Agriculture in times of Corona

These questions are answered by this short and interesting documentary on Nordliicht, in which conventional farmers, minister of agriculture Romain Schneider, as well as the representatives from the OIKOPOLIS Group Änder Schanck, Sigmund Walbaum, Volker Manz und Patrick Kolbusch are interviewed on this topic.

The turnover exploded in the grocery business due to panic buying, also in the organic market. A trend that has been visible across Europe for weeks. Their prices have been stable so far according to NATURATA CEO Walbaum and the supply of goods is guaranteed thanks to their long-term partering structures with BIOGROS. Moreover, NATURATA communicated closely with its clients and acted fast on installing savety measures in the stores. Until now, the crisis has been managed very well by the OIKOPOLIS companies thanks to the huge solidarity of all participants and the regional high-quality products. Nevertheless, the risk that clients do not purchase the reliable organic products anymore because of their financial situation nowadays, exists.

Differences between conventional and organic production are especially visible in regards to dairy products. With the fall out of exports and the closing of restaurants, the market for non-organic milk is much more uncertain. Furthermore, organic farmers are not dependent on the imports of fertilisers and cattle feed.

Besides all these problems with the Covid-19 crisis, we cannot forget one essential topic: climate change, which has huge impacts on agriculture. Here, organic farming leads the way to the right path, but the world also needs a fundamental change in thinking within society and politics.

The whole documentary can be seen under the link on the right.