ICOAS 2018

The two sister EU-Horizon 2020 projects RELACS and Organic-PLUS organised a joined session and workshop at the 6th International Conference on Organic Agriculture Sciences (ICOAS 2018) held at the Esterházy Palace in Eisenstadt, Austria from 7 – 9 November 2018.

For further information see ICOAS-2018 website www.icoas2018.org, and please download the ICOAS 2018 Book of Abstracts (PDF download).

The workshop ‘Pathways to phase-out contentious inputs’ was chaired by Ulrich Schmutz (Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience, Coventry University, UK) and had three input presentations:

• Replacement of Contentious Inputs in Organic Farming Systems (RELACS) – a comprehensive Horizon 2020 project, Veronika Maurer, Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL), CH. Presentation Veronika Maurer (PDF download)

• Pathways to phase-out contentious inputs from organic agriculture in Europe – Research overview and preliminary results (Organic-PLUS), Ulrich Schmutz, Coventry University, UK. Presentation Ulrich Schmutz (PDF download)

• Lessons learned from phase-outs – the case of the peat phase-out in the United Kingdom, Judith Conroy, Coventry University, UK. Presentation Judith Conroy (PDF download)

The presentations were followed by three parallel 30-min break-out groups to discuss contentions inputs in organic livestock, organic plant protection and organic soil/fertility management (peat, plastic and fertilisers). The project collected valuable feedback from the organic research experts community at the conference.

Thank you – to everyone at the workshop for the contributions made to the lively discussion on contentious inputs in organic agriculture!