During the 1990’s Hydroponic growers lobbied hard to have their produce recognized as organic by the USDA who was soliciting comments before finalizing the USDA Organic certification standards in 2001.

But long before the USDA Organic Standards were written, it was understood within the established organic farming community that the defining aspects of organic produce production were literally rooted in soil. 

In contrast, a Hydroponic growing system by nature is soilless which is one of its greatest human sustaining assets.  It’s capabilities are not bound to land that is increasingly in need of protection from human farming activity and less reliable for producing food in a climate changed world.

In the 90’s consumers were more focused upon the aspects of organic farming that banned the use of carcinogenic agri-chemicals.  Along with those concerns, organic farmers were and still are just as intensely focused on organic farming growing practices that revitalize the natural biome in soil and require biodiverse planting practices instead of monoculture and chemical fertilizers to enhance yield as conventional industrial agriculture does.

It’s still difficult to understand why the Hydroponic grower community pushed so hard to have their products recognized as organic when it’s obvious that they could only meet half of what was required to be viewed as legitimate. It is even more perplexing that the USDA bestowed that legitimacy upon them but here we are.

Perhaps the answer is found in the opportunity Hydroponic growers saw in the organic market. At last there was an independent federally funded and administered third party certification that would promote one of their greatest benefits; no carcinogenic pesticides herbicides or fungicides are needed in Hydroponic growing systems. And the USDA found an opportunity to fulfill part of its core mission; develop new agricultural markets to benefit farmers.

But it infuriated and threatened the organic farming community who felt allowing any Hydroponic production to claim organic authenticity was dishonest and a degradation of what organic food production is intended to be. It’s been a pitched battle ever since between the two camps. And that battle is no more apparent than among those who produce USDA certified land grown organic tomatoes and those who produce and sell USDA certified Organic Hydroponic ones.

You can mess with a lot of things but don’t touch the tomato. With vigor, Organic consumer advocacy groups have taken up the cause for organic produce growers, with the tomato producers front and center. They continually remind the press and public that Hydroponics have no business in the organic arena and should get out.

So if Hydroponic growers have been victorious in their efforts and achieved recognition as being capable of producing USDA certifiable organic produce, their victory has been a pyrrhic one.

It’s hard to find Organic Hydroponic produce in Natural food stores because of the fomented consumer backlash that store owners want to stay clear of.

However, no one is really winning here. The backlash has been so severe that the markets for Hydroponic farmers are anemic in growth when compared to how crucial their success is to the future of human sustainability, and that future includes the very organic farmers who have fought them.

How do we find our way out of this? We’ll try to point to the PATHS forward in our next post.