Global organic agriculture market hits $75 billion in 15 years

The global organic agricultural market is steadily growing, hitting $75 billion in the last 15 years, according to the International Federal of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM).

Mr Markus Arbenz, the Executive Director of IFOAM

Mr Markus Arbenz, the Executive Director of the movements, based in Bonn, Germany, said this in an interview with the Renaissance in Lagos.

“The global organic market has $72 billion in global consumption; most of it is actually in North America and Europe.

“But more and more actually, the Asian markets are also discovering, Latin America markets are discovering and slowly also African markets.

“Particularly, urban markets are discovering the potentials of organic foods.

“The development is quite impressive. If I say $72 billion right now in the market, in year 2000, it was only $15 billion.

So, you see, from $15 billion to $72 billion, it is a huge edge which you can make in only 15 years.’’

Markus, who is in Nigeria for the third African Organic Agriculture Conference holding in Lagos, also spoke about the geographical spread of organic farming around the world.

“There are about two million certified organic farmers.

“Organic farming is a production system but it is also a certification standard, so you can certify to that and then internationally trade it.

“The biggest country in terms of farming is India; the second biggest is Uganda and the third – Tanzania and Ethiopia.

“And I can tell you that 80 per cent of organic farmers live in Latin America, Africa and Asia.’’

The executive director explained what organic agriculture entails.

“Organic agriculture is based on four principles. It’s on the principle of ecology, health, fairness and care.

“It is actually a system that performs on two levels. On the first level, we have production itself.

“This is, in most cases, the food but it can also be textile, in case of cotton for example, but it also can be for body care products.

“This is directly beneficial for the market or beneficial for the family itself for consumption.’’

He further said that there are 37 million hectares of organically certified agriculture land globally.

“There is another 30 million hectares of white collection areas, in which you can also harvest and yield organic products for the global organic markets.

“Such is a market growth in two digits, more than 10 per cent growth every year at the moment being the record of 30 per cent growth of organic market,’’ Markus said.