Question: when is a tomato not a tomato? Answer: When it’s an organic tomato. Those who are into organics say it’s superior to anything you can get that has been grown using conventional production methods. They will tell you that an organic tomato tastes better, is better for you and is grown in away that causes less harm to the environment. It may be more expensive, but you get what you pay for, don’t you?
Thats accoring to an article on organics titled It’s only natural published over the weekend in the Sunday [colour] Magazine of the Sydney and Melbourne tabloid newspapers. I didn’t see the magazine, but Detribe kindly sent these snippets for the blog:
Critics, however, say it’s a rip-off. Nothing more than a load of marketing hogwash aimed at people with more money than sense, which plays on fears about the misuse of pesticides and is supported through a series of far-fetched claims. Weighing up the pros and cons can be confusing, but one thing that’s New Age crystal clear is just how popular organic products have become in recent years.
In 1990, just 372,000 ha were farmed organically in Australia. Today, the total land area given to organic production is around 10 million hectares and Australia now accounts for nearly half the world’s organic farmland. Staggering as that increase may seem, organic food production still represents less than two per cent of the total value of agricultural production in this country.
The Australian organic food industry, estimated to be worth between $250-$500 rnillion, remains a minor player in the agricultural sector But, according to the government’s Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation (RIRDC), domestic demand for organic products significantly outstrips supply, despite an estimated growth in organic production of at least 15-25 per cent per annum, every year for the past five years.
… “Our market is intelligent consumer” says Pierce Cody founder of Macro Whole foods, a new chain of organic supermarkets sprouting up in Sydney and Melbourne. The stores sell everything from organic toilet paper and toothpaste, to cleaning products and pet food. Cody believes the key to growth is treating the consumer with respect.
“I can’t see us advertising on a billboard, ‘Macro: You’ll love us’ because people don’t buy organic just because you tell them to. It’s a choice they arrive at themselves” he says.
Cody’s background is in advertising, he confesses he only got, into organics because he could see there was “monstrous scope for growth”. “It’s the thing,” he says. “The concept is very simple to understand. It’s clean, original food, made the way it used to be made. We are taking food back to the future.”
Cody admits that “our market tends to be more white collar than blue collar”, but he, denies the higher cost associated with organics makes it elitist.
“It is more expensive, yes, but it’s the real cost of food prior to industrialised farming, which cuts comers.”
[But]… by not using artificial fertilizers -like nitrogen, organic farmers have smaller yields – typically around 30 to 50 percent less than crops grown on conventional farms. This is the main reason why organic products are more expensive.
…In 1994; Trina Karstrom took over the Botobolar vineyard in scenic Mudgee, NSW. The 22 ha vineyard was the first organic one to be planted in Australia. That was in 1971 and the vines have always been grown without the use of pesticides, herbicides or chemical fertilizers. She is in no doubt about the health benefits of organically grown produce.
“I shudder to think what residual spray is in [conventional] wines,” she says, “Grapes don’t get washed before they’re processed and the chemicals growers are allowed to spray are quite scary.” Or are they?
Not according to Microbiologist Dr David Tribe, Senior lecturer at the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Melbourne. “The organic lot make all these claims about better nutrition and health benefits but, overall, the hard evidence simply doesn’t support it” he says.
A review of more than 100 studies that looked at differences between organic and conventional food, conducted in 2002 at New Zealand’s University of Otago found there was “no convincing evidence to back claims that organically grown foods were healthier or tastier than those grown using chemicals”. The review found that nutritional value had more to do with freshness and methods of storage than whether artificial inputs, such as pesticides, were used during production.
Strictly speaking; professional bodies outside the organic movement, such as the Dietitians Association of Australia (DAA) and the Australian Medical Association (AMA), do not share the view that organic food is necessarily healthier than food grown conventionally.
Sunday Magazine (News Ltd Herald/Sun), page 23.
February 19 2006 Craig Scutt
…………
Thanks Detribe.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
So in other words, organic food is just an excuse for rich luvvies to feel good about themselves? Big surprise there.
I am willing to bet $10,000 that not one organic food fan is able to tell the difference between an organically grown tomato and a GM Modified, nitrogen enriched tomato in a blind taste test.
They are simply all full of it.
What’s New? We have industry nonsense everywhere. The organic theme is no more farfetched than having Blackmores, Coke, Kelloggs or MacDonalds in the house. On the other point, if it feels good use it regardless of its origin.
Detribe’s quoted comments seemed to be aimed at the quality of organic produce, rather than the presence of residual pesticides and chemicals on conventional produce. Two separate issues.
I’d also guess that the main reason why most consumers would choose organic is to avoid the pesticides and (for meat) hormones and animal vaccines or whatever, not because of any sense of getting more nutritional or better tasting food.
So your bet is quite irrelevant yobbo, and I doubt you’d actually bet $10k anyway (whose full of it?).
Detribe, can you discuss any research re residual pesticide consumption?
Everyone else: why are white collar people a bit nervous about consuming pesticides to the point that they will pay more to try and avoid this? This is the real question.
Cmon yobbo, go to a Coles or Woolies and there is no difference betwen organic and normal – they are both suffering from travel fatigue and extended chill.
Go to a proper organic shop and the tomato is grown local, is picked ripe and is as fresh and is as tasty as that out of a backyard picked that day. Whatever the reason it is a quality product.
I thought the same as Steve. Where’s the proof on the health, soil and ecosystem impacts of synthetic pesticides (in addition to chemical fertilisers)? Given the many causal influences, it’s probably similar to proving that smoking is bad for your health. No-one really believes that do they? If you want to convince people that organics have no intrinsic benefits, you need to do better than show there’s no proof that they have more vitamins or taste better as the issue is more complicated than that.
And who here is prepared to argue against free market demand? So they spend more. Why not beat up on people who buy fancy cars when a cheaper one will do the job, or buy fashion labels or new clothes when some St Vinnies clothes serve the purpose just as well, or people who waste money on beer when water is almost free? And if you’re going to argue the productivity per land area issue then you’d better be prepared to argue that people only eat cereals and veges with highest yields per acreage.
Steve: People who read more widely want to eat better as a rule. I make a habit of picking up other folks kitchen books and passing them on. With this hobby it is easy to see what they are after besides the basics.
We also have a similar opportunity to watch many customers in direct contact with growers and resellers. ‘Organic’ sellers fair better than others in this way, their produce looks organic. Asian buyers regularly take first pic by feel regardless.
Rog is so right; discerning buyers go by taste alone and astute sellers are prepared for the on the spot test, over and over. This is not Woollies or Coles
Thinksy,
The yield issue is only relevant to the misguided aims of the organic movement who try and impose their standards and practices on others and ambitions of converting the whole world to inefficient agriculture which is ecologically stooopid: argue the yield bit with THEM. I have no particular disagreement with their low productivity. As far as residues I do disagree though – their tolerance of copper fungicide and failure to substitute with existing better fungicides merely because they are synthetic organic chemical (note two different meanings for organic here) is a real permanent residue problems. Copper accumulates in the soil permanently. If you want data on this Search GMO PUndit or elsewhere.
The free market bit. Hmmm, good to see you argue for freedom of choice Thinksy.Also rather sorry that the organic crowd don’t favour that freedom very much – and at least we should be clear headed as to who benefits from high prices; not the consumer. The supermarkets for instance would have the same percent markup on a high priced rolls of toilet paper as the cheap stuff, and expensive tomatoes too. Its rather like luxury cars, first class airfares, Body Shop makeup , or French parfum – a way of making the rich feel better than us all, while stripping them of cash. Marketing perceptions, not science.
Fair enough detribe, but many organic knockers do criticise its low yields and to hold, that argument has to be applied across the board. And still on that same argument there are some studies showing yields from permaculture style farming equivalent to industrial style. There are many different approaches to more sustainable, lower impact farming and I doubt that mainstream organic
farming holds the answer. But as you already know I welcome some diversity in approaches for greater long-term resilience and cross-fertilisation(!) of methods.
Locally sourced production, where appropriate, (which is also more likely to give fresher, hence more nutritious food) and fair trade are probably more important.
Taz got it right about reading widely being a key influence. A recent study on the typical consumer of organics indicated that the highest correlation is with higher education, not higher income. (Opens the way for Ian to claim that the green lunatics have a stranglehold on the universities and the worst thing you could do for your kids, other than plant trees, would be to let them attend uni).
Do they REALLY sell organic loo paper? I find that hard to swallow.
rog is yr nursery(?) organic / do you have organic stock?
Thinsks,
you and I are largely in agreement. I think diverse approaches should be be encouraged – my criticisms are of people who make demands that they know cannot be satisfied that shut down competitors, while at the same time providing publicity and distracting consumer attention from the fact they don’t actually deliver what they claim. Brilliant business strategy, but to coin a phrase, difficult for me to swallow as morally defensible.
I hadn’t thought about it that way as I always expected organics would be little more than a fringe movement. But then, Germany is/was planning up to 20%(?) of its output as organic I think, and similar plans elsewhere in Europe(?). So perhaps organic hippies really are taking over the world (I guess organic toilet paper has leaves instead of sheets). Oh well, come apocalypse and mass hunger, the organic vege hippies are sure to make better eating!
Thinksy you dont understand, I only buy on value not on label.
Meaning you buy organic that’s good value in your opinion? That’s ok. I was wondering if you sell organic stock in your business.
I’ve recently happened across a few research reports saying the most significant pesticide risks are to households that are in close proximity to gardens (meaning, I gather, their own [careless?] backyard use). I keep thinking how few people bother to grow their own vegies anymore, even when they have plenty of yard available. We’re habitual consumers I guess and in our busy lives the effort doesn’t seem worth the return (not even for pensioners).
Thinksy says:
“thought the same as Steve. Where’s the proof on the health, soil and ecosystem impacts of synthetic pesticides (in addition to chemical fertilisers)?”
Detribe says thins in agreement
“you and I are largely in agreement.”
Taz takes the middle road, but is forced to agree:
‘Organic’ sellers fair better than others in this way, their produce looks organic.
Have you guys ever thought of submitting a script to Woody Allan. You seem to harbour all the neurosis he does but about food.
“Go to a proper organic shop and the tomato is grown local, is picked ripe and is as fresh and is as tasty as that out of a backyard picked that day. Whatever the reason it is a quality product.”
As are those at any farmers’ market. You seem unable to distinguish between the product and the method of purchase. Obviously food bought at a national supermarket chain is not going to be as fresh as something that is bought on the farmers’ lot. This is just a stupid point to make.
And if want to take the bet, I’m pretty sure I could find some interested organisation who’d be willing to put up the $10,000. Of course nobody will take it, because deep down they really do know that there’s no difference.
I’ve got reason to want organic foods banned. It just shits me that the same dimwitted hippies who claim organic foods are superior are the same ones complaining about third world hunger, when it is quite obvious that their decadent western desire for feel-good food lowers the total amount of food grown on earth.
If hippies really cared, they’d sacrifice their own wellbeing by buying the cheaper, non-organic food and sending the savings off to community aid abroad. But their self-delusion at being in harmony with nature precludes that possibility.
Oh, and these are also the same luddites who oppose GM organisms for religious reasons, once again preferring sickness and death over scientific advances.
They’re still fuming that “the population bomb” never came true. And they hate being wrong so much they are willing to sacrifice millions to be proved right.
Yobbo what concrete actions do you take to reduce 3rd world hunger?
Thinksy; there are very few Australian backyards that can be certified as ‘clean’. Anyone who used Yates etc. over the years has lost the organic plot.
However, no one here has worked with more nasties over the years than me. Folks the human body is quite rugged considering the soups we made here and there.
Our fragility is a state of mind in the end.
Yobbo
On other thing.
GM food means less acreage needed allowing land use to drop and more wilderness that would allow hippies ro romp around naked.
So the idea of land reclaamation is bullshit to these people. They are just frauds pretending that worrying about the “state of the world” puts them on higher plane then lessor mortals.
Their logic is frightening and their state of mind is suspect.
Thinksy
“Yobbo what concrete actions do you take to reduce 3rd world hunger?”
How about making food cheaper and easy to produce for a start. The cheaper it is the more the world’s hungry can have.
I would be willing to take the bet that none of you caould tell the difference.
$10,000.
I pick the food. You eat it. I’ll get an arbiter who will put it all together. He decides who wins.
We escrow with my lawyer.
Joe and Yobbo, you overlook the complexity of the 3rd world hunger issue, besides which, poverty is far more complex than just hunger. Governance, entitlements, equality, education, rural development and livelihoods are all key to ending poverty and hunger.
If global yields are the sole issue, are people going hungry because there isn’t enough food available in the world to everyone? Is there currently a shortage of food? (And if so, I hope you’re doing everything you can to reduce your personal footprint such as living in a small home in a multiple story building and growing vegies in your backyard/frontyard/rooftop/balcony/windowsill/nature strips).
Yes thinksy
It’s always more complex when you don’t have an answer. If it’s more complex share it with us.
Cheap food tells us there’s lot’s around. The cheaper it gets the more the poor will be ablke to afford with their very limited money.
You want to take the bet, Thinksy? Or is it too complex?
Joe the world’s numerous poor often don’t have livelihoods or entitlements, ie they don’t even have limited money or even goods to trade. Many are too malnourished to even employ their own labour. Without justification, your arguments assume the following:
* There’s insufficient food to feed the world’s population, ie food shortages (and prices) are the sole problem.
* The global production of organic food has a significant impact on the amount of food that’s available to the world’s poor.
* The land that’s used for organic foodcrops would otherwise be used for non-organic foodcrops that would otherwise benefit the world’s poor.
* There are no offsetting benefits whatsoever from organic farming.
* Your own consumption and lifestyle activities bear no impact whatsoever on 3rd world livelihoods so therefore you are free to criticise everyone else.
As usual Joe, you don’t seem to have examined your own assumptions and you haven’t provided any evidence to support your points. Instead you’re heckling as usual, rather than making and defending your own arguments. You heckle detribe, but like myself, he seems to be constantly open to new evidence and willing to adjust his opinions to new information. At least detribe is actively engaged in this area and trying to make a difference.
Other than heckle or declare unsubstantiated b&W opinions, what have you or yobbo done to alleviate 3rd world poverty and malnutrition (a problem that Yobbo claims organic consumers are exacerbating)? To have such strong and fixed attitudes, you must have at least researched the topic thoroughly? If you want to read our recent exchange on the complexities, see http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/001165.html#comments Or go read the world development reports. Otherwise, if you’re not actively trying to be part of the solution or understand the problem then I suggest that you refrain from sniper attacks on those who are.
“Governance, entitlements, equality, education, rural development and livelihoods are all key to ending poverty and hunger”
Put it more directly, helping farmer produce crops more profitably and in greater amounts provides income and labour where it is needed, and the farmer’s family income helps with all the others things. Better farm technology helps the rural poor, who are most of the worlds desparately poor, and seeds are an important way to spread better farming as farmers already know how to use them well.
Put this way , its not that complicated.
Most interestingly, when I posted an article recently describing how new disease free varieties of bananas (non “GM” but developed using scientific breeding), were helping farmer income in Kenya, I got a raging comment of how this was rampaging capitalism.) For some people, blocking and denigrating corporations is more important than helping poor farmers sell more crops and getting properous.
Steve,
as far as pesticide levels and the key point as to why consumers are scared, can I suggest you google Bruce Ames and The Environmental Cancer distraction, or Ames Gold pesticides dose poisen carcinogen mutagen animal testing
According to the figures in the article the average return is between $25, & $50 per hectare on organic farming.
For a couple of locals who tried it, the returns were not only less than this, they were negative, & that was after some years of effort. Don’t worry about loss of agricultural production, with our water being pumped to the city, there won’t be any.
I’m off to the Logan Basin draft water plan advisory panel meeting now. I’ll report on how they plan to pinch our water.
Hasbeen
Thinksy: When I was in Thailand I gave some hard currency to some prostitutes, who then sent it on to their starving relatives in the north-east. It may not be much, but that probably did more to alleviate poverty in developing countries than most leftists have ever accomplished.
Of course organic farming has little negative effect – but it certainly doesn’t have a positive effect. It’s the principle that’s important. And the continuing efforts of the lefty luddite brigade to hold back development of GMO technology has definitely been a disaster for the developing world.
Obviously the biggest contributor to third world hunger is their own corrupt third world governments, closely followed by corrupt western governments who subsidise agricultural production in their own countries in return for votes.
The world is producing more than enough food to feed everyone already, the major problem is getting it to the people who need it. Organic food is a drop in the bucket by comparison, but it’s the luvvie left who are always talking about how western decadence clears too much land for farming and industry, and yet they are the biggest supporters of organic food – the most wasteful of all western agriculture!
I have no problem with organic food in principle. It’s a product that has been created to meet a demand. I have a problem with people who say large-scale agriculture is destroying the planet and stealing from the poor on one hand, and then trump up organic food as some kind of “nature-friendly” solution to everything on the other hand. It’s inconsistent and muddle-headed to hold those 2 views simultaneously, but the anti-capitalist left have never been renowned for clear thinking.
Put simply, nitrogen fertiliser is probably the greatest invention of the last 200 years. Without it much of the world would be starving. For organic supporters to think there’s somehow something bad about it says to me that they care more about their own religion than about the lives of billions of people.
But we already knew that – the green-left alliance has a long history of turning a blind eye to mass starvation, murder and disease in the name of their twin religions of socialism and environmentalism. The fact that they continue to do it shouldn’t come as any surprise.
Ah. Peak phosphorous anyone?
I’m off for a nice hot cuppa DDT.
Has anyone made a carbon free tomato? That would be a true advance towards an inorganic fruit.
Chemicals versus organics; beyond the looks, feel and taste of food, choice is about some educated thinking on our personal selections. Think good!
If I can indulge briefly in some nostalgia and expose some personal bias about quality assurance systems QAS in agriculture and other industries such as Australian food processing and distribution we may each have more to chew on.
Australia developed the principles and structures that underpin much of the world trade in goods however today we have a plethora of organizations that claim to represent the process along the way after major drives for industry self regulation. Expect to find at least a couple at every level of certification. The rest is also a loose outline.
On vexed question of residues; we have a rather young federal agency in Canberra the APVMA that registers all agricultural & veterinary chemicals, pesticides, and herbicides with links to many other authorizing organizations.
Ideally; any testing agency in science should be traceable through my favorite umbrella organization NATA. Google on ‘what is ‘NATA’ and find the links to your nearest testing lab, pathology, DNA, etc. It all started way back in the 40’s with electrical testing, I used to call say John Mitchell our electrical specialist based in Melbourne for an overview on something like our new QAS regime with advent of JASANZ and more recent inter Govt. MOU’s.
http://www.nata.asn.au/index.cfm?objectid=965128BD-65B1-96AB-71AE2791A7112EC7
Back to foods; NATA was the first to certify our practices as well as the instruments. Technicians who studied at Geelong after we moved away from council health inspectors as the Gods on bad products in the market place became hot property in the dairy and meat industries. These highly trained industry people became mandatory at all processing plants as they reapplied through say the Australian Dairy Corporation for export licenses after the collapse of local farmer owned coops in their dealings with the ECM.
I still reckon anything with out a NATA logo some where along the way is not worth a pinch of salt. Their underlying basic principles of ongoing independent peer group review, including scrutiny from the leading edge counts more than any old policy.
Be assured though; yesterday I concluded another long running private battle with off batches of roo meat in our supermarkets over summer when a major manufacturer called and said they had upgraded their outback collection methods to reflect those for human consumption voluntarily after recent complaints.
Pets like their organics fresh too.
Bottom line to my online friends; for the complete story on Technology in Australia visit my favorite www site on this subject under “tia” at Melb Uni, use their extensive index A-Z on say C = Chemical Complex, F = Fertilizers, V = Vegemite etc
http://www.austehc.unimelb.edu.au/tia/titlepage.html
Also
http://www.chemlink.com.au/altona.htm
http://www.chemlink.com.au/huntsmanchem.htm
Then go back to APVMA which is only quite recent in the general scheme of things complex around our food chain.
http://www.apvma.gov.au/
The classic, for me, was discovering “organic free range” eggs in my local. They were $5/ carton while the no-name was $2 per carton. But the bit that said it all was that the OFR had only 10 eggs in it. Once again, the green movement has over promised and under delivered. So next time you need to buy 10 items of something, just ask for “a greenies dozen”, and be happy if you get more than eight.
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This comment was edited by Jennifer at 11.19 am.
All this over a tomato, imagine the angst over a lettuce!
Speaking about “organic” free range eggs. They will soon not be found anywhere in Europe with the lastest confirmed cases of H5N1 infected wild birds in France and Northern Germany.
France, The Netherlands, Sweden , Norway , Slovenia, Switzerland and Austria have ordered all domestic poultry to be kept indoors. Germany Minster for Agriculture has declared a “zero tolerance’ to H5N1 infected birds and orderd the military to cull the 400,000 domestic poultry on the island of Rugen.
EU rules dictate that a country must establish a three-kilometre protection zone around the outbreak and a surrounding “surveillance zone” of an extra seven kilometres.
In the UK the Soil Association and other organic lobby groups have convinced the Government not to ban free range chickens which is a big money earner for the egg and poultry industry.
I have written an article in onlineopinion about it http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=194.
Pierce Cody , marketing genius, said in an interview in The Age, that ” An organic orange has a minimum of 40 per cent more nutrients than a chemically grown one. Nutrients take time to form in the fruit. Acceleration kills off the goodness.” . It was clear in his mind that the selling argument for organics is that they are healthier by nature and pesticides is a secondary issue in the mass marketing appeal of organic produce.
It is scary when organic marketers are quoted as reliable sources for information on the health benefits of organic produce.
http://www.macrowholefoods.com.au/news.php/17.html
More on Cody Pierce form the Macro whole foods website.
“People like to brag that they shop at Macro – it’s actually a badge of honour. It means you are a conscious consumer.”
“And the consumer, he says, is king. Macro Wholefoods is committed to providing an extraordinary level of customer service and follow-up”.
“Remarkably, each week Cody personally answers every single customer feedback complaint by telephone. You get training, tips and feedback. It puts your feet back on the ground and makes you think, ‘Wow, I’ve got so much to learn.’ And I’m not saying that to be some sanctimonious wanker – you really are humbled by that.”
Cody Pierce the renaissance man – a scholar, a marketing guru, a concerned environmentalist and most of all a fair dinkum hands on good old greengrocer.
Yobbo says: “Of course organic farming has little negative effect – but it certainly doesn’t have a positive effect. It’s the principle that’s important. And the continuing efforts of the lefty luddite brigade to hold back development of GMO technology has definitely been a disaster for the developing world.”
I’m no great fan of organic agriculture myself but I am aware that another “alternative” food production system, permaculture, has had some successes in the third world.
People who make grand claims about GMO saving the third world have little evidence to back the claim up. GMO agriculture may be significant in 10 or 20 years time but I wouldn’t hold my breath.
So many GMO Great White Hopes have sunk without a trace or been extremely disappointing. For example New Scientist published a story about a “super-potato” developed at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi in 2002. There are thousands of Google entries on it. Monsanto’s website crows about how this high protein super- potato will save millions of lives.
However we have heard nothing about it now for years. The super-spud turned out to be a dud.
Golden Rice is another example. We have been hearing about it since 1999 yet researchers are still trying to develop a strain with enough Vitamin A to make it worthwhile. (see http://www.golderice.org)
The CSIRO’s immune-response producing pea fiasco is a major PR disaster for the GMO pushers.
However, I do accept that Greenpeace etc exaggerate the dangers of GMO.
Free range whale, totally organic, yummmm.
“However, I do accept that Greenpeace etc exaggerate the dangers of GMO”.
Would lie be a beeter word for Greenpeace’s behaviour? Just asking
………
Edited comment 1.10pm. Jennifer
http://education.guardian.co.uk/schoolmeals/story/0,,1714314,00.html
Forget organics, just eat more veg, says food adviser
James Randerson, science correspondent
Tuesday February 21, 2006
The Guardian
The former head of the government’s food watchdog has criticised the focus on organic food in efforts to improve school dinners. He said money could be better spent by buying fresh conventional produce rather than spending it on more expensive organic varieties.
“My advice would be not to worry about the organic, but worry about your kids having more vegetables,” said Sir John Krebs, who was head of the Food Standards Agency until April last year.
“I totally admire what Jamie Oliver has achieved in trying to turn around the whole approach to school meals,” said Sir John, “but nevertheless I would say if local authorities and schools are strapped for cash I think money would be better spent increasing the consumption of fruit and vegetables and meals that contain lower salt and lower fat, than specifically spending it on organic.”
In an interview with the Guardian Sir John said there was no scientific evidence that organic food was healthier, either because it contained more nutrients, or because conventional foods had pesticide residues on them. He added that public protection bodies across Europe, including Austria, France and Sweden, had come to the same conclusion.
Michelle Leslie ( of Bali fame) is an organic supporter.
In a character witness statement on her behalf Celebrity (!) Sydney hairdresser Anthony Nader said “She’s a stunning model with an extraordinary presence,” he said. “A very professional and very pleasant person. There was none of the arrogance or rudeness which quite often accompanies people who work in her industry.”
Mr Nader furthermore said Ms Leslie had invested in two organic health- food shops in Sydney.
( Say no more! Pierce Cody strikes again !)
“As she left me that day, I thought what a beautiful person, she was a woman who appeared to really have her head screwed on. I would never have imagined that a month or so down the track she would be languishing in an Indonesian jail.”
The statement must have helped her case since she is out of jail back in Sydney and trying to revive her modelling career and enjoying her organic lifestyle.
Yes, I had heard that the project had been onsold to keen investors.. .. ..
Jen, yet again you show your naive ‘bushie’ ignorance on a topic you vehemently discredit.
For many people who buy organic it is not about the apparent superior taste, which you seem to suggest as the only possible reason one would buy organic. But rather it is about regaining lost knowledge of traditional agricultural methods and open pollination that has supported humanity for thousands of years. In the last 50 years culture has been subjected to heavy marketing from chemical companies, this combined with the fact that we have also become lazier and greedier. Hence the very reason a conventional chemical user is stuck with pesticide/herbicide and chemical fertiliser usage.
The amount of chemicals used today in the environment, the very thing that supports human life, is accumulating and having deleterious effects on species viability. (I suggest you research about chemicals banned in the past, and also the current issue of endocrine disruptors and mutagens).
To buy organic is to ensure that there is support for an industry that has lesser detrimental effect than conventional chemical culture. And a proper organic farm (if run by a holistic land manager) should have a positive impact on the quality of soil structure, soil microbial activity, surface and subsurface water quality, vegetation management (with regards to both weed control and native habitat) and economic and social sustainability. It is uncanny that conventional farming throughout this country and indeed the world possess negative issues related to all of the above mentioned benefits.
Additionally organic farming can be viewed as a environmental and cultural ‘lifeboat’ should any potential man made global crisis arise. And as it appears in the global arena we are in for some tough times. (notice rising fuel prices, notice children and families getting blown up in order to protect those fuel prices).
Buying organic is an ethical choice for many, chemical usage and monoculture is a self serving form of greed. Get real Jen!
regards
Farmer J
“For many people who buy organic it is not about the apparent superior taste, which you seem to suggest as the only possible reason one would buy organic. But rather it is about regaining lost knowledge of traditional agricultural methods and open pollination that has supported humanity for thousands of years.”
Oh please. What do you learn from buying a piece of organic fruit? Absolutely nothing. If you are real smart you may catch an inkling that you’ve been conned, but that’s about it.
“In the last 50 years culture has been subjected to heavy marketing from chemical companies”
Yeah right. I for one am heartily sick of all those ads for superphosphate that keep interrupting the cricket.
“this combined with the fact that we have also become lazier and greedier.”
As a 4th generation farmer, I take offence to this. Farmers are neither lazy nor greedy.
“Hence the very reason a conventional chemical user is stuck with pesticide/herbicide and chemical fertiliser usage.”
No, the reason we are “stuck” with chemical usage is that the green revolution hugely increased world production of food, meaning that prices came down and we had to sell more of it to make a living.
Sure, we could not use chemicals, plough our fields with an ox instead of a John Deere, and harvest it by hand instead of a combine, and instead of living of the proceeds of the sale we could collect the dole and sit around smoking bongs like the hippies in Mount Barker do. But some people prefer to work for a living and contribute something valuable to society.
And because of what we do, the hundreds of millions of deaths by starvaton predicted by Paul Erlich never eventuated. If we listened to idiots like you, they would have.
“Golden Rice is another example. We have been hearing about it since 1999 yet researchers are still trying to develop a strain with enough Vitamin A to make it worthwhile. (see http://www.golderice.org)”
Steve, you are out of date on Golden Rice. Initial varieties have improved several fold over first proof of concept, but more importantly, the levels of vitamin have shot up with a newer breed “Syngenta Golden Rice II ” reported last March-April in the journal Nature (Biotechnology) that has about 23-fold more vitamin A than the original proof of concent. The issue now is choosing a level of vitamin that doesnt make it too red in colour, which has been done. The main bottleneck now is making sure that it is test and suitable for farming by further conventional breeding and testing with local varieties.(discussed by me at Online Opinion a while back)
You are right though, some GM concepts don’t reach the market, for various reasons, and the path to market is long with many hurdles.
David Tribe
Farmer J ‘s post is a put on, in my opinion. The full story about pesticide risks has been ignored by the organic-lobby as it ruins their advertising spin.
Bruce Ames and Lois Gold have explained why in numerous articles. This are never accurately presented by the organic lobby.
Public Health is poorer for having the important message – eat more veggies- obscured by organic PR blather. see for example
http://www.hoover.org/publications/books/fulltext/polscience/117.pdf
I’m going to post the full explanation at gmopundit.blogspot.com.
Get real yourself, Farmer J
URL
http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2006/02/environmental-cancer-distraction-part.html
for my “Rachel Carson was Wrong” posting.
Why pesticides are a distraction, and why the organics industry does’t want to talk about Bruce Ames and Lois Gold.
Also listen to your grandmother and eat your brussels sprouts (conventional is cheap and good for you).
I have attended the Community Reference Panel launch Of the Logan Basin draft Water Resource Plan.
What a joke.
We got over an hour of Environmental Investigations Report which said only,
1/ It is more important that the river is a wild life corridor, than we do anything to reduce/prevent erosion.
2/ The Invertebrates in the sand are much more important than the people who live, & work, on the river.
Then the real crunch, what it means to the people who have lived on, & depended on the river for much of their lives.
For those on Supplemented [with a taxpayer funded dam] streams there is not much difference. They still pay for their allocation, weather it is availsble, or not. There is a likelihood that this water will be sold to higher payers [Eg power stations] in future.
For those on Unsupplemented streams, where not one cent of taxpayer funds has been spent, the story is bad.
These people are on area licenses, they may irrigate so many hectares. These are to be converted to volume licences, but at a very low rate, varying between 4, & 4.5 ML/ha.
DPI figures state that it takes 5.6 ML/ha per year to maintain pasture grass, about the lowest user of irrigation. For Dairy farmers it takes 6 ML/ha to produce 4 months of winter rye grass, then a similar amount to run summer feed.
Lucerne growers could not survive on this allocation, & neither could small crops growers.
We were told this conversion figure was chosen after a survey of irrigators, but none of the comunity reference panel had been surveyed.
To make matters worse, a volumetric cap will be put on Water Harvesting. Harvesting is only allowed when the river is in “fresh”, & hundreds of mega liters per day is rushing out to sea.
To tell a farmer that he must watch a river, 30 meters wide, & 6 meters deep rush past his pump, with out taking any is stupid. When that water will be in Morton Bay in 6 hours, its criminal.
One of the water resource people I spoke to did not appear to understand our little river, it seamed as if we were talking about two different things.
Their thinking, & I suppose, training relates to our long, slow, inland rivers, where water can take weeks to meander down stream. He found it almost impossible to believe that if we all pumped, with all our pumps, we could not make a dent in the flow of our river during a fresh.
He would not believe that a rain drop, from our head water, would be in Morton Bay in 24 hours.
After EIGHT years of community imput we have got a total “stuff up”.
None of the pain this plan will impose on our community will, or can, have any benifit for anyone. We will pay for our water, even if there isn’t any, & probably go broke doing it.
How can they get it so wrong, unless there is a hidden agenda, & this plan is to be used as a basis for other plans, which can advantage urban water supply.
Hasbeen
yobbo wrote
“we had to sell more of it to make a living”
sounds like you are calling for a paradigm shift as you admit your are ‘stuck’ in the system that perpetuates greed, and may I add another element – extravagance.
And for Mr David Tribe, how do you answer the issue of endocrine disruptors and mutagens in the surrounding environment and hence in the food chain.
Why is it that whenever precautionary information is availible it gets criticised by those who are in it for the buck. Why use chemicals when food can be grown without it, simple question, simple answer. And dont try replying this with the population issue, especially when we live in this world of extravagance and deliverence of all expectations. This is simple egocentricity, something that human ‘civilisation’ (tounge in cheek) should have overcome by now!
You people are only laying the foundations of a future wasteland, and a serious bottleneck in human and other species genetic variability.
Perhaps that is what this planet needs, to rid itself of pestillence and hope for the next ‘intelligent’ species to fulfill its obligations in creating richness and diversity.
Should I just go out there and have one hell of a good time doing whatever the fuck I want, make a buck, piss it up against the wall, and die. Now theres a fine way to find satisfaction and purpose in life.
Somebody please tell me thats what I should do!
“And because of what we do, the hundreds of millions of deaths by starvaton predicted by Paul Erlich never eventuated. If we listened to idiots like you, they would have.”
What and your telling me that your greed and protection of way of life is not resulting in the death of millions throughout the world.
“Sure, we could not use chemicals, plough our fields with an ox instead of a John Deere”
Hey and why dont you clone a couple of hundred little Johnny Howards towork on your farm, better with only 3 fingers so they dont bruise the fruit.
I present this sarcasm as levels of technology may appear to eventually be ridiculous, well for many in this world the idea of spraying food with human manufactured poisons that are known to be mutagenic and cause other problems, many still unknown, and to eat it, is a preposterous idea.
And my friend I only hope that one day in your lifetime you will be out there plouging a field with your ox, just to get enough food to put the plates of your family.
And for Mr David Tribe, how do you answer the issue of endocrine disruptors and mutagens in the surrounding environment and hence in the food chain.
I’m happy to talk in generalities about mutagens: they are a distraction for numerous reasons.See recents posts at GMO Pundit for a start, and the Bruce Ames articles.
As far as putative endocrine disrupters please give specifics. Also discuss natural compounds for example oestrogens in soy.
“Why use chemicals when food can be grown without it, simple question, simple answer.”
Which chemicals are you refering to. If you mean fertiliser, which forestland are you going to cklear to grow the food need for billions of peple-simple question, simple answer.
Farmer J,
It must be horrible to hate so much.
When I was a young bloke, the sale of 10 steers would pay for a new Holden ute. Now it takes the sale of over 20 steers.
A dairy farm, milking 70 cows, would keep 3 families in the same standard as the local butcher.
A dairy farmer must now milk 150 cows to keep one family in the same standard.
You will have to look else where to find those involved in a greedy life.
Hasbeen.
I’m a bit curious too, about all these accustions of greed. It seems the people who make them are always pretty comfortable themselves, and don’t seem to worry about what impact their own ideas have on those who are poor. I agree totally with Hasbeen, must be a dreadful life to hate so much.
“What and your telling me that your greed and protection of way of life is not resulting in the death of millions throughout the world.”
Correct. In fact it is the direct opposite. Nitrogen fertilisers and chemical herbicides feed the world. Without them there would be mass starvation.
“well for many in this world the idea of spraying food with human manufactured poisons that are known to be mutagenic and cause other problems, many still unknown, and to eat it, is a preposterous idea.”
“many still unknown” being code for “my religious beliefs tell me that all chemicals are evil, so there MUST be SOMETHING bad!”. Do you believe in thetans too? Perhaps it’s time you questioned your faith.
Did you know that anything you touch can be represented by a series of chemical symbols? That’s right, YOU ARE SURROUNDED BY CHEMICALS! Run and hide!
“And my friend I only hope that one day in your lifetime you will be out there plouging a field with your ox, just to get enough food to put the plates of your family.”
The greenie wet dream, writ large in brutal electrons.
“Should I just go out there and have one hell of a good time doing whatever the fuck I want, make a buck, piss it up against the wall, and die. Now theres a fine way to find satisfaction and purpose in life.”
It’d be a better way to spend your time than repeatedly making a fool of yourself on the internet.
“””* The land that’s used for organic foodcrops would otherwise be used for non-organic foodcrops that would otherwise benefit the world’s poor.”””
Bull, how would that benifit world’s poor. Farmers are not going to give their crops away free to people! They never have! People are going to have to make money in order to get food, unless they live in the US and can sign up to get it for free. It is much more expensive to buy prepackaged ready to eat food then organic raw products that you have to prepare.
All of that packaging material is filling up land fills, and that land that those land fills are on could be used to feed the Worlds Poor!
The majority of Americans are OVERWEIGHT! If they just eat less, we wouldn’t have to worry about getting more from the land. Why is it that the poor “hungry” people are always the biggest people in line at the grocery store? If they have enough money to buy that much food they could deffinatly afford to buy organic food in the amount that an average human should consume. They would even SAVE money.
Buy natuaral prodcucts and learn how to cook. I am tired of having to go to health food stores, organic markets, and growing an organic garden large enough to be considered a farmer. I cannot walk into a regular grocery store and buy products to cook a normal meal. All they have are prepackaged junk food for people who eat meals infront of the TV!
I have a right to eat real food without putting uneccesary chemicals into my body!