A certain group of people out there seems to have the misconception that organic food is beneficial to their health or the environment.
I argued against the environmental impact about a week ago. Organic farming uses more resources than conventional farming. Therefore the productivity per ton of water or per acre of land is smaller. This is not a big problem for Europe or America. We are producing too much food anyways. But it is a problem for many African countries, where people are starving because organic food production increases world market prices of their staples by reducing the amount exported from the industrialized countries. Who wants to grow cheap rice if he can sell organic fair trade chocolate to the US?
Today I will be extremely selfish and solely focus on the health aspect of organic food. I’m not an expert in nutrition or chemistry. Thanks to the worldwide scientific community I don’t have to. There is plenty of peer-reviewed, high quality research material out there I can look at. After about 10 minutes, I found two papers that said the following:
There appears to be widespread perception amongst consumers that such methods result in foods of higher nutritional quality. The present review concludes that evidence that can support or refute such perception is not available in the scientific literature.
– Hugh Sinclair, Unit of Human Nutrition, School of Food Biosciences, University of Reading in “Proceedings of the Nutrition Society (2002), 61, 19–24“
The study showed that organic dairy farms, as compared with matched conventional farms, were producing milk without increased rates of reported CM, BTSCC, cul l i ng rat e, lameness scores or sanitation scores . Notable di ff er ences bet ween organic dairy farms and conventional farms were lower milk production per cow and smaller herd size. There was little evidence of other fundamental differences between the two farm types in other management and production parameters.
– College of Veterinary Medicine, Michigan State University in “Livestock Production Science 93 (2005) 105 – 115“
Organically produced food products have no proven health benefits as per now. That’s not the end of the story, but what we know as per NOW. In five years time we might find out that everyone who eats conventionally produced food will die a slow and painful death. Thing is we don’t know that. We could also find out that a all-mighty teapot is orbiting the sun. Could be, but it’s not likely.
I consider skepticism and fact-based reasoning as the fundamentals of Western society as it developed in Europe after the Age of Enlightenment and the Renaissance. They are the main source of our prosperity and the great life we can enjoy today. If we lose them we are no better than our ancestors during the medieval ages in (Christian) Europe, some Voodoo guys in Africa who circumcise young girls for so-called “traditional” reasons, Creationists in the US or Homeopaths.
If some hippies go out and tell people that everyone has to eat organic because it’s healthier they are no better than these kinds of people. One shouldn’t sell his ideals, morals or his imagination of a perfect world as facts. You should rather use facts to argue for your view of an ideal world. I’m sure there are people who would like to know the first name of every cow they eat. They like to imagine happy farmers working on a small picture-perfect farm with lots of happy animals. Just like they were told when they were young. It’s totally fair to have this opinion.
But it’s wrong to try to convince other people by telling them lies. If you think the agricultural industry should be like Old MacDonald’s farm, you are free to find others who share this view and open a farm that is being managed just like that. Problem is that there is
- no measurable difference in quality and
- it is not possible to create the kind of wealth we have today with this kind of structure.
Before the green revolution everything was organic and people back then weren’t happier either. Actually they died at around 60. Maybe younger.
I really urge you to reality check your perceptions and beliefs from time to time. You may have had them for a long time. Maybe your parents or teachers taught them to you. This all doesn’t matter. They are not infallible (Just the pope is). You are not infallible. Neither am I. We constantly need to improve our understanding of the world to make it better for us. This is just our nature.
Kick it like Locke!
On Thursday we should take the opportunity to remind our governments and ourselves where their power comes from. It was given to them by their citizens, the common people, by us. They should never forget that the only ones they are truly accountable to is their people. It’s not lobbyist groups, other governments and its most certainly no god.
