A leading organic sector body has criticised government delays in sharing market data which it says is stifling business planning.
The outcry from Organic Farmers & Growers (OF&G) comes as DEFRA released the 2010 figures for organic farming last week.
Traditionally the statistics on which the annual report is based are collected from organic control bodies as a snapshot at the end of December each year and supplied to DEFRA by the end of the following January. This data is then analysed and released through DEFRA, but not until around eight months into the following year.
However, monthly reports are also required of the control bodies, which OF&G believes could be used to provide a rolling view of the sector.
OF&G chief executive Richard Jacobs has called for the release of industry data to be urgently improved.
He said: “Successful businesses know the value of timely and accurate statistics to inform their planning and allow swift responses to market changes.…. This becomes incredibly hard to do if such key information as national organic vegetable land areas is only made available when it is eight months out of date. Apart from giving a year-to-year benchmark, this renders the data effectively useless as a planning tool. A farmer or food processor needs to see trends in order to react.
“In these days of connected databases and every person with a smartphone having more computing power in their pocket than Nasa had to send men to the moon, it beggars belief that we have to wait months for the numbers to be crunched. We should be getting at least quarterly updates to show everyone where the demand and opportunities lie.”
