Scholarly record

SUSTAINABLE PRIMARY FOOD PRODUCTION IN LATVIA

Modrite Pelse, Lasma Aleksejeva

Abstract

The urgency of sustainable development in the world requires seeking solutions to chronic problems of a number of the past decades. Several of the problems are associated with the environment and food supply. The current food supply system was based on conventional farming, yet such food was produced making negative environmental impacts. Organic primary food production is an alternative to the system, which is based on organic farms, the number of and the land area managed by which have considerably increased. In Latvia, 3500 organic farms were registered, which managed 11% of the total agricultural area. Most organic food products were produced from organic grain, potato, milk and meat. Under the organic farming system, support payments were the key motivator; however, the eligibility criteria have to be changed, and the production of quality products at a reasonable cost has to be the key factor influencing agricultural activity. Unfortunately, the authors found that profit-making is a dominant factor for those engaged in organic farming, yet it is mainly based on receiving support payments. The introduction of new techniques and technologies has to be more important for the purpose of reorienting the organic food production system from the kind of farming dependent on financial support to a system of production of quality and healthy food.

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DOI resolver: doi.org/10.5593/sgem2017/53/s21.103

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