Organic Agriculture Centre of Canada

Faculty of Agriculture

The Ecology and Environmental Effects of Organic Agriculture

General resources on the ecological and environmental impacts of organic agriculture

Practical Resources

Designing Sustainable Farming Systems with Dr. Martin Entz
- Prairie Organics: Think Whole Farm Recorded Presentations. 2016
Ecological Farming Systems on the Canadian Prairies: A Path to Profitability, Sustainability and Resilience [PDF - 979 kB]
- Natural Systems Agriculture. 2013
Good to great with Tom Frantzen
- Prairie Organics: Think Whole Farm Recorded Presentations. 2016
Horizontal activities such as environmental and sustainability audits, cost-benefit analyses and socio-economic impact assessments [PDF - 315 kB]
- European Union Integrated Project "Quality Low Input Food". 2009
Increasing Agricultural Sustainability Through Organic Farming: Outcomes from the 2016 Organic Confluences Summit [PDF – 3.4MB]
- The Organic Center. 2017
Life-Cycle Assessment in Agricultural Systems
- ATTRA. 2013
Life cycle assessments of organic foods

FiBL. 2017
The Long-Term Agroecological Research (LTAR) experiment: Ecological benefits of organic crop rotations in terms of crop yields, soil quality, global climate change mitigation and economic performance [PDF - 82 kB]
- Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture. 2014
Organic 3.0 for truly sustainable farming & consumption: Discussion paper
- IFOAM. 2015
Organic Agriculture: A Productive Means of Low-carbon and High Biodiversity Food Production
- Organic Eprints. 2014
Organic Food and Farming: A system approach to meet the sustainability challenge [PDF - 1.2 MB]
- IFOAM. 2010
Redesigning Canadian prairie cropping systems
- Natural Systems Agriculture. 2016
Resilience and Innovation in Organic Farming with Dr. Caroline Halde
- Prairie Organics: Think Whole Farm Recorded Presentations. 2016
Resource Efficiency and Organic Farming: Facing up to the challenge [PDF - 962 kB]
- IFOAM. 2011
Rodale Institute: The Farming Systems Trial Celebrating 30 Years [PDF - 2.0 MB]
- Rodale Institute
The Science Behind Organic Environmentalism Video
Special Information on Food Waste:
- Food wastage footprint: Full-cost accounting [PDF - 2.1 MB]
- FAO. 2014
- Mitigation of food wastage: Societal costs and benefits [PDF - 2.7 MB]
- FAO. 2014
Sustainability and quality of organic food [PDF - 6.1 MB]
- FiBL. 2015
Tools for Managing Pest and Environmental Risks to Organic Crops in the Upper Midwest
- University of Minnesota. 2010

Scientific Results

Agronomic and environmental implications of organic farming systems
- Advances in Agronomy (2001) 70: 261-262
Agronomy for Sustainable Agriculture: A Review
- Agronomy for Sustainable Development (2009) 29: 1-6
Assessing a farm's sustainability: Insights from resilience thinking
- International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability (2010) 8: 186-198
Assessing the ecological soundness of organic and conventional agriculture by means of life cycle assessment (LCA) - a case study of leek production
- British Food Journal (2009) 111: 1028-1061
Assessing the Sustainability Performance of Organic Farms in Denmark
- Sustainability (2016) 8(9): 957
Assessment of the environmental sustainability of organic farming: Definitions, indicators and the major challenges
- Canadian Journal of Plant Science (2012) 92: 981-996
Can the Life Cycle Assessment methodology be adopted to support a single farm on its environmental impacts forecast evaluation between conventional and organic production? An Italian case study
- Journal of Cleaner Production (2014) 69: 49-59
Commercial Crop Yields Reveal Strengths and Weaknesses for Organic Agriculture in the United States
- PLoS ONE (2016) 11(8): e0161673
Comparing the environmental impacts of pasture-based and confinement-based dairy systems in Nova Scotia (Canada) using life cycle assessment
- International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability (2009) 7: 19-41
Cost-effectiveness of organic farming for achieving environmental policy targets in Switzerland
- Organic Eprints. 2009
Crop Production and Environmental Effects in Conventional and Organic Vegetable Farming Systems: The Case of a Long-Term Experiment in Mediterranean Conditions (Central Italy)
- Journal of Sustainable Agriculture (2012) 36: 599-619
Design, rationale and methodological considerations for a long term alternative cropping experiment in the Canadian plain region
- European Journal of Agronomy (2010) 32: 73-79
Does organic farming reduce environmental impacts? – A meta-analysis of European research
- Journal of Environmental Management (2012) 112: 309-320
Ecological and economic evaluation of Dutch egg production systems
- Livestock Science (2011) 139: 109-121
Ecological impact of wheat and spelt production under industrial and alternative farming systems
- Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems (2012) 27: 242-250
Ecology in Sustainable Agriculture Practices and Systems
- Critical Reviews in Plant Science (2011) 30: 64-73
Economic and environmental evaluation of three goal-vision based scenarios for organic dairy farming in Denmark
- Agricultural Systems (2011) 104: 315-325
Effect of origin and composition of diet on ecological impact of the organic egg production chain
- Livestock Science (2013) 151: 271-283
Environmental assessment of organic soybean (Glycine max.) imported from China to Denmark: a case study
- Journal of Cleaner Production (2010) 18: 1431-1439
Environmental assessment of organic juice imported to Denmark: a case study on oranges (Citrus sinensis) from Brazil
- Organic Agriculture (2011) 1: 167-185
Environmental, Energetic, and Economic Comparisons of Organic and Conventional Farming Systems
- BioScience (2005) 55: 573-582
Environmental Impact of Different Agricultural Management Practices: Conventional vs. Organic Agriculture
- Critical Reviews in Plant Science (2011) 30: 95-124
Environmental Impact of Organic Agriculture
- Advances in Agronomy (2016) 139: 99-152
Environmental impacts of organic and conventional agricultural products - Are the differences captured by life cycle assessment?
- Journal of Environmental Management (2015) 149: 193-208
Environmental impacts of organic agriculture: a Canadian perspective
- Canadian Journal of Plant Science (2009) 89: 621-628
Environmental impacts of organic agriculture in temperate regions
- CAB Reviews (2012) 7, No. 010
Evaluating the environmental impacts of conventional and organic apple production in Nova Scotia, Canada, through life cycle assessment
- Journal of Cleaner Production (2015) 104: 40-51
How organic farmers practice conservation agriculture in Europe
- Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems (2016) 31: 72-85
Integrating agroecological processes into cropping systems research
- Journal of Crop Improvement (2004) 11: 61-80
Life cycle analysis reveals higher agroecological benefits of organic and low-input apple production
- Agronomy for Sustainable Development (2013) 33: 581-592
A Life-Cycle Approach to Characterising Environmental and Economic Impacts of Multifunctional Land-Use Systems: An Integrated Assessment in the UK
- Sustainability (2010) 2: 3747-3776
Life cycle assessment (LCA) for apple orchard production systems including low and high productive years in conventional, integrated and organic farms
- Agricultural Systems (2017) 153: 81-93
Life cycle assessment of conventional and organic milk production in the Netherlands
- Agricultural Systems (2008) 96: 95-107
Life Cycle Assessment of organic and conventional apple supply chains in the North of Italy
- Journal of Cleaner Production (2016) 410: 654-66
Life cycle assessment of organic versus conventional agriculture. A case study of lettuce cultivation in Greece
- Journal of Cleaner Production (2016) 112: 2462-2471
Life cycle assessment of Swiss farming systems: I. Integrated and organic farming
- Agricultural Systems (2011) 104: 217-232
Life cycle environmental impacts of wine production and consumption in Nova Scotia, Canada
- Journal of Cleaner Production (2012) 27: 11-20
Measuring and Communicating the Environmental Benefits of Organic Food Production
- Plant Management Network. 2006
A meta-analysis of the differences in environmental impacts between organic and conventional farming
- British Food Journal (2009) 111: 1098-1119
Mixed crop-livestock systems: an economic and environmental-friendly way of farming?
- animal (2012) 6: 1722-1730
A new method for analyzing agricultural land-use efficiency, and its application in organic and conventional farming systems in southern Germany
- European Journal of Agronomy (2017) 83: 15-27
A novel index of land use intensity for organic and conventional farming of Mediterranean cereal fields
- Agronomy for Sustainable Development (2011) 31: 699-707
Organic agriculture in the twenty-first century
- Nature Plants (2016) 2: 15221
Parameters affecting the environmental impact of a range of dairy farming systems in Denmark, Germany and Italy
- Journal of Cleaner Production (2013) 54: 133-141
Productive, environmental and economic performances assessments of organic and conventional suckler cattle farming systems
- Organic Agriculture (2011) 1: 1-16
Quantifying the impacts of ecological restoration on biodiversity and ecosystem services in agroecosystems: A global meta-analysis
- Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment (2015) 202: 223-231
Review: Redesigning Canadian prairie cropping systems for profitability, sustainability, and resilience
- Canadian Journal of Plant Science (2015) 95: 1049-1072
The role of catch crops in the ecological intensification of spring cereals in organic farming under Nordic climate
- European Journal of Agronomy (2012) 44: 98-108
A safe operating space for humanity
- Nature (2009) 461: 472-475
Spatial analysis of the participation in agri-environment measures for organic farming
- Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems (2016) 31: 375-386
Stockless organic farming: strengths and weaknesses evidenced by a multicriteria sustainability assessment model
- Agronomy for Sustainable Development (2013) 33: 593-608
Scenario Modeling Potential Eco-efficiency Gains from a Transition to Organic Agriculture: Life Cycle Perspectives on Canadian Canola, Corn, Soy and Wheat Production
- Environmental Management (2008) 42: 989-1001
Sustainability of organic food production: challenges and innovations
- Proceedings of the Nutrition Society (2015) 74: 83-88
A two-stage DEA approach for quantifying and analysing the inefficiency of conventional and organic rain-fed cereals in Spain
- Journal of Cleaner Production (2017) 149: 335-348
Using minimum tillage to improve the efficiency of ecosystem service delivery on organic farms
- Organic Eprints. 2012

Resources on specific aspects of the ecological and environmental impacts of organic agriculture

For more information about Organic Science Cluster research on the environmental stewardship of organic agriculture, please see the following Research Activities:

Dalhousie University

Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3H 4R2
1-902-494-2211

Agricultural Campus
Truro, Nova Scotia, Canada B2N 5E3
1-902-893-6600

Dalhousie University
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3H 4R2
1.902.494.2211