Why do people think eating organic vegetables is better?

Question

The spokesperson for the organic food industry already admitted on national television that it isnt any healthier. There arent even any studies indicting modern pesticides, not even among the farmers and their families that use them. Organic takes up to 4 times as much land resource to yield the same amount due to the inefficient and backward methods. If this catches on we'll be cutting down forests for farm land to meet demands. Why do people think organic is so good?

Answer 1

Can't argue with Bella, but I can paraphrase:

Just because YOU don't benefit directly doesn't mean something isn't better.  You are a small part of a big,wide world and sometimes it's better for everyone to be a little more altruistic toward Mother Nature.

Answer 2

People are stupid and care more about "feel-good" ideas and things that feel right, than actually discovering the truth. I remember back in high school, my health teacher told us that the more "natural" things are, the healthier they are.

Answer 3

Let me paraphrase. Commercially grown organic food is better than non-organic foods, better but still woefully inadequate in terms of impact on the environment, on animals and on humans.

http://www.localfoodworks.org/Web/SA/SAW...

Note The pest and disease control products on the organic list are restricted, but, an organic grower can apply for a variation if he is newly converting to organic or he has good reason to use them (ie threat to his livliehood) and the farmer must include methods of reducing his future reliance on it!

The use of Copper in commercial Organic production  has still not been banned despite the fact that it can build up in soils and be harmful to creatures that live there.

However compare the 1400 pesticides that are currently registered for use in non-organic farming (2004 UK Pesticide Guide cited in link above) to commercial organic farming where no herbicides (weedkillers) can be used and only    four materials are acceptable to control of pests and disease

Commercial Organic Growing is substantially better for humans, animals and the environment. Other systems such as home growing and Permaculture (which is really organic) are leagues above Commercial  Organic Growing. Browse Permaculture below and notice it is different from other agriculture, including Organic, in that it has a set of ethics, Earthcare, Peoplecare and FairShares.

http://www.permaculture.org.uk/mm.asp?mm...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permacultur...

http://www.spiralseed.co.uk/permaculture...

Answer 4

Everu point you make is wrong

there is a growing body of syudies that says food grown on organically managed soils is indeed healthier than food grown on chemically addicted soils

There are at least 10K studies that indicate that pesticides are very bad for living creatures (why do you think they get banned on occasion? because the corporations likes to sink millions into R&D only to find they will lose money?!?)

organic farming takes up no more land than conventional and generally produces as well or better

see http://www.organicconsumers.org

or

http://www.rodaleinst.org

for a lot more real information about organic farming. your information comes right out of the Hudson Institute, it's like i am reading something Alex or Dennis Avery would write.

And I must ask those of you who hate organics simply because you know nothing about this kind of agriculture (or agrculture at all, for that matter) what will happen to chemical ag when the oil gets too expensive to use on these farms? Are you willing to pay $15 for a tomato or $25 for a bag of chips? I ask because chemical farming cannot be done with out cheap petrol. What methods will be used when the "conventional" method cannot be use any longer?

Answer 5

Marketing...Its all about marketing (and people making themselves feel like they are better than others)

Answer 6

Organic has become a license to make more money and one should be wary of what is really organic ,and the only way to be sure is to do it your self or intimately know your source.

He may be talking about Commercial organic ,and then i have not much to say

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

But in the case of  organic as done by small home growers and Permaculture ,nothing of the above is true

The fruit may not always look as perfect but is more tastier and healthier for sure.

the most compact style of farming known to man is Permaculture a totally organic concept

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

Bella will sort you out and I have been told by the grape vine that you do not vote for your own questions ,That is horrific news

If that is true and you do not  give the best answer to whom it is due in this case,i will personally feed all of your questions  to my wild boar

and it is not my answer,

Answer 7

We're already cutting down rainforests to make way for farms,  have been for years now.  

The big deal with organic vegetables is that they are sustainable and "green".   By sustainable,  I mean that once you have an organic farm going it needs nothing but water, sunlight, and time.  If society collapsed,  corporate farms would wither and die while the organic farms would be fine.   It's not as "efficient" as using all the commercial fertilizers and pesticides,  but think about where those things come from and the pollution that making them may cause.  

As for organic vegetables being "better" in a nutritional sense,  not so much.  They can be better,  but this is largely because organic farms tend to be on the small side.   When you've only got 10 acres growing,  you want every plant in every row to be the best-looking healthiest plant possible to maximize your market value.  Organic plants get a lot of gardening TLC, if there is such a thing.  Big corp farms, on the other hand,  have contracts that pay by the ton.  They need bulk product, and they have thousands of acres to grow it on.

Answer 8

My husband is a former chemist and is allergic to practically every solvent that exists. I could hire him out as human litmus for dangerous chemicals. Perhaps you aren't too worried about putting chemical garbage into your body along with those nutrients (which may or may not be equivalent to those of organic veggies). However, the effect of eating pesticides, hormones, antibiotics and other nasty chemicals IS cumulative for many of those chemicals. Give your liver a break!  I hope to live a healthy life well into or past my 80s. Also I don't think your assertion about land use and efficiency is true.

Answer 9

Because nothing you said is the truth.

Small scale local agriculture utilizing organic methods use less land than their industrial counterparts, and organic vegetables have been shown to have a higher nutrient value that those that are grown using fertilizer and pesticides and then shipped across country.

Small scale farming also makes food safer and more secure due to decentralization and fortifies local economies.

Answer 10

I have been asked to respond to this question and to do it justice this is gonna be a long answer. So if you have a short attention span, please move on to the next question.

'The spokesperson for the organic food industry already admitted on national television that it isnt any healthier'

Yes I understand this did happen, but what he said was it was inconclusive and this was a while back. This is no longer correct, they now have conclusive evidence to support commercially grown organic food being higher in nutrients.

First I will clear up  the misunderstanding of the intention of growing Organic Food. The concept was a growing method to protect the environment by reducing the number of chemical fertilizers and routine injections given to animals. The intention was not to produce more tasty or healthier products at all.

However, consumers have misunderstood this subtlety, mainly because producers have seen the massive profits that can be made from people believing that Commercially grown Organic products are better for them (as opposed to the truth, Commercial Organic farming is  much better for animal welfare and the environment -stricter legislation too. AND marginally better nutritionally see below).

PLEASE NOTE The reference to Commercially grown organic foods and homegrown or local grown organic foods, a distinction I will return to later.

There had been a number of inconclusive studies done on commercially grown organic foods in the past in relation to both taste and nutritive benefits. Indeed many people have appeared on television challenging both the claimed taste and nutritive benefits, including popular chefs (Delia Smith comes to mind).

But ... there is now well supported research findings by

Dr Kirsten Brandt of Newcastle University which found that  

commercially grown organic carrots, apples, peaches and potatoes had greater concentrations of vitamin C and antioxidants than conventionally grown produce.

In 400g daily allowance of fruit and vegetables you get 20% more nutrients in organic food. Other research supports these findings including American Research on Kiwi Fruits and research done on organic milk has been shown to contain 68% more omega3 fatty acids than ordinary milk in research done by the University of Liverpool. However, eating more conventional fruit and vegetables a day can also increase your nutrient intake.

There have always been strong distinctions between the welfare of commercially grown organic animals and conventional animals, enforced by stricter legislation for the commercially grown organic animals. However, these are still far from perfect (in my opinion still dubious eg in egg production, better than conventional farming methods but still awful).

'There arent even any studies indicting modern pesticides, not even among the farmers and their families that use them'

Sorry incorrect again. A nice summary here of some of the research that disapproves this statement.

http://www.pesticides.gov.uk/acp.asp?id=...

‘‘Long-term exposure to pesticides can lead to serious disturbances to the immune system, sexual disorders, cancers, sterility, birth defects, damage to the nervous system and genetic damage’. European Commission 2006

'Organic takes up to 4 times as much land resource to yield the same amount due to the inefficient and backward methods'

Wrong.

http://www.defra.gov.uk/farm/organic/pol...

There are numerous Governmental research findings which consistently show that organic farms are more biodiverse; more plants, flowers, birds, insects, bees, etc etc. Organic farming also avoids some of the of carbon hungry processes  eg avoidance of soluble fertilizers and pesticides.  

http://www.defra.gov.uk/farm/organic/ind...

Another reason why UK Governments have financial grants packages and information services to encourage UK farmers to grow organically and sustainably.

http://www.defra.gov.uk/farm/organic/sys...

'If this catches on we'll be cutting down forests for farm land to meet demands'

The opposite is actually true. Also, do not confuse the intensive meat and dairy industry with organic production they are different beasts (lol).

See this video for mass deforestation caused by traditional agriculture - intensive beef and dairy industry and growing foodstuff for intensively reared livestock (such as the intensive poultry industry).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWWNLvgU4...

The intensive Beef and Dairy industry (and growing feeds for intensive livestock farming) are responsible for more deforestation than any other cause.

Why do people think organic is so good?

Animals have not been treated with: antibiotics, growth hormones or feed made from animal byproducts. Animals are fed organic food (for a proportion of their life). They have access to outdoor space. Organic food can not be GM. Organic food is (largely) free of synthetic chemicals, such as pesticides.

U.S. Department of Agriculture  Environmental Working Group found that even after washing, some fruits and vegetables consistently carry much higher levels of pesticide residue than others on conventionally farmed foods. They developed the concept of the dirty dozen fruit and vegetables.

http://www.foodnews.org/methodology.php

http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/od/nutriti...

So far this has been about commercially grown organic produce. There are problems with this method of food production, see comments above. It is also usually a monoculture system. It is also usually more expensive to buy. Organic produce is often imported from abroad, where they do not have as strict Organic standards as the UK and there is also the issue of CO2 production from flying food half way around the world. Another criticism of organic food is that it is not as fresh as other food (when it has been flown from abroad) and it's appearance can be poor in comparison to conventionally grown produce.

However, all of these problems can be overcome, you can get fresh, seasonal, local produce, that is much higher in nutritive value than conventional food products. You can ensure that it is chemical free, you can grow biodiversly. You can increase habitat and retain the minerals we need to stay healthy and organic matter in the soils. You can build soils. How?

Grow Permaculture.

(see my profile for youtube links and site links about Permaculture.

Answer 11

VEGETABLES ARE VEGETABLES ONLY DIFFERENCE IS ONE IS SPRAYED AND THE OTHER IS'NT. BUT VEGETABLES HAVE TO BE EATEN RAW TO GET THE ENZINES, OR FULLY COOKED. HALF COOKED VEGETABLES ARE'NT ANY DIFFERENT THAN FULLY COOKED = NO ENZINES

Answer 12

Because it's the new form of conspicuous consumption- it's their way of saying that they can spend five times more than they need to on food.