19.11.2014
Category: Organic
By: Sanna Heinze

First workshop of the Organic Network - Successful kick-off


On October 12, 2014 the workshop "Understanding organic farming worldwide" took place at Yeditepe University in Istanbul, prior to the IFOAM Organic World Congress.

As this workshop was the first meeting of the agri benchmark Organic Network, the aim was to inform participants about the agri benchmark project and to discuss methodological questions. The agri benchmark Organic Network is an international cooperation between scientists, advisors and farmers in order to compare and share information about typical organic farms with respect to production and production systems, ecological parameters, production costs, competitiveness and future development.

28 participants from 16 different countries joined the workshop. The meeting opened with an introduction to the agri benchmark Network by Jürn Sanders, coordinator of the agri benchmark Organic Network. After giving an overview of the whole network, he explained the internationally standardized approach, which is used for worldwide comparisons of production systems, their profitability, driving forces and perspectives.

This was followed by presentations from Sanna Heinze (Thünen Institute) and Susanne von Münchhausen (HNEE- University for Sustainable Development Eberswalde) on first results of farm comparisons and practical experiences from a membership in the agri benchmark network. Matthias Stolze from FiBL (Research Institute of Organic Agriculture) gave some considerations on integrating agri-environmental indicators in the agri benchmark Organic data base.

The workshop produced a fruitful discussion on the methodology, networking and communication infrastructure. Special attention was also paid to the main challenges linked to the approach of comparing production systems based on data of typical farms.

For more information please contact Opens window for sending emailjuern.sanders@ti.bund.de


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