Organic farming could offer a solution to food security in Samoa.
So says visiting Fulbright scholar, Dr Jared Williams. “We cannot feed the world right now with organic farming,” he told the Samoa Observer.
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“We just cannot produce enough food to do that. But that doesn’t mean that one day we can’t develop that way.”
“Currently we just cannot produce the same amount of yield.”
However, for small places like Samoa, it can be done because the population is small.
He added that it has a lot to do with the diet.
“(In) the U.S., we like to eat a lot of grains, we like to eat lots of meat, so to produce organically, we cannot feed the population.”
“But maybe in Samoa where you eat lots of fruits and vegetables, which is healthier, organic farming may be a solution to food security.”
Dr. Williams is working with the Royal University of Agriculture in Phom Penh, Cambodia. He is in Samoa to share his knowledge on improving soil productivity and food security.
He added that soil productivity is a key component to increasing food production and reducing environmental degradation of important natural resources.
Among the vital elements that affect soil productivity is the method of farming being utilized which is either conventional agriculture or organic agriculture.
Conventional agriculture involves the use of fertilizers and chemicals. Fertilizers increase yields and pesticides make controlling pests far easier while organic farming is the opposite.
On Monday, Dr. Williams met with the members of the Women in Business Development and Samoa Land Corporation where he discussed issues surrounding conventional farming and organic farming.
“How do we make soil more productive, so we can grow more in less land so we can do better?”
In alleviating poverty, “the way it works is, if a farmer can produce more food on his land, that gives him more produce to sell at the market and therefore if he has more to sell, he has more income.”
Such points were discussed.
He also discussed the effects of conventional farming to the health of the soil.
The soils have its equilibrium, and any time we change, we add something different, the equilibrium of the soil changes, is that change good or bad? It can be good, it can be bad.
Pure organic system is limited in how it can produce but its often sustainable, when we move to a conventional system, we shift the equilibrium and as a result we can produce more food but now the soil becomes dependent on us putting inputs into the soil, fertilizers.
Dr Williams has been in Cambodia for five months teaching soil science to with the aim of using education to improve soil productivity.
Dr Williams shared that Samoa shares some of the same agricultural concerns with Cambodia and could benefit from improved agricultural curriculum and teaching methods.
He claims that Samoa has similar soil types which is sandy and the tropical climate with Cambodia.
His visit is part of the activities lined up by the United States Embassy for the proclamation of 2015 to be the International Year of Soils by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization.
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