The Organic Trade Association has reported double digit sales growth for 2013 in its latest survey.
The key driver of sales is organic food and beverage products which have risen significantly and now stand at $32.3 billion, which accounts for circa 92% of the total organic sales.
This increase continues the upwards trend which has seen organic food sales rise on average by almost 10% every year since 2010. This is a significant growth difference when compared with the average annual growth of just over 3% in total food sales during that same period.
US Organic Food vs Total Food Sales, Growth and Penetration | ||||||
Category | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 |
Organic Food ($ bn) | 18.19 | 21.57 | 22.50 | 24.12 | 26.34 | 29.02 |
Growth (%) | 16.4 | 18.6 | 4.3 | 7.2 | 9.2 | 10.2 |
Total Food ($ bn) | 628.22 | 659.01 | 669.56 | 677.35 | 713.99 | 740.45 |
Growth (%) | 5.0 | 4.9 | 1.6 | 1.2 | 5.4 | 3.7 |
Organic (as % of total) | 2.9 | 3.3 | 3.4 | 3.6 | 3.7 | 3.9 |
Source: Organic Trade Association (Organic Industry Survey 2014) | ||||||
Whilst this news is very good for the sector, there are potential problems to overcome, heading into the future, in particular land conversion and supplies of organic feed and grain.
Challenges to keep up with demand
- US farmland is not being converted at a rate quick enough to keep up with demand.
- Supplies of organic feed and grain have been difficult to source due to short supply, hence costly. This could potentially limit growth especially in the organic dairy and meat sectors.