2 Disasters In 1 – Indian Journalism & Sri Lankan Ban On Chemical Fertilizers


As a journalist, you have to be extra careful with your reporting. As President of your country, you have to be extra careful you’re your exercise of power, like banning 100% of an imported item.

From Filipino Mark Nas’ Facebook sharing of Friday, 10 September 2021, today I Filipino give you an example of modern hyperbole in media, which is always modern bad journalism. While India’s online paper ThePrint has a brilliant slogan – “Substance of print, Reach of digital” – its journalist Samyak Pandey has written a dark, dreadful story, “How Sri Lanka’s Overnight Flip To Total Organic Farming Has Led To An Economic Disaster[1]” (10 September 2021, Theprint.in). The actual story is not dreadful, but reasoning and telling are quite alarming!

The main source of Mr Pandey’s report is a topic I have become a disciple of for the last 55 years: organic farming. I have read thoroughly Mr Pandey’s story of 932 words, including title, and I can see that he fails to report the bigger part of the story, which I may state thus:

The utter failure of the government of Sri Lanka under President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to fully prepare for the 100% shift to organic farming by the whole country.

It is not the unprecedented 100 shift to organic farming itself, as the journalist of India would like readers to believe, but the unprepared inorganic farmers that caused the economic bubble of Sri Lanka to burst.

Not mentioning that President Rajapaksa failed to prepare his country to the organic shift from the inorganic, the implication of Mr Pandey’s Sri Lanka report is that organic fertilizers are bad for farming!

I am neither a seller of organic fertilizers nor an organic farmer; while I believe that organic agriculture is good for your health, including your own country, I a journalist have the obligation to try to convince you, but not force you, to shift to organic fertilizers. I should know my agriculture because I have a BS Agriculture degree major in Agricultural Education from the University of the Philippines Los Baños, UP '65; I should know my journalism, even as a self-taught journalist – and so I do study my subject matter very thoroughly.

A careful reading of the Indian ThePrint scary story on Sri Lanka’s “Journey to the Land of Promise by Organic Farming” has brought out the teacher in me!

Mr Pandey says:

President Gotabaya Rajapaksa was forced to impose an economic emergency on 31 August (2021) to contain soaring food inflation, and currency devaluation and forex reserves crisis. … According to the Sri Lankan government, two primary reasons have driven the inflation – crashing tourism due to the pandemic, and hoarding of food items.

It’s clear to me that Sri Lanka’s President Rajapaksa did not see his own mistake in not preparing his country to the shift to organic farming! Being President, you cannot force a good thing without preparing your people to accept it! Being a journalist, neither can you right a wrong by reporting badly about it!@517


[1]https://theprint.in/world/how-sri-lankas-overnight-flip-to-total-organic-farming-has-led-to-an-economic-disaster/728414/?fbclid=IwAR0WflzFnZnxVLOW8msPJ30lP9I6Kg115toTwE82zE6R111qzveEtH183K0

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