Study on the environmental impacts of achieving 25% organic land by 2030

The report ‘Study on the environmental impacts of achieving 25% organic land by 2030’ outlines and quantifies the benefits – in terms of the environment, climate change mitigation, reduced nitrogen pollution and improved biodiversity – that would be obtained by achieving 25% organic farmland in the EU. In particular, total GHG emissions would be reduced by up to 68 million tonnes of CO2 per year, a 15 percent decrease in total GHG emissions from EU-27 agriculture, while biodiversity would increase by 30 percent on organic farmland compared to non-organic land.
The study also points out that conversion to organic would lead to a 90-95% reduction in pesticide use, thus enabling the achievement of another ambitious goal of the Farm to Fork strategy: a 50% reduction in the use of chemical pesticides by 2030. The agro-ecological transition to sustainable and circular systems such as organic farming would then contribute to a significant reduction in nitrogen pollution, safeguard ecological resources and biodiversity, while mitigating the increasingly devastating effects of climate change.