Swiss organic soy upgrades

Whether tofu, tempeh or soy cream - products made from soy are in vogue. In the human diet, the yellow bean is increasingly in demand throughout Europe and the range of soy products is constantly expanding. Now, Swiss organic soy stakeholders have joined forces to improve domestic cultivation and expand the range of domestic soy products. The project is supported by the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL) coordinated. The advantages of Swiss organic soy: no rainforest is cleared for it, the soy is guaranteed to be free of genetic modification, value creation takes place in Switzerland, and traceability is guaranteed. In addition, the farmers are organized in the producer organization PROGANA and have purchase contracts.

The pitfalls of soybean cultivation

With its nodule bacteria, soybean as a legume does bind important nitrogen and does not need to be fertilized. "The main problem in organic soybean cultivation is weediness," says Maurice Clerc, FiBL arable advisor and co-project leader. "This drives up production costs in organic farming. That's why it's important to breed varieties that suppress weeds better and which are ideal for producing the various products."

So far, the soybean is not very widespread in organic farming in Switzerland, although some pioneers have been growing the bean for several years. This is due in no small part to more than 30 years of breeding work by the Agroscope Research Station, which has produced varieties suited to the local climate. Now, however, more and more organic farmers are becoming interested in soybean cultivation, which is very demanding. This is where the "Organic Food Soy Switzerland" project comes in.

The "Organic Food Soy Switzerland" project: what is it about?

The aim of the project is to strengthen Switzerland's organic soy sector by involving the entire value chain, starting with breeding, variety testing, seed multiplication, cultivation advice, processing, product development, through the retail trade to the consumer, and to provide consumers with high-quality organic soy products entirely from domestic production. "We want to promote ideal collaboration for everyone involved in the production and processing of Swiss organic soy - from seed to the final product for consumers," says Matthias Klaiss, FiBL project coordinator.

The project is supported by the Coop Fund for Sustainability and from the Bio Suisse financially supported. "Coop has been producing all of its tofu products entirely with organic soy from Switzerland since 2015," emphasizes Roland Frefel, responsible for fresh products at Coop. "In order to be able to meet the growing demand for these products in the future, Coop is supporting this innovative project, once again underlining its pioneering role in the field of sustainability and organic farming in particular."

Coop, FiBL, Agroscope, Bio Suisse, the producers' organization PROGANA, Delley Samen und Pflanzen AG and Mühle Rytz are involved in the "Bio Speisesoja Schweiz" project. The project will run until the end of 2018.