Welcome to the inquiry on Charm Incosia, each week four expert witnesses, one question and an answer.

It's August 2019.

A former military officer from a powerful political family is campaigning to be Sri Lanka's next leader.

Three months later, Gautabaya Rajapasca is sworn in as the country's president.

He won the election with a new vision for Sri Lanka, including a bold policy for the entire country to switch the holy organic food production within ten years.

This plan was hugely ambitious, but it was also deeply flawed.

It's now cited as one of the reasons Sri Lanka has sunk into its worst economic crisis for decades, sparking outrage, protest and a new term.

So this week we're asking, why did Sri Lanka's organic farming dream fail?

Part 1. The Green Revolution

Agriculture is very important, particularly when it comes to employment.

Joveka Vera Heva is a professor of agriculture economics at the University of Peridena in Sri Lanka.

At the time that President Rajapasca was elected, farming-related industries were vital to the economy.

25% of our labor force is engaged in agriculture sector.

What it means is that 2 million people were working in the agriculture sector.

So if you look at our contributions to GDP, you will say that agriculture sector itself contributes around 7% to the GDP.

However, if you look at food manufacturing, you can see that another 6% is contributed by food manufacturing.

So even when you look at the gross national production, agriculture and food constitute fairly a large amount.

Around 80% of Sri Lanka's domestic food supply was produced by the country's smallholder farmers.

The main one is rice. It is our staple food and we need around 10 kg per person per month.

And we were more than sufficient in rice.

And also in vegetables, tropical fruits, coconut, meat, eggs.

It had taken many years to reach that point.

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