Over the years, the agribusiness line has not changed much: “Claims of organic superiority can’t be substantiated.” “If we farm organically, half the world will starve.” “Organically-grown food is more dangerous than conventionally grown food.” “Organic food is contaminated with E. coli bacteria.” I even saw a chemical company flack drink what he said was a glass of water mixed with pesticide to prove its safety to the House Agriculture Committee. But over this time, the evidence for the actual superiority of organic food has steadily grown, and now the claims of industry seem pitiful and ludicrous. And I wonder how that guy who drank the pesticide is doing?
A telling report by the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has a reliable summation of the safety benefits of organic food production. Here are a few excerpts.
Cattle are ruminants naturally meant to eat grass, not grain. But most American cattle are
“finished” on grain diets to add fat quickly. Virulent, disease-causing forms of E. coli develop in the stomachs of these cattle, but not in the rumens of grass-fed cattle. It’s one of the most important goals of organic beef production to keep the nutrient cycles closed, and so the animals are fed on diets of hay, grass, and silage. “It can be concluded,” the FAO said, “that organic farming potentially reduces the risk of E. coli infection.”
Aflatoxin is a carcinogen produced by a grain fungus. According to the FAO:
Two studies found that aflatoxin levels in organic milk were lower than in conventional milk. As organically raised livestock are fed greater proportions of hay, grass, and silage, there is reduced opportunity for mycotoxin-contaminated feed (grain contaminated with the fungus) to lead to mycotoxin-contaminated milk…. Organic agriculture’s contributions to cleaner drinking water, for example in Lithuania’s Karst area, UK’s environmentally sensitive areas, and Germany’s water protection areas, and to higher weed, insect, and bird diversity and general environmental quality, are positive values appreciated by consumers. Organic farming enhances genetic biodiversity, including organisms living in the soil, wildlife, wild flora, and cultivated crops. Organic agriculture practices recover indigenous crop varieties and regenerate landscapes with distinct quality characteristics. The FAO Committee on Agriculture agreed in 1999 that properly managed organic farming contributes to sustainable agriculture and therefore has a legitimate place within the U.N.’s sustainable agriculture programs.
In Europe, where folks seem to be far ahead of the United States in implementing organic agriculture, more than 16,000 people were asked by the Eurobarometer polling organization whether they favored organic farming as a goal for the European Union’s agricultural policy. Seventy-two percent said yes.
Organic foods are far safer than conventional, according to a study published in the peer-reviewed journal, Food Additives and Contaminants. The study team included analysts from Consumers Union, the publisher of Consumer Reports, and the Organic Materials Research Institute. The data covered more than 94,000 food samples taken through the 1990s and showed that about 80 percent of conventional foods showed pesticide residues, but only 27 percent of organic samples did, and that multiple residues were ten times more common in conventional foods. ....read more
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