"Organic" vs "Conventional" food

[draggonlaady]

So, my standard statement: the term "organic" food pisses me off. By the very definition of the word, everything you eat had better be organic or you won't process it, you carbon-burner, you.

Anyway, study reported by the BBC found no significant differences in nutritional value between food crops raised using pesticides/fertilizers/etc and "organic" crops. This study did not, mind you, address potential differences in ecological impact between methods.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8174482.stm

Comments

[neogrammarian.livejournal.com]

wait wait wait- ppl think that organic has more nutritional value??

More ecologically sound, entirely likely, and certainly lower in residuals that make us sick (cf hormones fed to cows found in milk fed to little girls who grow up to have endometriosis)

But -nutritional value-??

Tangent- I think you'd like a trend in the UK to label everything a) what variety or breed it is and b) what county, and sometimes even what far it comes from. That's cool, and helps raise awareness w/o going all yuppie locavore about it.

[draggonlaady.livejournal.com]

Well, yeah.... that's the whole advertising point "eat organic, it's healthier for you" I've seen several claims about how over-fertilized crops grow so fast they don't have time to accumulate the right nutrients and are just watered-down chemicals.

There are lots of problems with just assuming organic is better for the environment too... shipping distance and type of management and type of hauler make a huge difference; something that comes from a tractor-plowed field 3 miles away and gets hauled in in the old beater flat-bed 1 ton with no muffler is going to do a good bit more environmental damage than something raised in a greenhouse and shipped by van from 50 miles away, for example.

I've always been bemused to see things like the yogurt in Trader Joe's: all organic, better for you and for the environment! Sold in non-recyclable plastic cups.

[neogrammarian.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the transportation issue Really needs to be addressed. I like my fruits and veggies in December as well as anyone, but you'd think we were smart enough to work a balance.

Don't get me started on recycling. It just makes me cranky. My township finally "got" recycling, but the list is short and it means that a lot of plastic still gets tossed (and that's even of the recyclable stuff). I can't even haul it anywhere myself- nowhere in the area will take #5 plastic (which seems to be the most common food container plastic).

[draggonlaady.livejournal.com]

I've never seen a yogurt container that wasn't a 5...at least, not the individual serving type. and anymore, most of them are not even easily reuseable, because they haven't got lids.

'Round here, the closest place that takes any plastic but milk jugs is 45 miles away. The take 1 and 2, but only if it has a neck smaller than the body, so the open yogurt buckets, coffee cans, etc still aren't accepted.

[winnett.livejournal.com]

I eat organic (yes, I wish they had picked a different word for it) because it is environmentally better. I don't want all those pesticides in the soil, water, air. I also hate the bovine growth hormone and all the other shit they put in meat, especially antibiotics that are making more medicine resilient germs.

Why do we have to fuck with our food? Throw some shit on your crops, plant a variety that help ward off insects.

Oh yeah... you don't make as good a prophet. Well, that's just so terrible.

I HATE the fact that people see organic as trendy and charge an arm and a leg for it.

[draggonlaady.livejournal.com]

Depending on the situation, it CAN be better for the environment. But not always; that was my point above about distance and type of hauler. And I have huge doubts that much of the organic stuff sold in big stores (Safeway has an organic section now, produce looks crappy, small selection, costs twice as much...) is actually better for the environment. And nobody has ever offered me evidence otherwise; are they getting that stuff locally? it doesn't say locally grown. Are they shipping it to Chewelah from Kansas? Hell if I know.

Not quite so simple as making a bigger profit. Sometimes it's about getting anything to grow; some of the GM grain crops hold huge promise for helping feed people in areas that currently can't grow high-yield crops for crap. How much food can you grow in a desert? Well, there are people living there...and picking a variety that wards off insects and grows in the area may mean you're growing prickly pear. Good luck with feeding people on that.

And last I heard, there'd been no evidence that treating animals with antibiotics leads to antibiotic resistant bacteria in humans... but I have read several studies in which animals GOT antibiotic resistant bacteria from humans. And human doctors have just as much (if not more) to speak for the overuse of antibiotics. How many times do they actually do culture/sensitivity on a kid's sinus infection? they just throw antibiotics at it, same as everyone yells about in animals. (You don't eat meat anyway--what if I like my BGH? Maybe it's yummy! *larf*)

You do what you can. But it's not clear and simple. I don't want to hear "Eat organic, it's better for you and the world!" I want to hear where it was raised, how it was processed, how it was shipped. I don't want to hear "my dairy cow has an infection, but I can't treat it, because if I ever give her antibiotics, she has to be culled from my organic herd and shipped off" And yes, that happens... the cow may be only 3 years old and still producing well, but if a non-organic dairy doesn't want her, she's hamburger, because the options are hold her out of production for some bizarrely long time (which the producer can't afford to do) or get rid of her.

Damn, now I wish I had kept that article I read the other day; some bloke in Pennsylvania was selling O-milk to Horizon, which is all huge on "we treat our animals better". Same bloke on the same place was running a puppy mill that'd been cited several times for cruelty and poor conditions. Money quote: "The small dachshund with the broken back should be treated or euthanized." Nothing's simple.