: will he not flood the market with competitors if he convinces others of the merits of his ways?

�I take my role as a farmer on the Board of IOFGA seriously. My contribution to IOFGA's Manifesto is the item on hill farming. I feel it�s my job to push this. I don't like to sit around and wait for others to do this. Also, the current model of farming where outside forces take large chunks of profit from the producer is not working and it is extremely discouraging.

�I am proposing a new way forward that will inspire and motivate those of us who want to farm. The current infrastructure is not presently available to develop scale in my own business. I see this as a vehicle to grow a premium meat business and it's my intention to grow with it�

The name of this project? Organics With Altitude. Very apt indeed.

To contact Joe about Organics With Altitude, phone him on 087 2735447 or email him on info@omegabeefdirect.ie

seasonal strawberries and the all-Ireland farmers' market competition

this weekend, the inaugural All-Ireland Farmers' Market Competition is on. For more on it, go to this new enviro blog I'm involved in. You could also download a form to enter, even at this late stage, here. (Scroll down a wee bit!)

Finally, why not try to get down to the south east this weekend for a foodie fest in Strawberry country?

Here's an article on seasonal organic strawberries in Ireland to whet your appetite
Even the most perfect of products seems to become more perfect when you add the word organic to the title. Champagne is fine but organic champagne is finer. For better and worse, organic just adds that touch of class, in both senses of the word. The same goes for strawberries.

Each year, in Wimbledon, 28,000 kilos of strawberries, and 7000 litres of cream are consumed. But which would you rather sir: the organic or the conventional?

Even on the Galway route out of Sligo at the moment, there are little huts on the side of the road selling strawberries from Wexford. But if you want Irish organic strawberries, you have to go right down to the sunny south east.

But if you want Irish organic strawberries, you have to go right down to the south.
Growers like Billy Clifford, Paul van Bree and Tony Miller in Cork and Kerry produce strawberries, as does Grace Maher in Carlow and the Organic Centre in Wexford.

The Centre, which specialises in training people in commercial horticulture, sells at all four farmers' markets in the county: Wexford on Fridays and Enniscorthy, New Ross and Gorey on Saturdays

There can�t be a more perfect product at the moment: local, seasonal and organic: for those of us in the rest of the country, we�re trying to choose between imported organic, often from as far a field as the US, and Irish conventional.

I spoke to Pat Roache of the Organic Centre Wexford about their strawberries.

They grow Elsanta, Cambridge Vigour and Cambridge Favourite. Elsanta is the typical, big, juicy early strawberry, one that can easily compete with the best of the conventional in terms of aesthetics and flavour.

For those with a more refined palate, and an interest in heritage, the two Cambridge strawberries are popular. Vigour has a touch of bitterness, less uniformity in shape and size, while favourite is very sweet and small.

�The Cambridge seem to stand up well to the wet: they don�t seem to suffer from mildew as much�. Last �Summer�, Pat and his colleagues got plenty of opportunity to test this hypothesis out.

�We grow just under � acre of strawberries at the moment, which we sell through our shop and at the markets in the county. Technically, the strawberries are grown on the in-conversion part of our site, so they are not officially organic as of yet. Obviously in-conversion means that the farming practices are organic, and we�ll soon have that section full certified too�.

Wexford farmers� market shoppers don�t know how lucky they are. The strawberries actually retail for the same price as their conventional counterparts: �10 for a kilo and �5 for 500 grams.

The Centre is primarily a training centre for those interested in commercial organic horticulture - they offer 8 FETAC level 5 courses. On their 34 acre site, they grow 20 varieties of vegetables and have four large and one smaller polytunnel.

Two exciting upcoming events are looming large on Pat�s radar. At the end of the month, there is the inaugural all-Ireland farmers� market competition. This will be held on 28th and 29th June, and carries �5000 prize money. The event will be held in Enniscorthy as part of the annual Enniscorthy Strawberry Fair.

The other is the Irish Terra Madre, the biggest Slow Food event ever to be held in Ireland. This falls on the 4th-7th September.

Finally, if you fancy learning more, don�t forget that the Wexford Organic Centre is also a Teagasc demonstration farm: their open day falls on Friday the 19th September at 6pm, when horticulture and field-scale vegetables will be the focus.

And in the meantime, if you are on your way to Rosslare to catch a boat, or on your way back from a trip away, why not drop in to the farm shop for a punnet of those classy strawberries?

To contact the Organic Centre Wexford, call 051-428375 or visit www.wexfordpartnership.ie and click on the Organic centre link on the left.

Organic cosmetics to be certified by Organic Trust in Ireland

In a market leading move, the Organic Trust recently announced that it will soon be in a position to certify cosmetics and beauty products as organic.

This would make the Organic Trust, along with the UK�s Soil Association, the only certification body in Britain or Ireland with cosmetics and beauty products on their books.

The area of certifying organic cosmetics is perhaps the most contentious of all the possible areas. There are a number of reasons for this. Firstly, and simply, you can�t or at least shouldn�t, eat cosmetics.

But assuming that people want similar standards for cosmetics they put onto their body as for the foods they put into them, the area is still fraught with controversy.

Lovelula.com specialises in on line retailing of natural and certified organic cosmetics and body care products. Lula herself firstly pointed out that that the general labelling rules are weaker for cosmetics than for other products:

�It is currently legal for a product to be labelled organic if this word is part of its brand name even if it contains no organic ingredients whatsoever. Additionally these products can contain any number of chemical ingredients commonly used in conventional cosmetic products�.

Cosmetics often claim to have organic ingredients in them, or to have other, similar standards.

Lula�s company adheres to the BDIH industry standard as a baseline, while also carrying Soil Association approved products. BDIH is a high standard, but it is an internal industry standard with no third party external validation. For this reason, the Soil Association�s certification is considered stronger. It offers both the ingredients list limitations and the external, independent validation of products.

The Soil Association themselves point to some technical limitations in the area:

�Organic beauty products that contain oils and oil-based ingredients such as balms and body butters can be made using 100% organic ingredients and do not require the addition of preservatives. Sometimes they may use a mild antioxidant such as tocopherol or ascorbic acid which are permitted under organic food standards (both the EU regulation and Soil Association standards) and naturally derived.

However, products that contain water, and water and oil based ingredients such as creams, lotions and shampoos need to have some kind of preservative system so that they are safe to use. In addition they may need an emulsifier which mixes together the oil and water ingredients and stops them separating.�

They go on to suggest that organic preservatives are used, and, if none are suitable, then �a preservative that meets strict toxicological and biodegradibility requirements can be used�. The same holds for the emulsifiers.

The main problem, however, is scale and range: very few products are certified as of yet. Companies like Balm Balm, Spiezia and Pai are certified by the Soil Association, but they are conspicuous in their isolation.

In this context, the move by the Organic Trust is very much a leading edge development, putting them to the forefront of the organic certification sector globally.

I asked Colin Keogh, processing inspector with the Organic Trust, about �organic� cosmetics� bad name globally, compared to organic food:

�The Organic Trust places the credibility of the organic sector above all other considerations. In the rush to fill this vacuum for organically certified health and beauty products, we believe that some undeveloped standards have emerged in the world arena. The Organic Trust were adamant that we would not follow suit. Our Standard has emerged from a painstaking examination of many of the comparable organic and natural standards available in the worldwide market, canvassing the opinion of current producers and where necessary commissioning the appropriate experts in the field to ensure we have the most relevant and workable standards that still hold the credibility of being considered �Organic� in the real sense of the word�.

This includes carrying out individual ingredient and process analyses to assess their suitability for inclusion in the Standard.

Colin also suggested that they were still �at the crossing the T�s and dotting the i�s� stage: their stakeholder panel meets in July. Shortly after this, the list of approved ingredients will be made available.

And after this, we should start to see some trustworthy organic cosmetics, produced and certified in Ireland, on our shelves.

me elsewhere

here is an article I wrote for Organic Matters magazine about organic farming in Wales, and how it compares to Ireland. I've gotten a good reaction to it.

Btw check out their new site - it looks great!

The current edition of Food and Wine Magazine is also carrying an article of mine on biodynamic farming (no link I'm afraid!)

I've also started doing the foodie bits on an exciting new sustainable living blog, website and directory - greenme.ie . More details on this soon, but have a look over there when you can to get more foodie meanderings by myself. Don't worry, my organic stuff (and occasional foodie postings!) will continue here - I'll just be doing more foodie snippets, bite sized chunks (insert appropriate foodie cliche here) over there.

this week its an intro eco foodie rant (the quad rant) and a bit on potential new junk food legislation - go on have a look around this very new site and try to find them!

Ollie

O

The Organic Action Plan: what's in it?

Good news for organic dairy farmers, or those considered the option. According to the new Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food�s Organic Farming Action plan, the Department will, within three years, �facilitate the expansion of organic production by the allocation of additional milk quota�.

This stands out amongst the 64 actions in the plan as one of the mostlikely to have a positive effect. This is especially the case as recently this diary carried interviews with dairy farmers who specifically made the point that quota expansion was much needed.

The DAFF plan has four objectives � to increase production, increase the knowledge base, develop the market at home and abroad and to encourage public procurement.

The plan overlaps with the Teagasc organic production plan, though there are also some suprising differences. An obvious glaring example is horticulture. The DAFF plan asks for horticulture to be included, while ,as we pointed out last week, the Teagasc plan avoids it. The DAFF plan�s horticulture references include unusual phrases like �circulate possibilities�, �should be invited� and �explore possibilities�� hardly compelling language.

Indeed, the following phrase sits alone, below a sequence of 12 targets, as a plea to whomsoever is listening: �there is clearly a need for appropriate research into horticulture and this should be examined as a matter of urgency�. A specific, timeframed target here would have been apt.

On the whole however, it is a positive document, which gives its 64 specific actions a somewhat loose timeframe: actions are either short term of medium term, ranging from one year to three years.

A notable opportunity in this plan is the UK�s importation of 4,000 tonnes of organic beef a year. Specifically, the plan states: �on a rough estimate, to supply both the home and UK market, we need 3 times the amount of beef currently produced�. This of course presumed that the UK wants to keep importing, and will do so indefinitely. It has gone through phases of importing and then �buying British� before, which has hindered the longer term growth and sustainability of the organic beef sector in Ireland.

Interestingly, the plan suggests that Organic farming has an image problem �among the farming sector�. It is suggested that junior minister Sargent will invite stakeholders together, including some of Ireland�s top class organic farmers and growers. These latter producers will explain to the other stakeholders what organic production actually is, �to allay any misconceptions they may have�.

Some targeting of the farming press with information on the demonstration farmers and individual farming sectors is also proposed. Provided this will be done properly, it will be most welcome.

Some of the actions under the increasing the knowledge base objective are very worthy. Most were covered in this diary last week. The reactivation of the full DAFF organic cereal variety testing programme and composting research stand out. However, target 33, which states �consideration should be given to the development of a degree level course� in the medium term, should have the first five words dropped.

Less space is devoted to the market development and public procurement options. Developing the market includes a section on consumer information, laments the fact that national organic week is only for one week, suggests that ongoing PR work is needed �to explain the principles of organic farming to consumers�, and that �this information needs to be disseminated widely�. However, none of this actually makes it into the actions listed. This is hopefully an oversight, as a robust standalone proud promotion of organic farming and food without fear or favour would make the consumer sit up and take notice.

A fundamental issue is the fact that those charged with promoting organic also promote conventional so differentiation between the two is always understated. The use of independent PR, the food media, celebrity chefs and so on for this ongoing job would make eminent sense.

Public procurement gets almost no space, and yet it is perhaps the easiest to do: DAFF is a public body. Already, it is my understanding that Agricultural House is occasionally getting organic food, and events and plans are underway to move this objective on, through organic stakeholder engagement with DAFF.

Here�s to more organic stakeholder involvement.