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  Total organic yields were lower

  I hate to burst the bandwagon bubble on organic yielding more than non-organic, but this is an important topic and facts matter.

  Here is my published letter from Bioscience in response to the discussed article explaining precisely why the claim that organic farming yields more don't hold up. Also not mentioned in the 2005 article or my letter (space limitations) is the fact that Rodale is comparing organic to old-fashioned chisel-tillage conventional. But modern no-till and low-till farming aided by biotech herbicide-resistant crops achieves almost as much of the soil organic matter/tilth benefits of organic (and more if organic amendments are added as well), and, thus, yields more even in drought years. Why won't Rodale compare organic to no-till? They'll lose every year, including drought years and the system yield deficit of organic would be even more stark.

  Letter to Editor, BioScience Oct 2005, pg 820
  http://www.bioone.org/perlserv/?request=get-document& ...(2005)055%5B0820%3AOACAR%5D2.0.CO%3B2&ct=1

  In the recent paper by Pimentel and colleagues, "Environmental, Energetic, and Economic Comparisons of Organic and Conventional Farming Systems" (BioScience 55: 573-582), two claims were made by the authors that warrant closer examination.

  The authors cite data from the Institute's 22-year Farming Systems Trial (FST) showing individual crop yields were "similar to those of conventional systems." However, they presented no data on total system yields.

  I was able to glean wheat yield data from another paper on Rodale's FST for the years 1986-1995, during which they averaged just less than 49 bushels per acre (Hanson et al. 1997). At these yields and assuming 60 lbs per bushel, the organic wheat would yield an average of 3,302 kg/ha of grain per crop. Combined with the corn and soy yields, this gives an average of 11,906 kg/ha of total grain produced per 3-year rotation. After fifteen years, the organic legume rotation would provide 59,530 kg of grain, whereas the conventional rotation would yield 74,253 kg over the same period. Thus, the conventional system yields 25% more grain than the organic system over time. Even with organic wheat yields of 65 bushels per acre, the organic system would produce 20% less grain than the conventional system.

  Most disturbing, however, were statements that the "environmental benefits of . . . less soil erosion . . . were consistently greater in the organic systems than in the conventional systems" and "crop rotations and cover cropping typical of organic agriculture reduce soil erosion . . ." Nowhere in the paper were any data provided from the FST or any other source to substantiate these claims. In fact, ongoing work by USDA-ARS researchers has demonstrated the opposite: that soil erosion potential (as measured by soil properties) is essentially equal between organic and traditional non-organic farming systems, but that both were significantly more susceptible to erosion than a non-organic no-till farming system (Green et al., 2005). That these inaccurate and completely unsubstantiated claims were allowed to be included in this paper demonstrates a critical lack of rigor in the peer review process.

  References cited

  Green V, Cavigelli M, Dao T, Flanagan D. 2005. Soil Physical Properties and Aggregate Associated C, N, and P in Organic and Conventional Cropping Systems. Soil Science, in press. (http://www.ars.usda.gov/research/publications/publication ...)

  Hanson JC, Lichtenberg E, Peters SE. 1997. Organic versus conventional grain production in the mid-Atlantic: An economic and farming system overview. Am. J. of Alternative Agriculture 12(1): 2-9.
  On Organic farming beats genetically engineered corn as response to rising global temperatures posted 10 months, 1 week ago 8 Responses