The organic questions we are not asking

How many times have you gone out grocery shopping and been forced to buy non-organic products that are not included in your shopping list? Worse off, how many stores do you have to visit to tick off more of the organic products on your shopping list? The above are not the organic questions I have in mind, rather, my reality! Let’s dive into the organic questions I have.

Question 1: How far are we from accessing a wider range of organic products? That is, what is the percentile share of the organic farming area to total utilised agricultural area?

To have a glaring picture, below is a figure showing the share of the organic farming area in selected European countries as a percentage of the total utilised agricultural area. Between 2015 and 2019, the majority of the countries have witnessed an increase in the share of organic agricultural area, but at a significantly low hike over the 4 years gap. Overall, the percentile share for the EU members is under 30%, with the majority under 10%. Regionally, the EU-28 member states recorded an average of 7.9% of organic agricultural area to total utilised in 2019. That’s a far fetch from the minimum EU target of 25% organic agricultural share by 2030.