Why Organic?

[arwmommy]

We need to remember that when you talk about how "expensive" organic food is, we are forgetting to discuss how truly EXPENSIVE conventionally raised food is.

Yes, it may be cheaper up front, but when you have to shell out a ton of money for medical bills later (for infertility because you have so many toxins in your body that it will not ovulate, for medication or behavorists because your child cannot learn, for the cancer because you have ingested so many insecticidal residue, etc, etc), and you factor in the pain and suffering, organic is WAY WAY WAY cheaper.

This doesn't even factor into the equation the way that organic farming BUILDS the soil, that pastured, organic animal raising is HUMANE and COMPASSIONATE.

When you are factoring in "How much does that organic chicken cost" make sure you think about the type of farming that you WANT to support--- humane? Natural (the way the animals are supposed to live)? Non-toxic? Hormone free?...........or just CHEAP? Even if money is tight, you always get what you pay for. It may be cheap in the short term, but in the long term it will be much, much more expensive for you , for your family, and for the farming community who is trying to make a difference.

As the mother of a child who has had a catastrophic medical history, I assure you, my son's first year that was over 5 million dollars (literally) and billions of shed tears was not cheap. While I have no idea if conventional farming contributed in ANY way to his medical problems (a congenital heart defect requiring 2 open heart surgeries), I know that a medical crisis is heartbreaking, and insanely expensive. If there is a chance that I can reduce my children's ingestion of toxins and the impact that it will have in their bodies in the future, while supporting sustainable, local farmers who treat their animals humanely...... well, that opportunity is just too good to pass up.............I will gladly pay more for the blessing of organic food.

 

[kstaven]

Well said Leanna.

 

[seedcorn]

AWRmommy, No problem w/any of your statments, American Ag will grow anything anyway the American consumer will pay for. The reason GMO crops are taking over is very simple. GMO products are cheapier per acre to put out and are giving better performance, thus the farmer is making more money which he in turn gives to landowners in rent and his inputs. FYI nitrogen to grow corn has went up 40% if you pay now, in season may double--ant that's just one input.

Ksteven, hay this year is an outstanding crop if you have any but due to weather our crop is about 1/2 of normal yields. Last year, hay was cheapier than straw in areas. hay is not a viable alternative for everyone, for some it is. Canadian farmers are government price supported/protected unlike their American counterpart plus you have National health care, we don't. Farming in Canada/Europe is a totally different financial gig than American.

For those that eat 3rd world produce, they still use DDT. So when you buy 3rd world produce, know that you are eating a chemical that is illegal (rightly so) in America. American produce growers can not compete w/the fresh produce of Mexico, etc. Take a look at the labels when you buy grapes, pinapples, banana's etc as to where they are grown. Support your american farmer and he will grow what ever you want however you want it but don't make us compete w/Mexico or government supported Ag, we can't.

 

[Agilityscots]

Quote:
Here, here. Excellent post.

Amy

 

[SeaChick]

Support your american farmer and he will grow what ever you want however you want

Exactly. And support your LOCAL American (TRUE) ORGANIC farmer, and he'll grow true organic produce for you. It may take some time, but American Ag, as you put it, CAN CHANGE.

Anyone read Tim Magazine's excellent article about the new Farm Bill? Here are some things to REALLY think about when you're contemplating American farming. The current farm policies in this country are DISGRACEFUL and are all about making the richer few even richer while not really taking care of small farmers nor planning for the future. They also CONTRIBUTE TO THE NATIONAL OBESITY PROBLEM by encouraging and subsidizing the cheapest, most fattening calories around. Truly, it makes me SICK how greedy and short-sighted some people can be.......
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1680139,00.html

U.S. Agricultural Policy...redistributes our taxes to millionaire farmers as well as to millionaire "farmers" like David Letterman, David Rockefeller and the owners of the Utah Jazz. It contributes to our obesity and illegal-immigration epidemics and to our water and energy shortages. It helps degrade rivers, deplete aquifers, eliminate grasslands, concentrate food-processing conglomerates and inundate our fast-food nation with high-fructose corn syrup. Our farm policy is supposed to save small farmers and small towns. Instead it fuels the expansion of industrial megafarms and the depopulation of rural America. It hurts Third World farmers, violates international trade deals and paralyzes our efforts to open foreign markets to the nonagricultural goods and services that make up the remaining 99% of our economy.

In reality, the top 10% of subsidized farmers collect nearly three-quarters of the subsidies, for an average of almost $35,000 per year. The bottom 80% average just $700. That's worth repeating: most farmers, especially the small farmers whose steadfast family values and precarious family finances are invoked to justify the programs, get little or nothing.

Lots of people TRIED hard to make a change this time around, but they failed:

But it's never wise to bet against the farm lobby, which spent $135 million on lobbying and donations last year and brilliantly portrays opponents as enemies of the heartland of America.

Very sad.​

 

[Agilityscots]

Quote:
Hi Seedcorn,

I'm already paying substantially more for my organic food than if I were buying standard-issue, traditionally farmed and produced food. For example:

1. I pay $5.69 for a pound of unsalted butter by Organic Valley, a farming cooperative. I refuse to buy Horizon Organic, which is considerably cheaper (in the $3 range) because of their practices. Kroger's regular butter is $1.50-2.50, depending on sales.

2. I pay roughly $4 for a 16-oz. container of Organic Valley cottage cheese. I used to get cottage cheese on sale at Kroger's for $1.50.

3. I buy organic flours made by Bob's Red Mill and King Arthur; each package (standard size, can't remember how much they weigh) costs roughly $6.

4. Before my girls started laying (woo hoo!) I bought eggs from an organic farmer who lives a few miles from me, at $3.50/dozen. Quite a bit more expensive than the $1.50 or so I could pay at the grocery store for factory-farmed eggs. I also bought organic spinach from him...watched him cut it right off the plant in his cold frame, load it up in a grocery bag and charge me $5. That's roughly twice what it would cost in a grocery store.

I don't eat meat but my husband does, so we buy only organic meats as well.

So I'm already paying quite a bit more. Yes, it's expensive. Yes, I pay about $25-50 more each week to feed myself and my husband. It's worth it to me. I can't think of anything more important, more valuable than buying the best food to nourish myself with. Barbara Kingsolver addresses this conundrum, that of Americans wanting to buy and feed themselves with the cheapest food they can find, in her book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life.

And as far as the "fish/algae" gene, still no thank you. I'm all for old-fashioned genetic engineering--creating hybrids and crosses within species through careful breeding--but I'm not going to touch anything with genes from outside its own species if I can help it. And the only way I CAN help it is to self-educate, since labeling laws in this country favor agribusiness and the Almighty Dollar rather than the consumer. And, Roundup may be touted as the "safest" chemical--and safe seems a dubious claim--but I'd still prefer not to eat it, or drink it through runoff in my drinking water. I'll pass.

Amy

 

[seedcorn]

Again, thank you for all the input. I didn't start this thread but find it highly enlightning.

To those that pay extra for the kind of food you want, continue on, that is how you can change an industry. Give the American farmer $5/lb pork instead of $.40 and he'll give you all the organic pork, chicken, etc you want.

To be honest, you have to know we feed/sell many times more organic than is grown. A lot of "organic" food is really "less" chemicals used. It needs to be identified as such. Organic growers break their own rules w/excuse we have no choice. It's either organic or it isn't. That's my problem with them. Free range is even more disturbing.

 

[valmom]

The problem with "organic" not being really organic and "free range" not really being free range is that the government defines both those terms. And according to our government they do not mean what would be logical or a dictionary definition.

You can't believe an "organic" label anymore. If you don't know the farmer or grow it yourself it probably isn't really organic. And , I forget the definition of "free range", but it is something idiotic like the chickens have to see daylight for so many hours a day or something. I'll have to try to find it, I know I read it somewhere.

 

[Rosalind]

1) Here in Indiana, cash rent is $100-$200/acre cash rent. You mentioned allowing ground to sit a year w/a ground cover. How would you do that if you farmed 500Acres? How do you make cash rent, pay for ground cover and not recover the costs?

A few ways I've seen it done, and again, this is from people who inherited their farms from mom & pop--not renting them. I've said before, I think farming is mostly a losing-money lifestyle rather than a viable moneymaker, but that is a different question from "do you buy organic chicken feed/groceries". In economics as in physics, the starting conditions make all the difference.
a. You can put the fields into rotation so that only a portion stays fallow. This means you have to have either land you're not paying rent on or enough cash to float for a couple years while the soil builds up.
b. Grow non-food cash crops that have high returns per acre and don't deplete the soil so much--my cousins grow tobacco, but I've also seen cut flowers fulfill this part nicely. This takes more time in the long run, but it does work eventually. The trick is to really, really know the growth requirements of what you are growing.
c. Sow something like buckwheat, that can be used as green mulch and which also supports bees, and take a honey/wax crop.

In terms of soil quality, I think that renting farmland is possibly the worst choice with respect to both economics and long-term soil quality (renters don't have any investment to lose if the land dries up and blows away, but plenty of incentive to make a buck).

2) You may have family that are amish like my neighbors. I and most of my customers/family do not want to live that way. They want electricity, cars, health insurance, etc.

Yep, I don't blame 'em. I'm sure not up to my knees in cow poo with my cousins.

3) Yes, we have 5" of top soil and below that is clay, rock, gravel, you name it.

Yikes. Are you sure it wouldn't be more efficient to set up an aquaculture system like they use in China and India where the soils are poor? Even with the old-fashioned methods, that sounds like a lot of broken tractor attachments.

Not if people will pay $5/lb. for pork, but here it is $.40/lb. Give us the $5 market, and we are there.

Oh, sheesh, move to Massachusetts. Us Yankees will pay any price for local organic pork, apparently. I don't think I've seen $0.40/lb pork since Reagan was president, that's the East Coast for you. What our local surviving farms do is this: they process as much on their own property as they possibly can into a finished good, whatever that may be. So, the local orchards make and sell their own liquor, cider, beer and wine; local animal farmers butcher their own meat; local veggie farmers run CSA shares and supply farmer's markets; local grain farmers have small feed mills or run these sort of boutique touristy stone-ground flour mills. Again, they are just scraping by, not much more than breaking even and putting a roof over their own heads.​

 

[kstaven]

Seedcorn. I agree with the grow it at home attitude. There is no reason to import half the food we do, or manufacture in other countries. Canada is as bad as the US for that. we should be putting our own people to work and supporting ourselves FIRST!

DDT has been banned for decades here.

"organic" and other terms like it should have never been regulated by the government. They sold everyone out to big corps and export markets on that one and many other fronts.