There is a company in Estonia that has developed drones with sensors which are capable of detecting areas of damage created by plant disease or pests. What are the opportunities in specific sectors? Water is used sustainably, toilets ideally use rain water, for example, and vehicles used have low CO2 emissions. But small landholders are cautious; recent climate changes and a new trend among the youth who want to leave farming behind and develop new skills and careers in Bhutan or in India, will perhaps make this change to total organic farming more gradual than the Ministry expects. Estonian education ranks 1st in Europe. If we consider that our state forests are organic and add to it the private forests which also operate on organic principles, we can easily deduce that Estonia is covered in organic forest. In addition there is a unique research, development and production centre in Estonia – the knowledge-based health- and natural products competence centre at the Estonian University of Life Sciences in Polli, near Viljandi. 4 in its cultural influence , as well. Bhutan will ban sale and use of pesticides and herbicides and instead will rely completely on its animals and waste from farms for fertilizers. All crockery must be reusable and over-packaging is avoided. Organic cultivation accounts for 0.4% of total agriculture. The activities of the centre include the development of plant-based cosmetics products and research into bioactive compounds from garden ingredients for the product development of functional beverages, foodstuffs, household products, natural cosmetics and natural plant protection. BORGEN Magazine is produced by The Borgen Project, an influential humanitarian organization working to make global poverty a focus of U.S. foreign policy. Lonely Planet, the largest travel guidebook publisher in the world, has ranked Estonia as the number one best value destination for 2016. In summer there is about 4-5 hours of darkness in Estonia whereas in the winter the proportion of daylight approximately the same. Supported by a collaborative ecosystem well suited to research and development, Estonia is emerging as a centre of excellence in industrial automation. Nopri Dairy Farm collects birch- and maple sap in spring, and then bottles and freezes it in order to offer this valuable product all year long. 210,000 hectares of land were added to organic farming in 2014 alone. The country has 40 hotels with the Nordic Ecolabel and 20 that have received the Global Green Key Certification, meaning that an environmentally friendly stay is guaranteed on all aspects of the accommodation. The nominees for the Investor of the Year award are: Autumn 2020 issue of Life in Estonia highlights cyber security. Small producers are even more active. The term and content of natural, and especially organic, cosmetics still needs to be exactly defined at the European Union level. Would such giants be alive at the age of 140–160 years, if our forests were polluted? One of the world’s tallest pine trees, at a towering 46.6 metres, grows in the Ootsipalu valley in southern Estonia. Half of the Estonian territory is covered in forest, which, as our forests are all naturally grown. ‘Let’s think big. Workaholics from a London bank, Shanghai skyscraper or the New York Stock Exchange want to recharge their batteries, restore their energy in calm and peace, to breathe in fresh air and to enjoy tasty organic food. Estonia has a sizeable advanced industrial sector and world-class IT expertise in areas including high tech systems, control technologies and cyber security. It is a long-term and responsible attitude, in order to leave the next generations with a dignified life and a clean natural environment to enjoy. “Sustainable Root Intensification” (SRI) systems regulate the amount of water needed for crops and the age at which seedlings are planted and can increase crop yield without use of synthetic chemicals. Uganda is the African country with the largest number of organic farmers (191,000), as well as the leader in the region in terms of the … Estonian state forests are organic forests, where economic activity is carried out on the basis of the same principles as on organic agricultural land. Estonian people are real gatherers – they love to go picking mushrooms and berries and other natural ‘gifts’ – everything from herbs and tree sap and pine kernels to nuts and needles – in the woods. Thanks to this, it is possible to act in time and with moderate measures, without using pesticides on the whole field just to be sure. Playing first violin in 5G: The future will be born in Estonia, Estonian smartpots startup Click & Grow raises $11 million in investment from…, Mindvalley: Worldfamous entrepreneur wants to change the global education system…, Spring 2019 issue of Life in Estonia focuses on 5G and IoT, This website uses cookies. Unlike Western countries where size of crops seems to have been affected by going organic, Asian countries like Bhutan have figured out a way to resist soil quality from declining and increasing crop production. Let’s show the world how little Estonia can do great organic things!’. We have tranquillity and space, untouched nature and a variety of clean, raw materials close at hand. Saaremaa Dairy produces organic cheese ‘Öko Saaremaa’, and Berry Group Ltd. offers different frozen wild berries from Estonian forests. The Estonian natural cosmetics industry is still young, but the home-based preparation of natural beauty products has a long history as our ancestors were well informed about and made use of the exceptional power of herbs. According to Pema Gyamtsho, Minister of Agriculture and Forests in Bhutan, going organic was an obvious decision because Bhutan, a mountainous region, necessarily experienced a huge run-off of chemicals which affected plants and water adversely. Probably not…. These are just some examples out of many. As a reply he always says it is an idea, not a project which lasts until the Estonian state lasts. However, there are local producers such as GoodKaarma, Domina Elegans, Nurme, TurBliss, Lumi and others, who use certified organic ingredients in their cosmetics. TRAVEL FOR DIFFERENCE - Disclaimer, Photo: Anders Ekholm/Folio/imagebank.sweden.se (, How to be Sustainable in the World’s Most Visited Cities, 1990’s Sweden switched to district heating, 0.1% of the countries electricity is generated by fossil fuels, not only is relying on renewable energy more than achievable. Gyamtsho says Bhutan is exploring varieties of SRI crops that can be used; his department is also researching ways to extend irrigated land area and use traditional crops that are naturally high-yielding and pest-resistant. A small country has limited agricultural land – there is nowhere to expand, which means that we need to be very smart, effective and innovative in our approach,’ says Kabrits. ‘One of the goals of Organic Estonia has been reached,’ says Kabrits. On a grassroots level our way of thinking and our values are organic anyway. As certification is a complex and expensive process; there is no production of top level organic cosmetics in Estonia where at least 95 per cent of the ingredients extracted from nature or made of natural substances would be gathered from monitored organic lands in the wild. Swimming in a bog lake, hiking in the wilderness, picking and eating forest produce in the autumn, skating on smooth river ice in the winter, smoked saunas and many other Nordic-style experiences are ‘exotic’ things they cannot even dream about. Estonian Spirit OÜ Moe Fine Liquor Plant – the second longest-established vodka producer in the world – has the necessary certification to produce organic alcoholic beverages. In terms of the share of organic agricultural land we are already third in Europe and fifth in the entire world. Forty percent of the world’s organic producers are in Asia, followed by Africa (28 percent), and Latin America (16 percent). These two sides – natural and innovative – could prove to be a match made in heaven.