GREEN HERBS AND WINE

* Omar Zumot is a pioneer – Not just as a winemaker, but also as an advocate for Jordan’s tiny, but growing, organic farming movement.

In the midst of the blank, arid landscape of Jordan’s Eastern Badia, the Zumot Wineries’ vineyard looks abandoned, as if someone had planted it and then forgoten its existence. Sheep graze unchecked among the newly-planted rows of Pinot Grigio grapes. Snakes, rats and lizards have free rein, and there seems to be as many weeds as vines. A low din fills the air from the constant buzzing of insects. But this vineyard is anything but abandoned.

 »I am showing with our example that by doing nothing, you can achieve », explained Omar Zumot, the owner.  »Minimal intervention » as it’s called, is one of the major precept of organic agriculture. Zumot has three vineyards around Jordan, totaling about 2,000 dunums. They have just been certified as organic by the Institute for Marketecology, or IMO, a Swiss firm that assists farmers in getting a variety of international-standard certifications for organic and sustainable farming. Zumot said he expects his first fully-certified harvest this season.

Organic framing has yet to take off in the Kingdom ; to this day it’s such an unknown quantity that neither the Ministry of Agriculuture nor USAID’s agricultural program had anyone on staff qualified to discuss it.

But since IMO started operating in Jordan in 2008, more than 30 farms have begun the organic certification process, according to IMO representative Ernie Liniger.

The sudden popularity of organic conversion may, in part, be due to the efforts of tha National Program for Organic Farming, launched by HM Queen Rania in 2009, wich aims to get 5 percent of Jordanian farms practicing organic farming by 2014. That initiative is now working with the King Abdullah II Fund for Development, wich is paying for the certification of many organic farmers, according to Rabih Al Raj, the organic farm program’s general manager. (Zumot paid for his own certification in 2008.)

According to Liniger, Jordanian farmers are beginning to realize that going organic is not terribly difficult. The process takes three years, he said, beginning with routine interviews and paperwork, followed by a series of rigorous inspections.

 »They checked everything », recalled Zumot,  »my workers’ shoes, the toilets. If you’re using artificial pesticides, they’ll find them. » IMO also counsels farmers as they make the conversion.  »When thay saw all of the bugs in the vineyard they knew what I was trying to do ; if I were using pesticides the wasps and ladybugs would be the first to go », Zumot said.  »They started offering advice and suggested things I could do better ».

Liniger stressed thet going organic can indeed be a lengthy process, but he believes the goal of getting 5 percent of farms to do so by 2014 is achievable. By 2011, he hopes to get 20 more farms in Jordan working towards certification.

Zumot has been growing wine grapes in Jordan for 14 years, and he said it wasn’t long after he began that he realized his vineyards, his environment and the grapes themselves could all benefit from organic methods.

 »Wine is the agriculture that most benefits by organic techniques », he said,  »because [wine] is all about complexity ».

Zumot said there are natural solutions to most agricultural obstacles, and that letting nature take its course often yields the best results.  »You have to adapt to what nature can give you and use it in a wise way », he said.

For example, the sheep that mill through his vineyards are there to eat weeds ; that way he doesn’t have to use chemical herbicides.

It was completely by coincidence that Zumot learned a second, unsung advantage to his weed-eating sheep.  »I had a small herd, like 20-30 sheep, and once one of them ran away and I followed them in the vineyard, » he explained. Watching the runaway sheep, Zumot noticed that it would not only eat the weeds, but -oddly- lick the inedible vines. After some research, he discovered that sheep saliva has an antibiotic quality ; in addition to de-weeding the vineyards, the sheep were sterilizing the vines, warding off disease.

And Zumot has found other ways of using natural predators to alleviate pest problems. Instead of netting the vines to keep birds away, Zumot relies on hawks and owls. And when faced with a crippling vine bug, he turned to wasps – »natural killers »- for a solution. By planting a breed of grape that the wasps find particularly tasty, Zumot was able to attract the predators to the problem area and eradicate the bug. He acknowledged that such tactics require sacrifice.  »They [wasps] need their wages, of course. They eat 10-15 percent of our production every year, but I think it’s only fair. »

Often, he said, he had to learn by trial and error, as he encountered problems tha organic farmers in Europe hadn’t experienced or documented – from long dry spells to little-known plant ailments.

 »Every year we learn something new, and we try to implement it for the future », he said.

In his Ajloun vineyard, at approximately 1,170 meters, he found that letting weeds flourish help blocks the wind and diminish water evaporation. To avoid using artificial fertilizers, he began raising fish, using the nitrogen-rich water from their ponds to irrigate and fertilize the vineyards. According to the organic certifier, he’s the first in the region to implement this practice. For other issues, Zumot has employed snakes, ladybugs and chickens.

 »This is the 14^th year ; I’ve never been obliged to use artificial fertilizers or pesticides », he said.

Zumot’s goal was never to master organic agriculture, he said, but  »to put Jordan on the wine map. » Organically-produced wine garpes should have intricate flavors, and produce the best wine, he explained. Pesticides and artificial fertilizers are designed to eliminate other organisms, allowing the principal crop exclusive access to unadulterated soil. For wine, Zumot said, you want the opposite :  »When you have an organic vineyard, it’s a living vineyard. All the organisms -insects, bacteria, fungi- are working together to give you a living soil. »

Both Zumot and Liniger say organic farming can have positive consequences for the environment, as well as for farmers. These include enriching the soil and conserving water, both of which can improve farm sustainability.

 »It’s necessary for farmers to grow things that work in Jordanian soil », Zumot explained.  »Farmers should plant other things to see what works. »

Among the grape vines he’s interspersed hundreds of other plant species, mostly herbs and spices.  »My next project will be in herbs, » he said.  »Having them in the vineyard adds to the wine, but there is a market for herbs too. »

At the edge of his northern vineyard, Zumot pointed out a recently-purchased hillside where he hopes to plant different types of trees and monitor their growth. His goal is to find a hardy species that can survive desert conditions.  »This will bring value to the soil, » he said,  »and we could have forest in the desert ! »

Water waste is another huge issue. Despite Jordan’s scarce water supply, Zumot’s IMO certification did not include subjecting his vineyards to water restrictions. But Zumot reasoned that if he wanted to keep using the land he needed to take precautions, and he looked to farmers abroad for newer methods.

In 1999, tomatoes made up 42 percent of crop production in Jordan. According to a study by Mississippi State University, tomatoes need six cubic meters of water per dunum, per day, while grapes take around 0,85 cubic meters. Thanks to pressure compensating pipes and organic methods, Zumot saidhe now uses only 0,4 cubic meters per day.

 »With filtered water that has been enriched with nitrogen from the fish properly distributed in the vines, we managed to cut down the water requirement by more than seventy percent, » he said.  »I’m using only one well of water ; until now we’ve planted 2,000 dunums. »

But today, with government subsidies making water cheap, and little regulation on its use, there are few incentive for most farmers to move away from thirsty crops like tomatoes, cucumbers, citrus and bananas, and towards more sustainable alternatives.

According to Liniger, organic methods work for almost any type of agriculture. The farmers now working toward IMO certification are growing ecerything from dates to vegetables to herbs. If natural methods are so simple, one is forced to wonder why more Jordanian farmers aren’t jumping on the bandwagon.

For one thing the market for organic goods is still limited ; Liniger noted a growing number of weekend farmers’ markets that sell local organic products, and some of the big international supermarkets in West Amman are starting to stock organic products as well. Liniger hopes opening up foreign markets will provide a powerfull new incentive to go organic. Before the IMO came to Jordan, he added local farmers didn’t have access to certification that would allow them to participate in the international organic trade. Today, he said, farme scertified by IMO will be qualified to sell in the European Union, Japan, and the United States. With stronger demand, he believes the cost of conversion could be nominal -and that going organic will save farmers money in the long run.  »They don’t have to buy chemical fertilizers and pesticides, and instead rely on natural methods, » he said. If the demand for organic products is high enough, he added, the costs of going organic could be nominal.

Zumot still can’t export to Europe -he said he needs another certificate, called VL1, wich no organization in Jordan is accredited to issue. He’s looking for a way to get certified, but for the moment he continues to sell only in Jordan.

And Zumot is an exceptional case. With a thriving business distilling alcohol, he’s come to describe the winery as his  »hobby ». Much of the profit from the distillery is devoted to expanding and experimenting with the vineyards. Zumot wine -most notably the Saint George brand- can be purchased at competitive prices in stores throughout Amman, but that low price is essentially, subsidized by other business ventures.

For Zumot, whose goal is to get Jordanian wine noticed, this isn’t a problem : experts have sipped his wine in European competitions, and it has won an award in Paris. But it begs the question of how viable an option organic agriculture will be for stuggling local farmers.

The IMO maintains that going organic will save farmers money in the long run, not to mention making their farms more sustainable. It’s a proposition that, in Jordan at least, remains untested -but the roster of farmers seeking certification shows there’s some faith in the future of organic agriculture.

For the moment, however, organic farming in Jordan remains in the hands of a few pioneers experimenters like Omar Zumot.