Organic farming on the rise in Brazil
A practice known to be more beneficial to human health and the environment, organic farming has seen a continued surge in Brazil—in both the volume produced and its financial gains.
Last year, the country’s organic industry—including fresh and industrialized foods, textiles, and cosmetics—yielded $850 million in the domestic market alone, according the Brazilian Council for Organic and Sustainable Production. In 2016, revenues totaled $730 million.
Today, the country is home to over 17 thousand organic producers, of which some 70 percent are linked to familiar agriculture, as per data from the Ministry of Agriculture. In 2013, this number stood at a mere 6,700.
“Optimal profit”
In the view of organic farmer Maria Alves, 65, the importance of the activity lies in the preservation of the soil, food quality, and the care for health with no agrochemicals and with respect for biodiversity and biological cycles.
“That’s what food security is all about. But small-scale agriculture also needs incentives, science, techniques, and support, so we can increase our output. And it’s good if everyone eats well. Why not?” she argued.
Alves is also the member of a group of local producers in São Paulo, and argues that the economic principles governing farming should be those of the “optimal profit,” and not “maximum profit.”
“Small agriculture is about diversity. It’s normal to have a tiny piece of land, and have a chicken pen, raise small animals, have a market garden, an orchard… The idea is not maximum profit; we have to go for optimal profit: I take my livelihood from farming, I consume what I plant safely and I trade my surplus, also safely, because we’re becoming more and more conscious,” she said.
Maria Alves is critical of overpriced organic goods. “The right thing is not to have a product in order to make a lot of money. We have to price things so people can have access to them, and also produce quality goods, not necessarily focusing on quantity, because when you think of quantity you exploit either man or the land. It’s not about exploitation,” she argued.
