Abstracts and Speaker Biographies

Continued growth in the organic sector will depend on overcoming challenges to production, handling and marketing. These challenges can be met by research, innovation, advancement in the technology, and broad dissemination of the results of that research and development. The methodology will involve analysis of public and private funding of organic agriculture research in the US, Canada, European Union member states, and key non-EU countries such as Norway and Switzerland. Priority setting and decision making processes will be compared. After several of growth, private funding for organic agriculture research stagnated in the US for several years starting around 2008. In Canada, private contributions appear to be minimal, with most funding for organic agriculture research funded by Federal and provincial sources. The public institutions have a strong partnership with the Organic Agriculture Centres of Canada. By contrast, the European Union has steadily increased funding for programs to conduct organic agriculture research, as have European countries outside of the EU. Some of the EU member states and private sector funding may have declined but on the whole, in contrast to the US, overall funding has increased. The EU has organized a technology platform for organic. On both sides of the Atlantic, funding is only part of the need. To be effective, research needs to be transferred as practical technologies that farmers can use. North America and Europe take different approaches to the dissemination and diffusion steps. Both sides can learn from the other’s experience. The presentation closes with a discussion of opportunities for trans-Atlantic collaboration. Bio Baker is an independent consultant specializing in organic and sustainable agriculture. He has been part of the Organic Research and Extension Initiative’s Value Added Grains project since 2011. Baker has worked as an International Research Networker for the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL) in Frick, Switzerland. Prior to that, he was a Senior Research Fellow of The Organic Center. As a founder of the Organic Materials Review Institute (OMRI), he filled many roles, culminating in his position as Research Director. Dr. Baker has taught classes on organic farming and sustainable agriculture at the University of California, Santa Cruz, the University of Oregon, and the State University of New York at Alfred.