How Dr. Ehrenfried Pfeiffer Contributed to Organic Agriculture in Australia

Abstract

Biodynamic pioneer Ehrenfried Pfeiffer was a major contributor to Australia’s first organic farming journal, the Organic Farming Digest. He was the leading contributor from the USA. Pfeiffer was living in the USA when his articles appeared in the ‘Organic Farming Digest’ (later called the ‘Farm & Garden Digest’). The Digest was Australia’s first organic journal, and the world’s first organic journal to be published by an organic association (Paull, 2008). Pfeiffer’s ten articles published in Australia from 1949 to 1950 served to give Australia’s organic pioneers a taste of biodynamic thought and practice, and forged early links in Australia between biodynamic and other organic practices. A visit to Australia by Pfeiffer in 1953 was promoted in Australia but cancelled on short notice due to illness. At that time, Pfeiffer was the leading advocate of bio-dynamics in the Anglo-world. Pfeiffer’s insights and experience traced back directly to his induction with Rudolf Steiner at the Goetheanum in Switzerland.