EVALUATE THE ECONOMIC EFFICIENCY OF ORGANIC FARMING SYSTEM

Organic farming means a production system based on farm management methods or practices that relay on building soil fertility by utilizing crop rotating, recycling of organic wastes, and application of unsynthesized minerals and when necessary, mechanical or biological pest control. Organic agriculture in Egypt has been successful in potatoes as one of vegetable crops. This research aimed to evaluate the economic efficiency for potatoes production under organic farming system compared with conventional system. Although the economic evaluation indicates that, the yield per faddan of organic agriculture system for potatoes decreased 13.74 % compared with conventional agriculture, the farm price per ton of organic production of potatoes increased by 24.39 % compared with conventional agriculture. This lead to increase net revenue per faddan of organic agriculture for potatoes by about 22.202 % compared with classic agriculture in 2005/2006. In response to the rapid increase of the world demand for environmentally safe productions, the production of organic agriculture could be expanded through allocation of the new lands to the production of organic agriculture for exports. The most important problem and standing block in organic agriculture in Egypt was represented in the difficulty of exporting and the unknown requirements of foreign markets. So, the most important advices is to study the problems and challenges related to the supply market (quality and quantity) and specify the problems and challenges related to market access and distribution system to local and export markets (specially the European market)