Monday, August 17, 2009

Nutritional Levels in Organics

This is a good article on about this study recently released about the nutritional value of Organic foods. Here's the response I posted on

"No question, the issue of labeling products "Organic" has its flaws. The now ubiquitous label has the power to add value, and potentially profits, to anything it is attached to, and so it can be exploited. Many folks who buy organic products have forgotten, or never fully understood why they choose Organic. The problem with the study cited in this article, (which has received considerable press,) is that it seizes on the uncertainties surrounding the issue of Organics, and re-frames the issue around nutrition, which is not, nor ever was the point of "Organic." The notion of "Organic" is to promote food systems, and in general systems of production, that don't create harmful materials as a byproduct and put them out into the environment, and don't put harmful products out into the market and ultimately into humans- to create systems that are sustainable rather than detrimental. If it turned out that heirloom tomatoes grown in compost had slightly higher levels of Vitamin C, that would be nice, but this is not the goal. If the results of this study were authored in good faith, it would have presented the results as the interesting side note that they are. But instead, it implicitly (and perhaps explicitly) suggests that it is blowing the cover off Organics, when it isn't."


  1. Well, I agree with you--but I wonder if arguing about the nutritive value of organic food is sort of second-tier argument, since some scientists have already been arguing that organic food is actually causing more harm to food production systems than good--do you know Lee Silver, a molecular biologist at Princeton? He's had some interesting things to say about genetically engineered foods versus organic.

  2. I haven't heard about this, but I'm curious about what the argument is. I don't know if it's relevant to his arguments, but there's a big distinction between the large-scale "Organic" farming that produces much of the "Organic" foods in Shaw's and Whole Foods, and the organic foods that are grown on smaller, mixed-crop farms that are selling produce at the farmer's markets in VT and elsewhere. Michael Pollan makes the point pretty vividly in Omnivore's Dilemma.