Organic food is basically food grown without the use of man-made chemicals. The U.S. Department of Agriculture defines “organic” as the lack of non-natural pesticides, hormones, antibiotics, and fertilizers, as well as bioengineering and radiation.

Organic food production originated with the avoidance of commercial pesticides – the 1950′s type. However, modern pesticides are safer, more efficient, and decompose rapidly in nature. There’s far less reason to avoid state-of-the-art chemical technology.

Still, many organic farmers use “natural” pesticides like the carcinogenic pyrethrum or fermented urine. Most use manure, a major source of E. coli bacteria, which poisons about 25,000 people a year in the US. There are nearly ten times more recalls for organic foods than standard foods.

Not only do organic foods have an inherently higher risk of contamination, but it also goes bad quicker than standard food. How is it better for anyone to have to pour milk down the drain or throw away moldy cheese and vegetables?

Think of this: Organic beef farms in England have had hundreds of cows diagnosed with mad-cow disease.

The term “organic food” has actually been hijacked by big business profiteers. Organic food once referred to local food, what we now call “green.” Its carbon footprint was as small as possible. Ironically, today’s organic food is less efficient, more wasteful, and far more ecologically damaging than standard food.

Major corporations make major profits by selling organic food to the ill-informed and outright duped public. Rather than state the whole truth, they stick to the minimum revelations that the law requires. They don’t tell you, for instance, that a huge portion of America’s organic food is grown in foreign countries.

Not that foreign countries cannot produce decent organic food. But there are fewer regulations and relaxed standards in some of these countries, and in fact many organic foods have been produced with commercial pesticides and fertilizers – some of which are dangerous or outright illegal.

And the carbon footprint is much bigger than a Sasquatch’s. Do you realize that all coffee – whether organic or not – is transported from the equator? We get organic meat from Australia and New Zealand, and organic vegetables from South America and Asia. Transportation equals pollution.

Organic farms tend to produce a lot of methane, carbon dioxide, and nitrous oxide – Global Warming gases – as well as burning excessive fuel and electricity in order to flush and irrigate their more contaminated and less efficient fields.

But organic food is healthier for us, right? Wrong. The Mayo Clinic says “No conclusive evidence shows that organic food is more nutritious than is conventionally grown food. And the USDA – even though it certifies organic food – doesn’t claim that these products are safer or more nutritious.”

What if everyone on the planet decided to eat organic foods? Because of the much lower crop yield per acre for organic foods, we’ll be FORCED to chop down the rain forests and dig up our national parks in order to create enough farm land to grow it all. Demand for additional farm land is already causing real estate problems world-wide.

Organic food once had an ethical philosophy attached to it that is now long lost. The idea was that farmers would treat their workers and animals with respect and dignity. Many of today’s organic farms keep their animals corralled into cramped “parking lots” where they can be force-fed their mostly-organic diets without taking up valuable farm land. Many foreign farm workers work long hours under horrible conditions and get paid close to nothing.

Organic food is more expensive than standard food. Why? Because it’s a fad. The plain fact is that organic food has a huge profit margin and zealous fans. They are so locked into this fad that they’ll pay double just for the bragging rights of doing something good for the environment and for their own health.

But patrons of organic food are supporting unhealthy pesticides, lower production yields, shorter shelf life, more bacterial infections, poorer health, slave labor, animal cruelty, unfriendly ecology, and Global Warming. And they pay more for the privilege!

Ill-informed and outright duped.

Scrud Kelley

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