The "Organic" Trend - do you believe the hype?

[olive bleu]

i really don't know what to believe anymore. I guess, i like to buy food when i can as close to the source as possible. I like to go to the farmers market to buy local , fresh produce and meat. I do like to support local farmers, it alarms me that the small family run farm, in North America is in jeopardy.But, the truth is, i buy the healthiest food i can afford. I can't get it all. I also like to buy fair-trade coffee.I can't afford to buy fair-trade coffee, organic fruit & veggies, free -range eggs AND free roaming happy animal meat(what do you call that anyway, I'm feeling braindead.)I usually buy the coffee, local produce inseason and occasionally free range eggs. Sometimes i feel having principles is a luxury only the rich can afford. In the end, i am honestly not sure it makes a difference.THe whole topic of food has become so political,you can't just sit down to a meal anymore without analyzing everything on yourplate.All i can commit to is buying the healthiest food i can afford for my kids.At the end of the day, I am still ahead of those who feed their kids chocolate bars for breakfast.

 

[Michaelson]

Free range eggs? [huh]

That's a new one on me.

Regards! Michaelson

 

[Baron Kurtz]

eggs from chickens that are "free to roam". This generally means that they're crammed into barns instead of cages. Still have their beaks clipped, though.:eusa_doh:

bk

 

[Michaelson]

Ah, ok.

Regards! Michaelson

 

[Miss_Bella_Hell]

Organic. The 'buzz word' of the moment.

Sort of reminds me of the hype about 'free range chicken'. All that means is a chicken is allowed to run around and eat anything that crosses it's path.....which is exactly what FARM raised chickens do in chicken houses, with the exception that they get corn and feed added to their diet.....but when you add 'free range' to the name on the package or menu, the price doubles.lol

Same thing with 'organic' around my neck of the woods. You pay almost double for someone to supposedly NOT use chemicals or the like on what you're about to put in your face for supper.. sort or reminds me of the old 'protection racket' that the mobs had back int he 30's. 'Pay me this amount of money, and I might not put crud in your food!'

Regards! Michaelson

Err...well, it depends on where your chickens are coming from. Plenty of chickens people eat are plopped in wire cages stacked floor to ceiling and never move out of that (very small) cage. Unless a chicken is lucky enough to be on the top cage, it's getting pooped on by its mates.

 

[olive bleu]

i don't think i want to come back as a chicken, regardless

 

[Haversack]

In keeping with our collective era of interest, pretty much all food produced in the Golden Era, (at least up to WWII), was organic. No pesticides. No artificial fertilizers. No antibiotics. No growth hormones. Of course, that doesn't mean that industrialized or adulterated food didn't exist here in the U.S. Consider cattle drives, reefer cars, and the Chicago Stockyards along with watered and chalked milk, ground lead in pepper, and _The Jungle_. Still, up until the introduction of DDT, pretty much everything we ate would be considered organic by today's standards.

Of course, food was more expensive to produce and took up more of the average persons' paycheck than it does today. With a few exceptions, it was probably all grown within a couple hundred miles of where people lived. (But that is a different story...) Suffice to say that the revival of interest in raising food without the benefits of petro-chemicals and pharmacueticals started in the 1960s along with the environmental movement and the serious back-to-the landers within the counter culture. Of course with the political ban hereabouts, I had better not say any more. Historically, food has been very political, and as they say out here in the west, "whisky's for drinkin', water's for fightin'".

For myself, I prefer that my meat, dairy, and foie gras be organic, (as certified by Oregon Tilth, not the watered-down Federal standards), because of concentration effects, but also because they taste much better and the animals they came from have likely been well cared for. The fruits and vegetables which I eat I prefer to be locally and seasonally grown. The quality is best and cheapest this way. Their 'organicness' is less of a factor. I also subscribe to Consumer Supported Agriculture and for nine months of the year get a box of locally-grown fruit and vegetables delivered once a week. I know the people who grow a good part of my diet, have had them to dinner, and trade recipes. To be sure, it costs more from the pocketbook than buying from Safeway, Costco, or Food Lion. But that way I eat smaller quantities which taste better. That way I figure the meal the worms will eventually get will in turn taste better too.

Haversack.

 

[Elaina]

Chicken is always tricky, there's a good couple companies tha pretty much do free range and don't charge extra for it, nor do they do anything to the chickens other then give them a good diet, and the chicken workers have to have shoes just for the farm, shower before and after entering etc.

Now I don't really like chicken. I worked on a farm as a kid that had chickens and they're supid, filthy animals. Makes you kind of not want to eat them. Lamb now, they're just mean, I once raised one and sold it on autction with the stipulation I got to come for dinner one time. That was about as organic as you can be.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

Trader Joe's, for example, is cheap and the organics are minimally more expensive than the conventionals.

Trader Joe's is the commerce god's gift to my neck of the woods. When I was living in Chile, I missed Trader Joe's more than I did any other retailer.


.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

We have a farmer's market I can walk to where I'm at, but the problem is is largely it's illegal immigrants and imported from Mexico.

Why is this a problem? The farmer's market is supplying a demand, is it not?

.

 

[Elaina]

Political. You support illegal immigrants, then they bypass the American system. Or the money goes away from the local farmer to Mexico. To me, buying locally is supposed to go to local farmers, not foreign ones or ones that don't persue citzenship legally.

 

[Lincsong]

Not really, I'm healthy and I never watch what I eat. So I don't really buy into the organic hype. One brother and one sister do, and she's got high blood pressure, overweight, he's always got something wrong with him. So I don't think it matters.

 

[Miss_Bella_Hell]

Not really, I'm healthy and I never watch what I eat. So I don't really buy into the organic hype. One brother and one sister do, and she's got high blood pressure, overweight, he's always got something wrong with him. So I don't think it matters.

Maybe you're just lucky! lol

 

[GOK]

In keeping with our collective era of interest, pretty much all food produced in the Golden Era, (at least up to WWII), was organic. No pesticides. No artificial fertilizers. No antibiotics. No growth hormones.

Interesting you should say that because between 1940 and 1991 the Ministry of Agriculture, Farms and Fisheries (MAFF, now DEFRA) conducted a long term study of farming practices in the UK. The findings indicate that during those 50 years, there was a 76% decline in the trace mineral content of UK grown fruit and vegetables grown during this time. *

In 2000, a review of over 400 scientific papers by an independent nutritionist and published by the Soil Association (in the UK, only growers and products certified by the SA are truly organic/free range) found indicative evidence of nutritional differences between organic and non-organic food – including higher levels of Vitamin C, minerals and trace elements in the organic.**

It's not merely a case of organic tasting better or containing less harmful sunstances, it's also the issue of environmental impact. Using artificial chemicals and pesticides takes its toll on the earth, the atmosphere and countless species that we rarely give a second thought to.

However, is organic always better? For vegans, no it's not, unless plant-based fertilisers and pest control are used. When I was self sufficient, I made my own fertiliser from nettles and comfrey steeped in barrels of rainwater, plus had a large compost heap. Pest control was done with the aid of companion planting, nematodes and my own garlic and chilli spray (my roses were beautiful!!). I have to tell you that nothing I have bought has ever tasted as good as the food I used to grow. Like Elaina, I always made (and still do a lot of the time) my own medicines for my family. But...and this is a big but (no jokes about big butts please - especially mine!), I was fortunate to have been born and raised in the country and had generations of my family's experience and advice behind me. I realise that not everyone is in such a postition. If you can do it though, there can be no doubt that growing one's own organic food is beneficial in terms of taste and health benefits and is ecologically sound.

Commercial organic food is often not viable for vegans because of the use of animal fertilisers. This isn't because of some high-blown notion of the animal not giving its dung freely, it's because in most instances the manure comes from farms or set ups that use animals as food sources. Most vegans I know find this unacceptable.

Then there is the issue of eco footprints. Take a bag of organically grown potatoes. Let's use Jersey Royals in this example. They are grown in Jersey (part of the Channel Isles), they are then shipped to the US. From the port, they are then distributed all over the country. You then drive to the store to buy a bag of potatoes. Bag for bag, your journey has used more fuel, polluted the atmosphere more and created a much larger eco footprint than shipping the potatoes and distributing them. Buying a bag of locally grown non-organic potatoes is actually a better bet, eco-wise.

As with anything, it's a question of balance. The principle of organic produce is sound but the practice is sometimes less than ideal. Oh, and returning briefly to the taste and vitamin factors. In a lot of cases, by the time the food gets to your store, it has lost a good deal of freshness and therefore, vitamin content, plus the taste is often lacking. I no longer buy organic bananas (I would if they were grown here in the UK) because the health and taste benefits are negligable. I do however, buy Fairtrade ones.

For myself, I prefer that my meat, dairy, and foie gras be organic, (as certified by Oregon Tilth, not the watered-down Federal standards), because of concentration effects, but also because they taste much better and the animals they came from have likely been well cared for.

fftopic: OK I don't want to start a fight here but on what planet is keeping an animal in semi darkness and then force-feeding it through a foot-long tube inserted into its esophagus considered caring well for a creature?

In natural circumstances, ducks and geese browse for food, taking their time and eating as and when needed. In foie gras production, if an auger is used (this method is known as gavage), the feeding takes about 45 to 60 seconds. Farms that use modern production methods pump the mash into the animal, which takes around 2 to 3 seconds. Sometimes the food sticks and is often puggled down with a stick. Shoving a stick down an animal's throat? Come on.

To begin with, a duck or goose will probably be fed a dry weight of around 250g of food per day, rising to a kilo or more (in dry weight) by the the time it goes to slaughter. Since the food is made with liquid into a mash (53% dry to 47% liquid), the actual amount of food force-fed is much greater. Consider that amount in proportion to the body weight of the animal. Could you comfortably eat that much?***

The birds’ livers, which become engorged from a carbohydrate-rich diet, can grow to more than 10 times their normal size (a condition called hepatic steatosis). The mortality rate of birds raised for foie gras has been found to be as much as 20 times higher than that of birds raised normally, and carcasses show wing fractures and severe tissue damage to the throat muscles.

And if you think that US foie gras farms don't engage in such barbaric practices, think again. The major U.S. producers of foie gras are Hudson Valley Foie Gras in New York and Sonoma Foie Gras in California. ****

A PETA investigation of a foie gras production facility at Commonwealth Enterprises in New York revealed that workers were expected to force-feed 500 birds three times a day. A worker told one of PETA’s investigators that he could feel tumor-like lumps, caused by force-feeding, in some ducks’ throats. One duck had a maggot-covered neck wound that was so severe that water spilled out of it when he drank. Workers routinely carried ducks by their necks, causing them to choke and defecate in distress.

One veterinarian who accompanied the police on their raid of Commonwealth noted, “Many of the ducks … were lame or unable to walk without using their wings for support. Some ducks moved by pushing their bodies along the floor. Healthy ducks spend much of their time on their feet, constantly investigating their environment.” This same veterinarian said, “All of the birds in the force-feeding area had dirty, ragged, incomplete plumage, yet none were attempting to preen. Only severely stressed or ill ducks allow their plumage to deteriorate to [such a] degree. … Normal ducks keep their feathers in near-perfect condition.”(13)

A New York state wildlife pathologist who examined ducks from Commonwealth expressed horror at the birds’ “greatly enlarged livers, the product of overfeeding by force (livers are easily torn by even minor trauma)” and at one duck’s “laceration of the liver with hemorrhage into the body cavity.” He went on to say, “This type of treatment and farming of waterfowl is outside the acceptable norms of agriculture and sane treatment of animals.”(14) And he later told PETA, “If this kind of thing was happening to dogs, it would be stopped immediately.”(15)

A New York Times reporter who visited Sonoma Foie Gras found that young ducks had their beaks clipped and that birds “were so fat [that] they moved little and panted.” The reporter also noted that at the age of 12 to 15 weeks, birds were confined to dark sheds that had “standing water … deep enough to suggest a drainage problem.”(16) Please visit www.gourmetcruelty.com or www.aprl.org to view footage and to learn more about this investigation.******

Interestingly, although production of foie gras is illegal in the following places;

Germany
The United Kingdom
Ireland
Israel
Denmark
Norway
The Netherlands
US: Chicago (from August 2006), California (from2012)

it does not stop them importing it from inhumane producers. Germany and Britain are the leading importers on that list. How very hypocritical.

For the record, if you absolutely must have foie gras, there is a Spanish company that produces it humanely; Pater??a de Sousa. See here and here

I suspect there will be those of you here that will want to shoot me down in flames for this and will decry PETA and its findings (I've seen and heard it all!). You have every right to do that of course...just so long as you respect my right to speak out against practices such as the above.













*McCance & Widdowson 1940 –91, The Composition of Foods, 1st to 5th editions, published by MAFF/RSC. Also Mayer AM, 1997, ‘Historical changes in the mineral contents of fruit and vegetables cited in Agricultural production and nutrition, Tufts University School of Nutrition Science and Policy, Boston, MA, Lockeretz W (ed).

**Organic farming, food quality and human health, A review of the evidence. Soil Association,
2000 ISBN 0 905200 80 2 2

***Guemene D, et al., “Force-feeding procedure and physiological indicators of stress in male mule ducks,” Br Poult Sci. 2001 Dec; 42(5):650–7, p.651.

****Patricia Leigh Brown, “Foie Gras Fracas: Haute Cuisine Meets the Duck Liberators,” The New York Times, 24 Sep. 2003.

Nick Ravo, “A Cornucopia of Native Foie Gras,” The New York Times, 24 Sep. 1998.

******http://www.peta.org.uk/factsheet/files/FactsheetDisplay.asp?ID=119

 

[Jazzman64]

Don't forget about foods produced biodynamically. Biodynamic, organic, all very confusing.

I usually try to buy seasonal organic fruits and vegs from a local CSA program or farmers market (usually cheaper than whole foods). Can't do that though in the winter so sadly Whole Foods or one of its equivalents seems to be the only alternative for organic. IMO though, the Whole Foods route does seem to be sort of a contradiction to the organic concept given the amount of petrochemicals used to ship their produce to each of their stores.

Also, being an omnivore, I try to buy most of my meats from local organic producers who also raise their livestock on pasture as opposed to stuffing them with corn. I have yet to find a relatively inexpensive organic meat producer but, I'm willing to pay the premium in order to avoid ingesting copious amounts of petroleum products and antibiotics

 

[Briscoeteque]

I feel like organic farming does far more harm than good. It does not produce enough relatively, and I feel the methods it uses for pest control even worse than most pest control. Genetically engineer food, make it as plentiful as possible, because there's alot of hungry people out there.

 

[Ben]

There is a difference between 'organic' as a marketing term, and being certified as organic by the USDA. The regulations are available here and are pretty extensive.

http://www.ams.usda.gov/nop/NOP/standards/CertReg.html

GOK, I love your post. It is always good to see people sourcing their claims.

 

[GOK]

There is a difference between 'organic' as a marketing term, and being certified as organic by the USDA. The regulations are available here and are pretty extensive.

http://www.ams.usda.gov/nop/NOP/standards/CertReg.html

GOK, I love your post. It is always good to see people sourcing their claims.

Thank you Ben - I'm still wearing my flameproof suit (in a vintage styleee) though!

 

[Section10]

I'm finding it very hard to believe that any farmer would be able to get raw sewage, let alone dump it on his fields.

When I had my farm, I could have gotten all I wanted. The septic tank trucks have to pay to empty at the sewage treatment plant and they are happy to dump it in a field for free. I never took them up on it though.

 

[jazzbass]

And bottled water is really a silly waste of money. If you are willing to pay more than a dollar for a pint or so of water, then it really shoots holes in any complaint over gasoline at $2.50 a gallon.

You haven't tasted (or smelled) my tap water....

Carbon filters only minimally help.





bob