The argument comes with a long series of events that happened over a distance of fifty years.
Text: Lucian Dragomir (bio farmer)
The agrarian revolution in Romania started at the beginning of the 60s, after the end of the bloodiest collectivization campaign of the East-European communist bloc, and was mainly done with machines with muddy traction, i.e. oxen, horses and donkeys!
The former dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, not wanting to depend on imports that would cost such precious currency for the communist regime, ordered that the national agriculture produce everything that was necessary for the specific imputations of modern agriculture at that time on the internal level. There were several industrial units that produced nitrogen in a totally ineffective way and far below the quantitative and qualitative needs of the entire agricultural activity.
Far from the advanced technologies of chemical amendment of the soil, the Romanian agronomists had to make do as they could to achieve the extremely ambitious agri-food goods production objectives drawn by the central leadership of the country.
The organization of production in large mixed CAPs (Agricultural Production Cooperatives), animal farms and vegetable farms, which most of the time included several communes with tens, hundreds or even thousands of hectares, naturally led to the creation of some symbiotic activities. Plant production had to ensure its necessary inputs by improving the soil with help from near-by workers in animal farms, who had problems with surplus manure anyway, there being no concern for its neutralization or isolation at that time.
In this way of working, Romania’s vegetable production soil has kept intact its natural content of humus, the mixture of amorphous organic substances in the soil, the only component which, when metabolized into plants, gives that unique natural taste of vegetables and fruits. Humus is formed by the decomposition of organic components, this being a natural process that lasts for hundreds of years and cannot be replicated by any chemical technology. We also find its benefits in dairy products: the vast majority of the dairy animals herds graze in mountainous areas where the spontaneous flora has not been altered by anything over time.
An enduring anthological moment is the time when, at the beginning of the 2010s, the CEO of the world’s largest agricultural machinery production company became intrigued by the large order made by the largest farm in Romania from Insula Mare a Brăilei. He hit exactly the spring plowing performed by the best performing machine at that time. The famous CEO, who was also good and well-versed in agriculture, took a piece of soil from the freshly cut furrow in his fist, saying that now he understands why the Romanian soil is so fruitful: the humus gives elasticity to the soil, so that, when pressed, it does not become just a boulder.
After the fall of the communist regime in 1989, the decline in agriculture took over for more than 20 years. Agriculture became an impoverished sector that, due to poor economic performance, could not even afford a modern irrigation system, let alone aggressive chemical inputs that were priced well beyond affordability.
Romania has 3.5 million registered farms, the most numerous in Europe, with over 90% of them stretching over an area of less than 5 hectares. This indicator demonstrates the type of agriculture practiced: an extensive, sustainable, environmentally friendly one.
Furthermore, Romanian agro-food products also taste good because they benefit from seasonality; we have four seasons, each with its own produce. Canned vegetables from over-summer are still produced on a large scale to be consumed in the cold, autumn-winter seasons: pickles made from green tomatoes, cucumbers, cabbage, cauliflower, root vegetables and all hard fruits; vegetable spread (zacuscă) made from eggplants, tomatoes and sweet and hot peppers grilled and cooked over wood fire – oftentimes the preparation involves using wood from fruit trees, either from spring cleaning or from very old specimens.
Photo credit: Romanian © LCVA | Dreamstime.com; Romanian Agriculture © Geeorrge | Dreamstime.com; Romanian Agriculture © Ana Mihaela Andrei Negru | Dreamstime.com
