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Background:
Systematic Review

Comparison of Organic and Conventional Agriculture in the Czech Republic: A Systematic Review

by
Hana Vašková
and
Pavel Saska
*
Functional Diversity in Agro-Ecosystems, Crop Research Institute, Drnovská 507, 161 00 Prague 6-Ruzyně, Czech Republic
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Agriculture 2024, 14(11), 2087; https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture14112087
Submission received: 16 September 2024 / Revised: 6 November 2024 / Accepted: 14 November 2024 / Published: 19 November 2024
(This article belongs to the Section Agricultural Systems and Management)
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Abstract

:
This systematic review aims to comprehensively examine publications that compared conventional and organic agriculture in the Czech Republic. Agriculture in the Czech Republic is unique because of considerable variability in natural and climatic conditions and from a historical context. The ultimate objective of this systematic review was to identify possible research gaps that could serve as a background for updating national research policy. The search for suitable publications was performed in Scopus and Web of Science, and screening for eligibility followed the PRISMA approach. In total, 65 publications satisfied the inclusion criteria, the extraction of which provided 380 data records. Crop production appeared to be the most frequent research theme (204 records), followed by economy (122 records), biodiversity (n = 30), animal production (n = 18) and food (n = 6). Unfortunately, numerous records suffer from methodological and statistical flaws. The research gaps identified in this systematic review include important crops, comparisons between varieties and individual practices, topics related to drought, biodiversity-oriented research including ecosystem services, and meat or egg production. We propose that, to obtain robust comparisons between the two farming systems across multiple areas of research, one large experiment covering several organic and conventional farms across the country is needed.

1. Introduction

Organic agriculture is an approach to farming that emphasizes sustainability, biodiversity, and the use of natural processes to cultivate crops and raise livestock. It avoids the use of synthetic pesticides, herbicides and genetically modified organisms (GMOs), and relies on organic fertilizers and more diversified rotations of crops [1]. Organic farmers need certification to be allowed to use the label “organic” or “bio” for their production. In contrast, conventional agriculture employs synthetic inputs and large-scale production methods. It involves the use of chemical fertilizers, synthetic pesticides and herbicides to maximize crop yields, and GM crops are approved in some countries. Conventional agriculture usually relies on growing crops in monocultures, so extensive land areas are dedicated to growing a single crop [1,2]. Integrated farming is a more common and less intensive version of conventional agriculture. It emphasizes sustainability and efficiency, and it aims to minimize the negative environmental impacts that conventional farming normally has [3], even though synthetic plant protection products and mineral fertilizers are still allowed and frequently used. As the distinction between integrated and conventional farming systems is somewhat blurred in many aspects, we considered integrated and conventional agriculture together in the present study, in contrast to organic farming. Indeed, most conventional farmers in the Czech Republic currently follow integrated farming principles.
In the Czech Republic, agriculture employs around 5% of the population and contributes 2% to the GDP of the country. In total there are 44.7 thousand registered agricultural entities in the Czech Republic [4], and organic farming accounts for approximately 14% of all agricultural entities, and operates on ca. 15% of the agricultural land. There is currently an increasing trend in the number of organic farms and organically grown areas in the Czech Republic [5].
Globally, there is a large body of scientific literature dedicated to organic farming. Since the Ardenclarke and Hodges review [6], the impacts of organic agriculture have been periodically summarized, and the number of synthesizing papers that compare organic farming with conventional farming has been steadily increasing. The positive effects of organic farming on biodiversity are frequently accentuated [7,8,9,10,11,12], even though these effects are taxon-specific [9,13,14] and greater in more intensively farmed landscapes [9]. Pests also tended to benefit from organic farming; however, these effects were also taxon-specific and dependent on the scale of the experiments [8]. Organic agriculture improves the soil organic matter content [7], nutrient composition [14] and overall soil health [15]; however, its effects on nutrient leaching (nitrate, phosphorus) are not conclusive [7]. Overall, the environmental impact of organic farming is lower than that of conventional farming [16], including improved land and resource use, a lower ecotoxicological burden and lower impacts on climate change. The chemical/nutritional composition of the produced commodity may or may not be affected by the farming type [11]. With respect to animal production or the nutrient content of animal-based products, organic food and conventionally produced food differ, e.g., in terms of fatty acid content [17,18]. Organic agriculture, however, usually delivers lower yields [10,11,19,20] and may increase yield instability [14]; see also [19], but it retains [14] or even increases profitability [21]. However, yield reduction may be low or non-existent in rotations that are not based on growing cereals [12].
This study aims to provide an overview of what has been done regarding comparisons of organic and conventional agriculture in the Czech Republic. The rationale for such a local focus of our study is threefold. First, Czech agriculture is highly unique for historical reasons. These include collectivization in the 1950s and 1960s, which resulted in the loss of small-scale agriculture and family farms and the establishment of large-scale collective farms, both of which had fatal country-wide consequences for land use and social structure in rural areas. After the collapse of the socialist bloc in the early 1990s, the whole sector was suddenly forced to revert to a market-oriented economic system [22,23]. This resulted in a strong divergence in farm sizes. On the one hand, there are large and industrialized agricultural companies that often farm on 1000 ha or more, and on the other hand, small family farms that usually have less than 50 ha.
The second peculiarity relates to the environmental conditions of the Czech Republic. Although it is a rather small country (with a total area of less than 79,000 km2), the territory encompasses fertile lowlands [24], highlands and mountainous regions. Most organic farms are placed in “areas with natural constraints” [25], which are located mainly at medium to high elevations, i.e., areas that are not suitable for intensive agriculture. The climate of the Czech Republic is temperate continental, which allows the growth of various crops, but the rotations are dominated by cereals [26]. Winter wheat is one of the most dominant crops in both organic and conventional agriculture [27]. In addition to the crops usually grown in conventional agriculture, spelt, rye, buckwheat or lupine are often grown in organically managed arable fields [28]. However, Czech organic farms are predominantly oriented towards permanent grasslands [28].
The third reason why we limited the focus of this study to the Czech Republic is that there is an emergent need to provide background data for national research policy in the area of organic agriculture and to evaluate its impact on agricultural practices, ecosystem services and the environment. Thus, there is a need for synthesis of published evidence. The aim of this systematic review is, therefore, to identify knowledge gaps at the national level that relate to the comparison of organic and conventional farming. The results of this study are intended to support national research policy at the national level.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1. Literature Search

This systematic review was performed following the principles defined in the PRISMA Statement (Preferred Reporting Items of Systematic Reviews and Meta-analysis) [29]; Figure 1). Two searches for relevant publications were performed, one in Web of Science (https://webofscience.com, Clarivate, Philadelphia, PA, USA) and one in Scopus (https://www.scopus.com, Elsevier, Amsterdam, The Netherlands). The last searches were performed on July 5, 2023. The search string was formulated as follows: “ecological agriculture” OR “biological agriculture” OR “organic agriculture” OR “ecological farming” OR “biological farming” OR “organic farming” OR “ecological production” OR “biological production” OR “organic production” AND “compar*”. We included the terms “ecological” and “biological” because the Czech terminology is not fully consistent and these terms may be used as synonyms, even though they may not have identical meanings in other languages, including English. There was no limitation for when the publications were published, but the search was limited to “Czech Republic”. Identical search strings were used in both databases, with the exception of formatting to meet the specific syntax requirements of a particular database.

2.2. Eligibility Check

The PRISMA flow chart shows the selection process for the articles (Figure 1). Together, both searches identified 278 potentially relevant publications. After screening the titles and abstracts, 187 publications were excluded because they did not fall within the scope of the review (e.g., no comparison of ecological and conventional farming was made, and the study did not originate in the Czech Republic) (Figure 1). Ninety-one publications remained for full text screening, after which an additional 26 publications were excluded. Of the 65 publications that were included in the final selection, 58 were scientific articles, 6 were conference proceedings, and 1 was a book chapter (Figure 1, List of publication citations Supplementary Materials S1).

2.3. Data Extraction

The data records in our database are based on individual comparisons of conventional and organic agriculture in published studies. That is, each record included one unique comparison, and if multiple comparisons were made in a single study, multiple records were extracted from that study. The number of records ranged from 1 to 33 per study (mean = 6, median = 4). The total number of records extracted from the 65 publications was 380 (Figure 1).
The subjects of the comparison in each record were classified under a new variable Keyword, so records with similar subjects were listed under the same keyword. For example, if the subject of the comparison was the content of a certain element or a chemical molecule such as a vitamin, the assigned keyword was “chemical composition”. Altogether, 40 different keywords were used in the database (Supplementary Materials S2). The keywords were further aggregated into five broad categories under a new variable Theme, with categories “Animal production”, “Biodiversity”, “Economy”, “Food” and “Crop production”. Another dimension of grouping the records (variable Commodity) considered the main commodity (usually the crop) or product.
The data were extracted from the main text, tables, figures or Supplementary Materials. The publication metadata and data related to the study design were also extracted (Table 1).

2.4. Data Visualization and Analyses

Data analysis was performed in R version 4.2.1 [30]. The packages “ggplot2” [31], leaflet [32], dplyr [33] and treemap [34] were used for data preparation and visualization.

3. Results

3.1. Metadata of Available Publications

The data included in this study were published between 2005 and 2021 (Figure 2). Even though the maximum number of publications in one year was published in 2013 (10 publications), there was an increasing trend in the number of published comparisons of organic and conventional agriculture over the whole period covered by the search (Figure 2). With respect to the year the data were sampled, the oldest data used in the reviewed studies originated from 1996.
The publications included in this study were published in 42 different journals (Figure 3; Supplementary Materials S1). Acta Universitatis Agriculturae et Silviculturae Mendelianae Brunensis was the most common journal (n publications = 10), followed by Food Chemistry (n = 4) and Agricultural Economics (Czech Republic) (n = 3). The 42 journals were published by 22 different publishing houses (Figure 4). The most frequent publishers were Mendel University of Agriculture and Forestry Brno and the Czech Academy of Agricultural Sciences (both n = 10), followed by the Czech University of Life Sciences Prague (n = 9), all three of which are based in the Czech Republic. Overall, 33 publications were published by Czech publishing houses, while the remaining publications (n = 32) were published abroad. Only 4 publications were published in the Czech language, and the remaining 61 were published in English.
The Scopus CiteScore of the journals covered by this systematic review ranged from 0.7 to 8 (mean = 2.18, median = 1.5). This criterion was not available for eight publications because these were either published before 2011 or because this metric is not provided for the particular type of publication (book chapter and conference proceedings; together n publications = 7).

3.2. Study Design

Individual publications varied in geographical scale—from the country-wide scale (mostly economic topics, n publications = 20) to the scale of a single location (hence only one study site; n = 12). Ten publications included two study sites, three publications included three sites, and 16 publications did not mention the number of study sites where data were collected. The types of data sources varied between the records (Figure 5) and included data extracted from databases (n records = 120), followed by original measurements made inside production fields (n = 61) or experimental plots (n = 57) (Figure 5).
The intensity of data collection also varied on a temporal scale. Data collection was repeated in time in 34 publications. Data collection was replicated in the same year in two publications, replicated over two years in eight publications, and replicated over 3 to 5 years in 21 publications, while three publications were based on data replicated for more than 11 years.

3.3. Quality of Data Presentation

Statistical evaluation was described only in 178 out of 380 records, and an additional 91 records were analysed according to the LCA approach; thus, these records were also considered to be statistically evaluated. No information about sample size was provided in 121 records, and in 93 records, sample size was not clearly explained because of temporal repetition. Only 166 records included sufficient information about the sample size.

3.4. Commodities Studied

The dataset included 20 different commodities (Figure 6). The most abundant commodities were associated with plant production. The most frequent commodity was cereals, which included wheat (n records = 40), barley (n records = 2), oat (n = 17), rye (n = 12) and buckwheat (n = 1). The vegetables used included cabbage (n records = 4), tomatoes (n = 4), carrots (n = 23), onion (n = 4) and radish (n = 12). Other commodities included potatoes (n = 38); fruits that included apples (n = 11) and pears (n = 7); wine (n = 15) and herbs (n = 7). The products used for animal production were milk (n = 15), goats (n = 6), sheep + goat (n = 4), cattle (n = 3) and swine (n = 1). In addition to the commodity level, the whole farm economy level was studied (n = 76).

3.5. Subjects in the Study Records

“Crop production” was the theme that accounted for the greatest proportion of the data (n records = 204), followed by “Economy” (n = 122). “Biodiversity” (n = 30), “Animal production” (n = 18) and “Food” (n = 6) comprised only a small portion of the data.
In the theme of “Crop production”, 15 different keywords were formulated (Figure 7). The main keywords included “chemical composition” in the final product (n = 73), “emissions” (n = 68) or “soil properties” (n = 17). Other keywords were linked to plant protection, such as “mycotoxin and fungal prevalence” (n = 10).
Among the 122 records under the “Economy” theme, 18 unique keywords were distinguished, with “profitability” (n = 58), “production” (n = 14) and “debts/gearing” (n = 9) being the most frequently used keywords (Figure 8). Surprisingly, only one record compared the ecological footprint of the products.
In the theme of “Biodiversity”, the keywords included “weeds” (n = 12), “natural enemies” (n = 11), “arthropod biodiversity” (n = 5) and “pests” (n = 2). Owing to the small sample size, the “Animal production” and “Food” themes were analysed together. Seven keywords were identified: “microorganisms” (n = 8), “chemical composition” (n = 6), “parasites” (n = 4), “nutritional status of livestock” (n = 2), “wastewater properties” (n = 2), “fermentability” (n = 1) and “yield” (n = 1).

3.6. Observed Effects

Overall, the direction of the effects was highly variable across the records, and indeed, the results may be difficult to interpret in some cases. This is because the directions of effects, i.e., decreases or increases in observed values, may have opposite interpretations depending on the variable. Here, we focus only on keywords with at least five statistically evaluated records.
For the “Crop production” theme (n = 207 records), statistical analysis was absent from 48 records (23.2%). In 28 records, no significant effect of the cropping system was found; these insignificant records were largely associated with the chemical composition of the commodity (Figure 9). The main decreasing effect was found for the keyword “chemical composition”, which suggests that there were fewer compounds in organic farming than in conventional farming. The production of emissions differed according to the LCA analysis between the cropping systems, interestingly, in both directions. In 61.8% of the cases, the production of emissions increased, whereas in 38.2% of the cases, it decreased in organic compared with conventional farming (Figure 9). An increasing effect on soil properties was detected in six records (34.8%), a decreasing effect was detected in four records (23.2%), and no significant difference was detected in one record (5. 8%). The prevalence of mycotoxins and fungi decreased more often in organic farming than in conventional farming (Figure 9).
In the “Economy” theme, 76 out of 122 records (62.3%) did not provide any information about statistical analysis (Figure 10). Only keywords related to profitability and yield were statistically evaluated in a sufficient number of records. The effect of the farming system was equally divided into increases (n = 10) and decreases (n = 9) in the case of profitability; however, in four records, there was no significant effect (Figure 10). Only a decreasing effect on yield under organic farming was found (Figure 10).
With respect to the “Biodiversity” theme, four keywords were identified (Figure 11). Weed abundance and diversity regularly increased in organic fields or plots (n = 9 out of 12), and the same patterns were also found for natural enemies (n = 6 out of 11) and other arthropods (n = 3 out of 5) (Figure 11).
The themes of “Animal production” and “Food” were again considered together. Compared with conventional farming, organic farming more often resulted in a greater number of microorganisms in the final product (n = 7 out of 8) (Figure 12). Regarding the chemical composition, the observed effects were not conclusive (Figure 12).

4. Discussion

This is the first systematic review on comparisons of organic and conventional farming for the territory of the Czech Republic, and covers 65 scientific publications on the topic. The aim of this review was to identify the main areas of past research in which these farming systems were compared and to identify possible research gaps at the national level, to support national policy in agricultural research.
Our review revealed that most research thus far has focused on the production of crops and the economic aspects of farming and has focused much less on animal production or food production in general, or on biodiversity. The dominance of crop production over animal production in the pool of published studies may be related to the general decrease in animal husbandry in the Czech Republic [35]. The commodities covered by the studies rather closely corresponded to the main crops grown by the Czech farmers, with some exceptions. Surprisingly, no published research has compared the organic and conventional growth of oilseed rape or maize, although these crops hold significant economic importance in the Czech Republic, and both can be grown organically. Oil seed rape accounts for nearly 16% of the total acreage in conventional systems [36], but in Czech organic systems, growing oilseed rape organically is minor (135 ha, 0.03% of ecologically grown crops in the Czech Republic [37]). This disparity could be attributed to highly unpredictable yields and high weed infestations in organic oilseed rape [38]. Clearly, research is needed in this direction so that the benefits of including oilseed rape in crop rotations can also be transferred to organic farming. Maize can also be grown in both systems, but sweet maize kernel yield is usually twice as high as that in conventional systems [39]. Since maize is predominantly used for silage or biogas in most regions of the Czech Republic, lower grain yields in organic farming may not be an issue. However, conventional Czech animal farms rely more often on silage than organic farms do, which mainly use pasture. Thus, the need for silage in organic animal production may be low. Disproportionally high attention has been given to some vegetables and fruits, mainly carrots and apples. One possible reason could be that they are widely used in the production of baby foods, where nutritional quality and zero pesticide residues are of prime importance [40,41]. Therefore, the lack of research on crops such as oilseed rape and maize represents one possible direction of future research.
Assessment of the effects of organic farming was based on the vote-counting method. Records that were subjected to statistical analysis in the source publications were sorted into three categories on the basis of whether organic farming caused a positive, negative or insignificant change in the measurements. However, an increase in measured values may not, in all cases, have positive interpretations and vice versa, depending on the context of each study. For example, higher microorganism counts in organically produced milk and dairy products [42,43] can be regarded as a negative effect, whereas a decrease in emissions in organic farming must be regarded as positive effect [44,45]. The positive effects of organic farming identified by research conducted in the Czech Republic and with substantial statistical support include increasing profitability, reducing emissions and agrochemical consumption, and increasing the abundance of invertebrates. The negative effects, in turn, include a reduction in yield, increased density of microorganisms and increased abundance of weeds. However, an increase in weed diversity in arable fields may be regarded as an environmental benefit under some circumstances, as many weed species support multiple species of insects and farmland birds, and the role of these weeds in supporting ecosystem services has been acknowledged [46,47].
In the “Crop production” theme, the most frequently studied area of research is related to changes in the chemical composition of crops or commodities. Eighteen records reported no significant difference in the content of the chosen chemical composition between organic and conventional farming. Significantly increasing values were found for potatoes, vegetables and buckwheat, whereas decreasing values were also found for potatoes and vegetables, which demonstrates that the trends are compound-specific. For example, lower amounts of total nitrogen, nitriles, starch and crude protein were found in potato tubers from organic farming [48,49]. Nevertheless, there was also a significantly greater amount of vitamin C in organic potatoes [48]. The inconsistency in the observed effects of the farming type on emissions, the second most frequent keyword, may be related to farming practices specific to particular species of crop. Decreasing emissions of CO2 in organic farming have been found in vegetables [50], whereas increasing CO2 production has been reported in organic cereals [44]. This was caused by mechanical weeding and other agro-technical operations during the cropping season. The measured variables related to soil properties mostly increased under organic farming, which included increased soil water retention capacity, air entry, hydraulic conductivity and water repellence, even though other properties (e.g., electrical conductivity) decreased under organic farming. The decreased content of mycotoxins and fungi found in organic agriculture was somewhat unexpected, as the opposite is sometimes used as an argument from the more conventional spectrum of the industry against organic production [51,52]. The pattern found can possibly be explained by the selection of more resistant varieties against pathogens in organic farming [53,54]. Only one publication in this systematic review [55] tested different varieties of a crop (namely, potatoes) under the two farming regimes. This also highlights another research gap that should be addressed more frequently. Other topics related to crop production addressed in other countries but not in the Czech Republic include the prevalence of pathogens other than fungi [56], comparisons of particular farming practices [57], plant water regimes or irrigation [58,59], the diversity of crop rotations [60] and many others.
Surprisingly, a large proportion of records under the “Economy” theme were not statistically evaluated, which allowed us to perform meaningful assessment for only two keywords. Organic farming caused a yield decrease in all records, including cereals and potatoes [44,45,50]. The same trend was found in other systematic reviews or meta-analyses [10,19,20]. On the other hand, a yield decrease may not always translate to a corresponding decrease in the profitability of organic farming [61]. In our review, increased profitability in organic farms was found in 10 records, which mainly related to wine production [62], farm economy [63,64] and milk production costs [65]. Higher prices of the final product or market preferences were likely behind the increased profitability, as found, e.g., in the study of Sgroi et al. [66], but one must not forget that organic farming is also heavily subsidized. Decreased profitability of organic farming was found in nine records, which mainly related to the farm economics and to cereal production [44,63,65]. The variability in the results included in our systematic review supports the conclusion made earlier [21,67] that it would be oversimplifying to regard organic farming as less profitable only because the yields per unit area are often lower than in the case of conventional farming.
Unexpectedly, the effects of organic vs. conventional farming systems on biodiversity have rarely been studied in the Czech Republic. Kocourek et al. [68] reported positive effects of organic farming on the Shannon biodiversity index for predaceous and phytophagous arthropods in orchards. In contrast, Vesely and Sarapatka [69] did not find any differences between the two farming systems in the diversity indices of carabid pitfall catches. A greater number of endangered weed species in organic farming than in conventional farming was reported [70]. There are also some missing biodiversity-related topics that are represented in studies from different regions, such as the biodiversity of vertebrates linked to cultural landscapes [71], ecosystem service provisions [72], etc. Biodiversity-focused research is clearly underrepresented and indicates another knowledge gap that can be addressed at the farm scale and in the long term, along with agronomical and economic aspects of the whole farming system.
With respect to the themes of “Animal production” and “Food”, products of organic agriculture more often contained greater contents of microorganisms, but the chemical composition of the products remained largely unchanged. In the records on animal production, there is no record on the production of meat. Other authors from different regions (e.g., [18,73]) have demonstrated differences in the chemical composition of meat originating from organic and conventional farming. Other types of animal husbandry, including poultry and pork production, are entirely or almost entirely missing. This is especially surprising, as pork is the most consumed type of meat in the Czech Republic [36]. Overall, the entire sector of animal production and the production of animal products represents one large knowledge gap that deserves research attention, because organic meat and dairy products represent a large portion of all organic retail. Consequently, the amount of organic meat and dairy production has been increasing [4,5], even though overall animal production is declining in the Czech Republic.
What is clearly missing from the available research is investigations at the farm or rotation levels to clearly demonstrate overall and long-term effects on yield, biodiversity, soil health and the farm economy as a whole. Even though the overall economy of agricultural farms was addressed in 76 records in our dataset, these were mainly single-year studies. More complex analyses would also help to evaluate possible contrasting effects. For example, yield was negatively affected by organic farming in our data. However, evidence indicates that yield and individual insect abundance are negatively correlated (e.g., [7,74]). Thus, one benefit—increased yield—is to the detriment of another value—biodiversity and associated ecosystem services. We clearly need a holistic approach to address the comparison of farming systems that could consider multiple aspects of the farming systems at the same time. From our perspective, funding of a large-scale experiment at the farm level should be prioritized. Such an experiment should cover multiple farms, should be replicated over multiple years, and should involve experts from multiple disciplines, including agronomists, ecologists and socio-economists. Long-term data are available from different countries [75,76,77], but these usually originate from a single site and/or from experimental plots. Alleviating long-term experimental approaches at the farm level would make it possible not only to cover the socio-economic aspects of farm conversion, but also to include all types of agroclimatic regions, various soil types and operational management (usual rotations, tillage regimes, as well as farm sizes, etc.). In this way, robust data could be delivered for policies regarding the impact of organic farming on the amount and quality of crop production, on biodiversity, ecosystem services provisioning and soil health, as well as on farm economy.
Considering our database, multiple records were based on experimental plots (n records = 57), which are usually smaller than commercial fields (n = 61). Even though plot-based studies are very common in ecology or agronomy, the possibility that the outcomes of these studies are affected by plot size cannot be excluded. Research executed under operational field conditions already includes potential changes in heterogeneity and border effects [78,79]. Additionally, most publications do not provide additional data about field management, landscape complexity or agri-environmental management (according to CAP), which affect not only crop yield [80,81] but also biodiversity [82] and soil quality [83,84]. Knowledge of agro-technical operations is necessary to evaluate farming systems thoroughly. Again, we stress that long-term experiments are lacking at the farm scale with simultaneous measurements of agronomical practices, farm economy and impact on the environment, which would include not only “apparent” biodiversity but also soil health.
The quality of the publications included in this study varied considerably. Some of the publications presented methodological and presentation-related flaws. Many publications provided close to no description of statistical data evaluation or did not evaluate the data statistically at all; therefore, the results presented in those studies must be regarded with caution. Additionally, retrieving information about the sample size was often difficult or impossible from the descriptions provided in the papers. Indeed, we report and discuss farming effects only for statistically evaluated records. Additionally, the methodological flaws might be responsible for the choice of journal to publish the results, which was not rarely the authors’ home institution.
This systematic review is limited to studies whose data collection was executed in the Czech Republic. Even though publications comparing organic and conventional agriculture are available from neighboring countries, such as Germany (e.g., [85,86]) or Poland (e.g., [87,88]), we decided not to include them, not for climatic but rather for social or historical reasons, given the dissimilar trajectories of agriculture in different countries over the last few decades.

5. Conclusions

Our systematic review demonstrates that the current level of understanding of the effects of organic and conventional farming is clearly insufficient. This is caused mainly by unevenly distributed research attention in published studies across disciplines and, in many cases, by substandard research or presentation of the research. Areas that are clearly underrepresented and need to be addressed include animal production, the production of several important field crops, soil health and biodiversity. With respect to crop production, biodiversity and the farm economy, these themes can be most efficiently studied together, preferably in one large experiment at the farm level, covering multiple farms and replicated over multiple years. Such a large-scale and long-term study should be prioritized, even though it would require substantial and targeted public fund allocation. In turn, such an experiment would have the potential to generate robust scientific data, close multiple research gaps and support transformative change in farming systems to be environmentally as well as economically more sustainable.

Supplementary Materials

The following supporting information can be downloaded at: https://www.mdpi.com/article/10.3390/agriculture14112087/s1. Supplementary Materials S1: List of publications used in systematic review. Supplementary Materials S2: List of keywords used in systematic review.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, H.V. and P.S.; methodology, P.S.; validation, H.V. and P.S.; formal analysis, H.V.; investigation, H.V. and P.S.; resources, P.S.; data curation, H.V.; writing—original draft preparation, H.V.; writing—review and editing, P.S.; visualization, H.V.; supervision, P.S.; project administration, P.S.; funding acquisition, P.S. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

This work was funded by project number QK23020044 funded by the Ministry of Agriculture of the Czech Republic (NAZV).

Institutional Review Board Statement

Not applicable.

Data Availability Statement

Data available from the authors under reasonable request.

Acknowledgments

We wish to thank Jiří Louda (UJEP) and Jan Moudrý (JČU) for their help with categorizing the keywords related to economy.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript; or in the decision to publish the results.

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Figure 1. PRISMA Statement flow diagram.
Figure 1. PRISMA Statement flow diagram.
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Figure 2. Histogram of year of publication (n publications = 65).
Figure 2. Histogram of year of publication (n publications = 65).
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Figure 3. Tree map of journal titles and other sources of the publications included in the database (n = 65). Acronyms: Agris (On-line P.E.I.) = Agris On-line Papers in Economics and Informatics, CJFS = Czech Journal of Food Sciences, EEaMJ = Environmental Engineering and Management Journal, IJoFM = International Journal of Food Microbiology, JAST = Journal of Agricultural Science and Technology, JFAE = Journal of Food Agriculture and Environment, JPDP = Journal of Plant Diseases and Protection, JRNC = Journal of Radioanalytical and Nuclear Chemistry, JSFA = Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture, PJAS = Pakistan Journal of Agricultural Sciences, Zem. Agri = Zemdirbyste-Agriculture.
Figure 3. Tree map of journal titles and other sources of the publications included in the database (n = 65). Acronyms: Agris (On-line P.E.I.) = Agris On-line Papers in Economics and Informatics, CJFS = Czech Journal of Food Sciences, EEaMJ = Environmental Engineering and Management Journal, IJoFM = International Journal of Food Microbiology, JAST = Journal of Agricultural Science and Technology, JFAE = Journal of Food Agriculture and Environment, JPDP = Journal of Plant Diseases and Protection, JRNC = Journal of Radioanalytical and Nuclear Chemistry, JSFA = Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture, PJAS = Pakistan Journal of Agricultural Sciences, Zem. Agri = Zemdirbyste-Agriculture.
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Figure 4. Tree map of publishers of publications included in the database (n = 65). The rectangles in orange represent publishers based in the Czech Republic, and those in green are from abroad. Acronyms: CSSfM = Czech Scientific Society for Mycology, CULS = Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, EA. U = Estonian Agricultural University, GATUoI = Gh. Asachi Technical University of Iasi, LRCAF—VMU = Lithuanian Research Centre for Agriculture and Forestry; Vytautas Magnus University, MDPI = Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute, MENDELU = Mendel University of Agriculture and Forestry Brno, PAoAiAS = Pakistan Association of Advancement in Agricultural Sciences, TMU = Tarbiat Modares University, UHK = University of Hradec Kralove, VETUNI = University of Veterinary and Pharmaceutical Sciences, WAP = Wageningen Academic Publishers.
Figure 4. Tree map of publishers of publications included in the database (n = 65). The rectangles in orange represent publishers based in the Czech Republic, and those in green are from abroad. Acronyms: CSSfM = Czech Scientific Society for Mycology, CULS = Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, EA. U = Estonian Agricultural University, GATUoI = Gh. Asachi Technical University of Iasi, LRCAF—VMU = Lithuanian Research Centre for Agriculture and Forestry; Vytautas Magnus University, MDPI = Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute, MENDELU = Mendel University of Agriculture and Forestry Brno, PAoAiAS = Pakistan Association of Advancement in Agricultural Sciences, TMU = Tarbiat Modares University, UHK = University of Hradec Kralove, VETUNI = University of Veterinary and Pharmaceutical Sciences, WAP = Wageningen Academic Publishers.
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Figure 5. Origin of the experimental data (n records = 380).
Figure 5. Origin of the experimental data (n records = 380).
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Figure 6. Tree map of the Commodity variable (n records = 380). The size of the smallest rectangle represents one record. 1—cattle; 2—grassland; 3—legumes; 4—fodder; 5—intensity; 6—waste water; 7—staff; 8—swine.
Figure 6. Tree map of the Commodity variable (n records = 380). The size of the smallest rectangle represents one record. 1—cattle; 2—grassland; 3—legumes; 4—fodder; 5—intensity; 6—waste water; 7—staff; 8—swine.
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Figure 7. Tree map of keywords associated with the “Crop production” theme (n records = 204). The size of the smallest rectangle represents one record. 1—germination; 2—product weight; 3—product physical properties; 4—yield; 5—pesticide abandonment; 6—agrotechnical operations; 7—purity of seeds; 8—sensorial quality.
Figure 7. Tree map of keywords associated with the “Crop production” theme (n records = 204). The size of the smallest rectangle represents one record. 1—germination; 2—product weight; 3—product physical properties; 4—yield; 5—pesticide abandonment; 6—agrotechnical operations; 7—purity of seeds; 8—sensorial quality.
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Figure 8. Tree map of keywords associated with the “Economy” theme (n = 122). The size of the smallest rectangle represents one record. 1—price of grain; 2—financial performance; 3—interest coverage; 4—ecological footprint; 5—economic size; 6—net value; 7—product chain.
Figure 8. Tree map of keywords associated with the “Economy” theme (n = 122). The size of the smallest rectangle represents one record. 1—price of grain; 2—financial performance; 3—interest coverage; 4—ecological footprint; 5—economic size; 6—net value; 7—product chain.
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Figure 9. Observed effects for records (n = 207) in the theme of “Crop production”.
Figure 9. Observed effects for records (n = 207) in the theme of “Crop production”.
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Figure 10. Observed effects for records (n = 122) in the theme of “Economy”.
Figure 10. Observed effects for records (n = 122) in the theme of “Economy”.
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Figure 11. Observed effects for records (n = 30) in the theme “Biodiversity”.
Figure 11. Observed effects for records (n = 30) in the theme “Biodiversity”.
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Figure 12. Observed effects for records (n = 24) in themes of “Animal production” and “Food”.
Figure 12. Observed effects for records (n = 24) in themes of “Animal production” and “Food”.
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Table 1. Variables extracted from the source studies and their descriptions. Data were extracted from the main text, tables, figures or Supplementary Materials.
Table 1. Variables extracted from the source studies and their descriptions. Data were extracted from the main text, tables, figures or Supplementary Materials.
LevelVariableDescription
PublicationAuthorsNames of authors that published the study
Year of publicationYear
Publication typeArticle, conference proceeding or book section
Journal nameName of the journal
PublisherName of the publisher
Residence of publisherCzech or other
Citation score of journalsCitation score of journals in the year of the publication (based on the Scopus CiteScore), NA if the publication was published before 2011 or if it was not in the Scopus database
Language of publicationCzech or English
RecordsStudy siteAt how many locations the research was conducted
Replication in timeYes/no
Sample sizeNumber of observations or data points collected per record
Difference between eco and convWhether a difference between organic and conventional systems was found
EffectThe nature of the effect of the farming system:
Increasing—significantly higher values in organic than in conventional agriculture;
Decreasing—significantly lower values in organic than in conventional agriculture;
Not significant—the differences were not statistically significant; Not evaluated—the differences were not evaluated statistically.
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Vašková, H.; Saska, P. Comparison of Organic and Conventional Agriculture in the Czech Republic: A Systematic Review. Agriculture 2024, 14, 2087. https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture14112087

AMA Style

Vašková H, Saska P. Comparison of Organic and Conventional Agriculture in the Czech Republic: A Systematic Review. Agriculture. 2024; 14(11):2087. https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture14112087

Chicago/Turabian Style

Vašková, Hana, and Pavel Saska. 2024. "Comparison of Organic and Conventional Agriculture in the Czech Republic: A Systematic Review" Agriculture 14, no. 11: 2087. https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture14112087

APA Style

Vašková, H., & Saska, P. (2024). Comparison of Organic and Conventional Agriculture in the Czech Republic: A Systematic Review. Agriculture, 14(11), 2087. https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture14112087

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