International federation of Organic Agriculture Movements - IFOAM is the worldwide umbrella organisation of the organic agriculture movement, with about 700 members from 100 countries all over the world (2004).

Major aims and activities of IFOAM are:
v To exchange knowledge and expertise among its members and to inform the public about organic agriculture.
v To represent internationally, the organic movement in parliamentary, administrative and policy making forums (IFOAM has for example consultative status with the UNO and FAO).
v To set and regularly revise the international “IFOAM Basic Standards of Organic Agriculture and Food Processing” (these IFOAM Basic Standards are translated into 19 languages!).
v To make an international guarantee of organic quality a reality. The International Organic Accreditation Services, Inc. (IOAS) runs the IFOAM Accreditation Programme to ensure equivalency of certification programmes worldwide.

Due to a better efficiency several regional groups were established within the IFOAM system. AgriBioMediterraneo (ABM) in 2004 gathers 146 IFOAM members from three continents and 16 Mediterranean countries: Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Egypt, France, Greece, Israel, Italy, Palestine, Portugal, Serbia & Montenegro, Slovenia, Spain, Tunisia and Turkey.

ABM was established as a regional initiative during the conference in Vignola, Italy in 1990. From 1997 it is an official regional IFOAM group.

IFOAM AgriBioMediterraneo has two major aims:
v To promote, develop and disseminate information, knowledge and expertise related to Mediterranean organic agriculture and food production.
v Development of AgriBioTourism on family farms.

Within IFOAM ABM is responsible for specific Mediterranean organic agriculture issues (marketing, research & development, standards & certification and training). To maximise its efforts, ABM has founded four working groups to focus on that main issues. Working groups are the following:

* Working Group for Marketing
* Working Group for Research and Development
* Working Group for Standards and Certification
* Working Group for Training.

Special emphasis is given to development of organic oliveculture, viticulture, citrus and Mediterranean fruit, arable crops and livestock growing, as well as on development of local markets, regional standards and AgroBioTourism.