Twenty-one Asian economies have fully implemented national standards and regulations, while five are in the drafting process.

Highlighting trends in organic agriculture at the recent International Conference on Environmental and Ecological Assessment of Organic Farming held in Seoul, ROK, Program Officer Dr. Shaikh Tanveer Hossain of the Asian Productivity Organization (APO) Secretariat Agriculture Department told delegates that because of its major impact on the environment and ecology more nations in the region had started to take policy initiatives to incentivize and promote it.

Dr. Hossain also pointed out that many economies in the Asian region were taking steps to enact national standards and regulations for promoting organic and agroecological agriculture. While 21 of 48 Asian countries had fully implemented national standards and regulations, five, including Bangladesh, Jordan, Kyrgyzstan, Nepal, and Pakistan were in the process of drafting frameworks to do so.

In his presentation on “Policies enhancing organic farming and assessing its environmental and ecological impacts in Asian countries,” Dr. Hossain also touched upon initiatives by Bangladesh, India, Japan, the ROK, the Philippines, and Sri Lanka to improve their ecological and environmental sustainability.

“These countries are adopting organic agriculture and taking necessary steps to include organic farming in government plans and programs,” he reported, adding that the efforts would help mainstream organic agriculture in those countries. Among non-APO members, Bhutan, PR China, and Kyrgyzstan were cited as having taken “adequate steps” to support it.

The conference was organized by the National Institute of Agricultural Sciences under the Rural Development Administration of the ROK in conjunction with the Korean Association of Organic Agriculture, 22–23 June 2017.