In March 2017 a study we published in Science Advances received some attention and was picked up by several news outlets. Our study highlighted the ‘Many shades of gray’ of organic agriculture, concluding that organic has some benefits, some costs and many uncertainties. In an accompanying piece in The Conversation we concluded that despite some shortcomings, in the end ‘Organic farming matters – just not in the way you think’. The media, instead, mostly focused on the negatives, producing headlines like ‘Organic food may be good for your health but it will not save the environment’ or ‘Organic food may NOT be good for you or the planet, shock study finds’.
While talking to journalists and seeing how our conclusions were interpreted and condensed into headlines, I was reminded again of this fantastic comic by the great PhD comics. |
If you want to read our own summary of the key conclusions from our study, check out our piece in the Conversation:
Organic farming matters - just not in the way you think. And here some radio interviews where I tried to explain our study in my own words:
CBC, BC Almanac CKNW with Jill Bennett Radio NZ, Sunday Morning with Wallace Chapman |
And if you want to read how the organic community (who produced some of most nuanced pieces written about our study) responded, check out these pieces:
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Check out my take on our organic yield paper and the media coverage about it in The Conversation (from May 2012): There is nothing black or white about organic agriculture
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My favourite food writer Nathanael Johnson on the yields of organic agriculture in Grist (from October 2015): Do industrial agriculture methods actually yield more food per acre than organic ones?
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