Organic agriculture helps address plastic pollution

UN World Environment Day 2025 calls for collective action to tackle plastic pollution. How organic agriculture helps address the plastic problem is our contribution to the call to action.

 

Plastic pollution, especially microplastics and nanoplastics, is a growing crisis affecting ecosystems, food security, and human health. While organic agriculture is not a direct solution to the global plastic problem, it plays a significant role in reducing plastic use, preventing further contamination, and promoting soil and food safety.

 

Organic agriculture helps in the following ways:

 

• Eliminates plastic-based synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. Traditional farming often uses chemical fertilizers and pesticides that contain plastic additives or packaging residues. Organic farming relies on natural alternatives, preventing microplastics from entering the soil and water supply.

 

• Reduces agricultural plastic waste. Plastic mulch, greenhouse films, and seed coatings are widely used in conventional farming and often break down into microplastics. Organic farming encourages biodegradable mulching techniques (e.g., straw, leaves, or compost), avoiding plastic contamination.

 

• Regenerates soil to filter out pollutants. Healthy organic soils with high microbial activity and organic matter can bind and break down pollutants, reducing plastic absorption in crops. Regenerative practices like cover cropping and biochar application improve soil filtration capabilities.

 

• Promotes plastic-free food supply chains. Organic certification often encourages plastic-free packaging, replacing conventional food plastic wraps.

In contrast, farming using genetically modified organisms (GMOs) requires chemical fertilizers and pesticides that, as said, contain plastic additives or packaging residues.

 

This brings us to the related topic, the global debate on GMOs.

 

Mexico recently set a legal precedent by rejecting an appeal to overturn its national ban on genetically modified (GM) corn. The decision protects native corn varieties, biodiversity, and traditional farming systems, reflecting a precautionary stance that prioritizes environmental and health concerns over the promotion of GMOs. It was in December, 2020 that Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, issued a decree to enact a ban on GM corn for human consumption by 2024. The order also called for the elimination of the use of glyphosate, a herbicide still used in growing GM crops and is subject to a contentious debate over its potentially carcinogenic effects. With glyphosate and chemical inputs to GMO farming, plastic pollution should be added now to the list of concerns about GMOs.

 

In India, after the 10-year moratorium on Bt Eggplant/Brinjal field testing, the government junked another plan to allow new trials of Bt Eggplant/Brinjal and other transgenic crops unless the concerned states certify no objection and that an isolated land for the trials is confirmed.

 

Ecuador’s stand against GMOs is written on its very constitution. In 2008, Ecuador declared itself free of transgenic crops and seeds, except only when its introduction will be in the interest of the nation as duly substantiated by the President and adopted by the National Assembly. It also prohibited the development, production, ownership, marketing, import, transport, storage and use of GMOs that are harmful to human health and/or that threaten food sovereignty or ecosystems.

 

Nineteen out of the 27 member state countries of the European Union have voted to either partially or fully ban GMOs. This comes after the European Commission called for each EU nation to vote if they wanted to opt out of having to grow GMO crops even if they were allowed to do so within the boundaries of the EU.

Several countries such as France, Germany, Austria, Greece, Hungary, the Netherlands, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Bulgaria, Poland, Denmark, Malta, Slovenia, Italy and Croatia have chosen a total ban. Wallonia, the French-speaking region of Belgium has opted out, as well as Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. So far, the only GM crop grown in the EU (within Spain and Portugal mainly) is Monsanto’s GM maize MON 810 used for animal feed and not for human food.

 

In the Philippines, on April 17, 2024, the Court of Appeals’ Fourth Division granted a Writ of Kalikasan and a Writ of Continuing Mandamus in MASIPAG et al. v. Secretary of DA et al. The ruling ordered a halt to the commercial propagation of Bt Eggplant and Golden Rice, and revoked their respective biosafety permits. The proponents and government regulators appealed this decision. The case is currently on appeal to the Supreme Court.

 

Let’s hope our Supreme Court does not reverse the CA decision because, as discussed, plastic pollution is another concern about GMOs.

 

GMO farming, like traditional farming, often uses chemical fertilizers and pesticides that contain plastic additives or packaging residues. It produces plastic mulch, greenhouse films, and seed coatings that often break down into microplastics. Its supply chain is abundant with plastic.

 

Thus, on World Environment Day 2025, let’s break free from plastic -- no to GMO, go organic!