"Organic meat, poultry, eggs, and dairy products come from animals that are given no antibiotics or growth hormones. Organic food is produced without using most conventional pesticides; fertilizers made with synthetic ingredients or sewage sludge; bioengineering; or ionizing radiation."
Whereever you see this USDA organic seal, it means that the product is at minimum made from 95% organic materials/ingredients. There are other USDA organic seals that indicate a lesser percentage of organic materials/ingredients and the slightly altered seal makes that clear.
Ok, so that makes sense. The US government decides that the consumer is not capable of determining for themselves what organic means to them nor if a producer meets those self proclaimed standards so they funnel off some tax dollars and widen their scope to protect us from our ignorance.
After I stopped channeling Harry Browne I thought, There are a lot of factors there that I want to look into: antibiotics, growth hormones, synthetic fertilizers, sewage (ugh), bioengineering, ionizing radiation and pesticides. I'll start with those problematic pesticides.
Since I seem to be out of the know when it comes to current definitions, I looked up pesticide and was happy to discover that it remains "a chemical preparation for destroying plant, fungal, or animal pests". Fewer pests mean more healthy plants which in turn means a higher yield. Is that a bad thing? After all, we are an agricultural society. The carrying capacity of our planet is greatly increased because of agriculture and (it stands to reason) by the introduction of ANYTHING that allows us to produce more resources for our survival on the finite amount of land we have.
I guess the only draw back I see is that pesticides are created to kill things. In some cases, they kill things that are a lot like us humans in their basic bodily functions. Doesn't that put us into some kind of danger when we consume the food that has been grown in proximity to them?
As far as I can find, our handy dandy federal government has been regulating pesticides since 1910 (California started in 1901). The Federal Insecticide Act was created to protect growers from a substandard pesticide product. After WWII, synthetic pesticides came onto the scene leading the Federal government to expand the Act to include Fungicide, and Rodenticide in 1947. These laws required that all pesticide products be registered with the USDA before their sale in interstate or foreign commerce and required certain information to be included in the label including warning statements to protect users, the public, and nontarget species of plants and animals. Yes it is a little harder to look at this government act with a tsk tsk, but I can manage :-)
What exactly are the effects of exposure to pesticides on the human body? The global healing center tells us that "Pesticides can be toxic to humans and lower animals" then goes on to quote Wikipedia's list of possible effects. The EPA explains that the effect depends on the type and the amount of pesticide. Pesticides can affect the the nervous system, hormones or endocrine system, irritate skin and eyes, and can be carcinogenic. All of the evidence indicates that pesticides are much more harmful to the people who work with them, than they are to consumers. The EPA regulates what pesticides can be used, in what quantities and how much residue to acceptable on the end product.
So where does that leave me? With a lot more research to do. There is an abundance of information about organic food production on the world wide web. For now, I'll not be going out of my way to find organic labels.
Here is a little treat for getting to the end of my ranting ramble. We all love quizzes and propaganda!
The Ultimate Organic Food Quiz
The Dirty Secrets of 6 Scandalous Foods
