In South Tyrol there is a great variety of agricultural crops and a careful handling of pesticides. This was underlined by the Südtiroler Bauernbund with regard to the protest march of several environmental groups on Sunday at Lake Caldaro.
"The environmental groups involved paint a wrong picture of our agricultural endeavours," says Bauernbund director Siegfried Rinner. "All agricultural 
sectors are working with the goal of sustainability. When it comes to crop protection, all the environmental measurements of recent years have shown that we are a not even close to a contamination threshold for our citizens."
Sales difficulties
Environmental groups call for 100% organic farming. "You can not ideologically approach the topic of 'organic' and then paint a very black and white situation," says the Farmers' Federation Director. He refers to the annual growth in organic farming. One in four European organic apples comes from South Tyrol, even though the share of organic apples in sales is only 4 percent. "At the moment, we are also having sales difficulties in the organic sector," remarks Rinner.