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Organic Agriculture: An Agrarian or Industrial Revolution?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 September 2016

Carolyn Dimitri
Carolyn Dimitri*
Affiliation:
Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health at New York University. She is currently on leave from the Economic Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture
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Abstract

The notion of industrialized agriculture has been a dominant theme in the applied economics literature. More recently, the debate has entered the realm of organic agriculture, with some suggesting that the organic sector has strayed from its agrarian roots. The terms “industrial” and “agrarian” are widely used, yet few have given precise definitions of what the terms mean. This paper puts forth testable hypotheses for agrarian and industrial agriculture. Then, using census data from the 2008 Organic Production Survey, we examine the evidence to assess whether the organic farm sector fits an agrarian or industrial model. Overall the evidence is mixed, yet suggests that the organic sector is less agrarian than expected.

Keywords

industrial agricultureorganic agricultureagrarianismOrganic Production Survey
Type
Invited Papers
Information
Agricultural and Resource Economics Review , Volume 39 , Issue 3 , October 2010 , pp. 384 - 395
Copyright
Copyright © 2010 Northeastern Agricultural and Resource Economics Association 

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