Sustainability in organic breeding - Improving the entire system or adjusting some genes?

The briefing provides an overview of the organic food and farming movement’s understanding of sustainability in crop breeding. As IFOAM Organics Europe, the European organic umbrella organisation and voice of organic with the EU institutions, we wrote this document to assess and counter the European Commission’s narrow and problematic approach to sustainability traits in plant breeding.

An action-research exploration of value chain development from field to consumer based on organic hempseed oil in Sicily

Although hemp cultivation is increasingly perceived as a promising option in terms of crop diversification, especially in semi-arid conditions such as in the Mediterranean region, its adoption remains limited thus constraining the development of hemp value chains at a larger scale. Our objective was to explore suitable conditions, at farm and downstream levels, for organic hempseed oil production in Sicily, taking on an action-research perspective that involves local actors.