Sri Lanka Fails Big, Gargantuan, Huge In Organic Farming – Bad News For Organic Agriculture Preachers Like Me!?

Last year, 2021, Sri Lanka strictly instructed her 1 million plus farmers: “Don’t Panic, Go Organic!” President Gotabaya Rajapaksa wanted to prove and show the world how his country would be the historic first 100% organic civilization. Sadly, Sri Lanka failed him, or he failed himself – or was it organic farming that failed?

ANN says “Sri Lanka To Pay $200M Compensation For Failed Organic Farm Drive” (Author Not Named, 26 Jan 2022, Aljazeera, Aljazeera.com). I am for the practice of organic farming all over my country, the Philippines – is this Sri Lanka nationwide debacle the worst news ever for advocates of organic farming like me?

The island country is currently reeling from a severe economic crisis that has triggered food shortages and rolling blackouts as the Covid pandemic sent the tourism-dependent economy into a tailspin.

The government will pay 40,000 million rupees ($200m) to farmers whose harvests were affected by the chemical fertilizer ban, Agriculture Minister Mahindananda Aluthgamage said.

What went wrong?

The lack of imported farm chemicals compounded the island’s economic crisis, with food shortages forcing shops to ration sugar, lentils and other essentials.

That tells me something was wrong about Sri Lanka’s national efforts to become Organic Sri Lanka in the first place – why would farmers be demanding chemical fertilizers when they were supposed to be applying organic fertilizers?!

Now then, I have questions concerning Sri Lanka’s agricultural extension:

On National Program Implementation

Did Sri Lanka Agriculture Minister Aluthgamage – as would PH Agriculture Secretary William Dar have done if the Philippines went similarly organic – have in advance an Organic Roadmap so that, among other things, farmer groups and clusters were encouraged with assistances in machinery and aids in grants and loans to carry out essential organic activities, with commercial organic fertilizers available as well as methods for preparing one’s own organic formula? The government cannot simply dictate – it must actively help farmers become successful businessmen in their own rights!

On Technology (Software) Availability

Did Minister Aluthgamage make sure that the procedures for organic farming were written down, in English and Tamil, publicized thoroughly, and available anytime via the Internet, even via cellphone? Did they prepare a Knowledge Bank for non-experts in advance?

On Organic All-Out Media Support

Did President Rajapaksa officially & earnestly implore that all Sri Lanka media promote organic farming for the sake of the country? Print & digital media, none exempted: Where is your patriotism? If I were a Sri Lankan, I would have proselytized day in and day out!

Above image is a terraced field in Sri Lanka (Panduka,  Blogspot.com). If those terraces were using organic farming methods, the soil would be blacker and I am sure the yield would be fabulous – if the soil were organically enriched the way it should be.

Done right, organic farming is Regenerative Agriculture, returning to the soil the natural wealth that crops & livestock take away from it; it is anti-climate change, producing no greenhouse gases; it is low-cost-yet-high-yield agriculture – Sri Lanka’s is human failure, not technology!@517