Organic Food
Of all of the issues having to do with food and eating, I think that in today's world, next to starvation, this may be one of the most disturbing issues to look at. At least, I find that to be true in my life. When I take a hard look at my personal buying decisions (both in terms of food and other items) this is the issue that hits closest to home and shakes me up the most. It is a hard topic partly because its not clear cut and partly because as I look at it I begin to realize the power I have as a consumer and yet the powerlessness I feel at being only one of many consumers whose choices shape entire nations. So please know that in all that I say here, I am in no way saying that I know what is right in this area. It is an area I struggle with constantly. It is an area that I think can easily become a "he said, she said" argument rather than a helpful discussion. So in studying this, and in discussing it with others, try to remind yourself that your goal should not be to prove yourself right, but to earnestly seek God's guidance. With that being said, let me launch into the organic arena. It is a topic far broader than what you might suspect as you look at the expensive organic produce in the shi-shi grocery stores.
(note: Some of these Q&A are by me; some I've lifted. Note the quote marks. Credit is given at the end of the quote.)
Q: What is organic food? Isn't all food organic by definition?
A: Well, yes and no. In the sense that "organic" means "
a living organism," yes, all food is organic. But the word has come
to take on new meaning as well. Organic now also means that the food was
grown without the use of pesticides. (Or, in the case of milk, eggs, etc.
that the animal was fed food that was grown without the use of pesticides.
In animals, it can also mean that animals were not injected with hormones
or given antibiotics.) In other words, organic as it is used in this context
doesn't refer to the food itself, but to the process that was used
to grow the food (or raise the animal). "Organic food production
is based on a system of farming that maintains and replenishes the fertility
of the soil. Organic foods are produced without the use of toxic pesticides
and fertilizers.
Organic
foods are minimally processed to maintain the integrity of the food without
artificial ingredients, preservatives or irradiation." (New Pioneer
Co-op in Massachusetts)
"Q: Is organic food better for you?
A: There is no conclusive evidence at this time to suggest that organically produced foods are more nutritious. However, well-balanced soils grow strong healthy plants which many believe taste better and contain more nutrients. Many restaurant chefs across the country are using organic produce because they think it tastes better. Organic growers often select varieties to grow for their flavor, not only their appearance." (New Pioneer Co-op) In fact, Rob was convinced to eat more organic foods after tasting an organic apple. It had a lot more flavor than what he was used to from conventionally grown apples. And I became convinced when I compared the organic (and expensive) strawberries from the hippie grocer to the conventional (and super cheap) strawberries from Costco. Although the Costco strawberries were cheaper, they tasted so much like cardboard that I had to add sugar to them just so that I'd have something to taste. On the other hand, though I had paid much more for the organic strawberries, they were sweet and delicious all on their own--definitely worth every penny that I had paid for them.
Q: I don't eat organic, my parents don't eat organic, my grandparents don't eat organic, and we're all fine. Why should I bother?
A: Higher rates of cancer and malnutrition (from quality, not quantity, of food) since the advent of chemically grown, processed foods, should be reason enough. Birth defects may also be caused by chemicals in food. Not only that, but as stewards of God's earth, we should be caring for it, not poisoning it. Granted, we may not be the ones pouring the toxic chemicals on, however, when we buy produce that has been grown with the use of chemicals, we are complicit in a system that poisons the ground and water systems (and in turn, people).
Q: But hasn't food always been grown the way its grown now on commercial farms?
A: The answer to that is an emphatic NO! Chemicals began to be added to crops as fertilizers in the late 1800's. As fertilizers began to destroy the living organisms in the soil (the microbes and fungi that plants need to resist pests and disease), pesticides were developed. In fact, in 1948, Paul Muller was awarded Nobel Prize for Medicine for developing the perfect insecticide. (It was found to reduce damage from the Colorado potato beetle and was used in 1944 to quash an outbreak of typhus carried by lice in Naples.) The perfect insecticide? DDT. Farms used to also have a mix of plants and animals. Now farms are segregated. Rather than having a few cows on a farm whose waste is used to fertilize the fields, now there are farms with thousands of cows (or tens of thousands) and their waste is washed into streams and rivers by the rain, polluting/poisoning the water.
Q: Why is it especially important to protect children from pesticides?
A: "Children's
exposure to pesticides is of particular concern because they possess physiological
and behavioral characteristics that render them particularly susceptible
to pesticide exposure and effects. In addition, children (particularly
infants) are undergoing important developmental processes that may be
highly susceptible to disruption by bioactive chemicals (such as pesticides;
Bruckner 2000). Children tend to have higher net exposures to pesticides
than adults because they have a larger surface area-to-body-area ratio
(allowing for more dermal absorption (Faustman et al. 2000)), possess
variable and sometimes limited xenobiotic detoxification pathways (Weiss
et al. 1960; Neims 1982), and have higher basal metabolic rates than adults.
Children also exhibit different behaviors that make them more susceptible
to pesticide exposure, including consuming higher amounts of certain food
groups (NRC 1993; Lawrie 1998), engaging in extensive hand-to-mouth activity,
and spending more time near the ground, where dust and pesticide residue
may accumulate (Faustman et al. 2000)." ((According to the University
of Michigan -- M Go Blue! -- http://www.co.washtenaw.mi.us/depts/eis/eischildrensehpesticides.html
)
Q:
If something is labeled organic, how do I know that it really is?
A:
Well, again, this is a situation where you have to rely on watch dog groups
to check up on things. An item should be certified organic, which means
that a certifying agency (such as CCOF -- CaliforniaCertified Organic
Farmers, or QAI -- Quality Assurance International) has inspected the
produce/animals, as well as the farm/land and determined that it was produced
in a manner that was organic from beginning to end. One advantage to organic
watchdog groups is that people who eat organic tend to be activists as
well and they're not afraid to stick it to organizations that they think
are falling down on the job.
General Thoughts on Organic vs. Commercially Grown Food
(see the boxes at the end of this page also:
Figures relating to the health and environmental effects of pesticides
and Top 10 Reasons to Buy Organic)
When we buy commercial food items, then we most likely are supporting the use of pesticides and fertilizers, both of which damage the people who farm our crops as well as their neighbors who then find that their water supplies have been contaminated by the run-off from the fields. (This is a major issue in California and there were several times when I would hear reports on the radio about counties in the state that were on contaminated water alerts.)
But how did we get to this point? Well, think back to Jesus' day. In fact, think back to any day as long as it was before the 1800's or 1900's. Where did people get their food from? Either they grew it themselves, they traded with neighbors, or they bought their food at a local market. When shopping at the market, its probable that the person they bought the produce from is the very farmer who grew it (or someone in that farmer's family). Basically people ate locally grown food and they had a fairly good sense of what kind of conditions that food was grown in (and what kind of conditions the farmer and his hired hands worked in). Granted, there were probably some items that weren't grown locally: tea, cane sugar, chocolate and coffee come to mind. But those items were also very expensive and therefore less commonly used than we are used to today.
Now, think about where your food comes from. Do you know any of the farmers that grew any of your food? Are you able to ask them about the working conditions of their hired hands, or about their use of chemicals, or even how their family is doing? Probably not. In fact, according to the Center of Excellence for Sustainable Development, your food has traveled an average of 1,200 miles from the farm to your local market. And to be perfectly honest, just because produce is organic doesn't mean that it hasn't traveled just as far as commercial produce. (Hence the movement toward eating locally. But like I said on page one, I'm not going to really get into that.)
So the real question is: "So my food is from far away, does that mean that it is covered in chemicals, or that people were mistreated while growing it?" (Or you could ask a parallel question: "Just because my food is labeled organic, how do I really know that it isn't covered in chemicals or that people were mistreated while growing it?" Well, if you don't have any relationship with the grower, then you are dependant upon watch-dog groups to determine whether foods are grown in a manner that is safe to the grower, the eater and the neighboring community. The two main problems then are: is the watch-dog group reliable? and am I going to listen to the watch-dog group and make decisions accordingly?
The predominant watch-dog group in America is the FDA (Food and Drug Administration). Their mission "is to promote and protect the public health by helping safe and effective products reach the market in a timely way, and monitoring products for continued safety after they are in use. Our work is a blending of law and science aimed at protecting consumers." (http://www.fda.gov/opacom/hpview.html) They are responsible for the safety of 80% of all food consumed in the US. In terms of pesticides, however, they only check to make sure that residue levels on food are within what is considered to be safe limits. Those safe limits, as well as all regulation of pesticide use, is determined by the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency).
I don't want to disparage either of these organizations. I think they're doing an amazing job considering how much is under their care. But..., well consider how many police there are in the United States and yet how often people still speed without getting caught. I suspect that there are similar gaps in the FDA's ability to police the agricultural sector. Yes, they might catch the fact that a pesticide is causing cancer, but how long after it has already been put into use? And though they have jurisdiction over the US, as well as produce that is coming into the US, they don't monitor the health liabilities of those that grew that produce in another country. So the food might be safe for you when it hits your kitchen table, but there was no one checking to make sure that it was also safe for those that grew it (and their neighbors).
According to the Associated Press, "A state agency's study found that Hispanic farm workers have higher rates of brain, leukemia, skin and stomach cancers than other Hispanics in California, a phenomenon their union blames on pesticide exposure. Female Hispanic farm workers also had more cases of uterine cancer than the rest of the state's Hispanic women, according to the Cancer Registry of California study, 'Cancer Incidence in the United Farm Workers of America, 1987-1997.'" Note, this is among farm workers in the US where such pesticides as DDT, parathion and lindane have been banned. In other words, these farm workers have only been exposed to chemicals that have been approved. Just imagine the state of the farm workers in countries that still use the chemicals that we have banned! (Or worse yet, imagine the health of the children, both born and unborn, who live near those fields and whose water has been contaminated.)
But lest you begin to lose hope, there IS something you can do. Eat organic. Look for foods that are Certified Organic. That means that someone has been to that farm and inspected it for pesticides, chemical fertilizers, use of hormones, etc. Eating commercial produce might not be a severe threat to those of us who can simply wash the pesticides off of our food. But for those whose environments have been polluted, our choice to eat organic can eventually lead to a cleaner environment for them.
A
few specifics on coffee....
The only product that is traded more than coffee is oil. Coffee is also one of the most chemically treated crops on Earth. (Cotton is another one that is pretty high up there.) OrganicComsumers.org sums up the disparity between our view of coffee and the reality of the workers saying, "Sip a steaming brew at Starbucks, and you might associate coffee with prosperity. The image of carefree consumers enjoying $3 lattes seems totally unrelated to that of coffee-bean farmers and workers, who live with grinding poverty, illiteracy and a long legacy of economic colonialism. But the two groups are part of an intricately related system that has existed for centuries, leaving coffee harvesters immiserated, and coffee drinkers mostly unaware to [sic] the suffering that goes into making their beverage."
The San Diego Earth Times explains the problems coffee farmers have with switching from growing coffee commercially to growing it organically:
Tons of dangerous pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and insecticides we would shudder to think of using in America (and are forbidden to, anyway) are sprayed routinely on crops in developing countries, in Central and South America, for instance, where much of the coffee crops are grown. The long-term effects of these synthetic chemicals are jeopardizing the environment, taking its toll on ground soil and drinking water, and posing health risks to the village farmers and their families. "I've seen kids playing with pesticide canisters strapped to their backs," said Perkins, of The Earth's Choice Organic Coffee Co. "The farmers are using primarily small hand-held pump-action sprayers, because they can't afford high technology, so the chemicals are being sprayed over wide parcels of land, and runoff from water and rain goes into the village water supply."
Encouraging more farmers to become organic is part of the solution. But there's a problem with that. Because organic farming is more labor intensive than non-organic farming, the yield is less. "All of coffee growing is pretty labor intensive," said David Griswold, general manager of Aztec Harvest, a specialty coffee broker that sells mainly to roasters in California and consumers via mail order. "But in organic farming, instead of carrying a bag of chemicals on your back, you have to carry a lot of mulch or beneficial insects."
Aztec Harvest deals with small-scale, certifiable organic and non-organic farmers in the Mexican states of Oaxaca, Veracruz and Chiapas. Each farmer works a two-acre plot, and belongs to a democratically run cooperative. Aztec works only with shade grown crops, which are said to yield better tasting coffee beans.
Considering that it takes five years for a coffee tree to bear its first crop, and the annual yield is only about one pound of roasted coffee for each tree, farmers need incentives to switch to organic production.
Not only do the workers suffer who must spray the pesticides onto the coffee plants, but their families, especially their children, suffer as those same pesticides are washed into their soil and their water supply.
Why Christians Should Take a Closer Look at How Their Food is Grown
There are basically two main reasons for considering organic food:
1. our own health and
2. others'.
If your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, and treating your own body well means treating God's temple well, then we should eat healthy foods in proper proportions without ingesting any unnecessary poisons. But that's not the only reason why Christians should consider carefully the food they eat. (In fact, its probably the lesser of the two reasons.)
God has always advocated justice and kindness toward the poor. Consider these proverbs:
He who oppresses the poor to increase his wealth and he who gives gifts to the rich -- both come to poverty. (Proverbs 22:16)
He who oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God. (Proverbs 14:31)
Do not exploit the poor because they are poor and do not crush the needy in court, for the Lord will take up their case and will plunder those who plunder them. (Proverbs 22:24)
Seeking the well being of those who grow our food seems to be in line with these Proverbs, especially as many of the field workers are poor and needy. And those that live near the farms that are spraying crops are probably poor as well. (If they had the money, I doubt they would continue to live near a farm that reeked of manure or in an area where they had to boil their water because of the warnings about contamination.) Families that live near polluting factories are often in the same boat. They can't afford to move, and yet their kids are coming down with cancers and leukemia that they can't afford to treat.
When we choose to eat organic food we are supporting a system of sustainable agriculture as well as a system that will help to provide a livable environment for many of the world's poor. These workers are not our hired hands in the sense that we know them and pay them directly. But in today's global economy, they are the chief providers of sweat equity into a global market. As consumers, we are the chief guiders of what that market will provide. If we buy commercially grown produce, then agribusiness will continue to dominate with a system that seeks profit rather than the good of its workers or the earth's resources which it uses up. If we continue to demand cheaper products, we are feeding the trend to seek cheaper and cheaper workers (and to pay them less and less). Our purchasing decisions affect far more than our pocketbooks. They affect ecosystems, market trends and people's lives. We need to be (as Jan pointed out in Bible study recently) "Conscience Christians."
Galatians 6:9-10 says, "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers." It is hard to change patterns of eating, especially because eating is a very personal, emotional event in many ways. (Why else would we include food at every fellowship gathering! Or be concerned that we eat together as a family?) But we are called to "do good to all people," even those who grow our food miles and miles away from us.
James 2:15-16 says, "Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, `Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,' but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it?" If we do nothing about the pollution that is affecting the poor and needy in our world, then aren't we simply ignoring physical needs?
Proverbs 3: 27-29 says, "Do not withhold good from those who deserve it, when it is in your power to act. Do not say to your neighbor, 'Come back later; I'll give it tomorrow'-- when you now have it with you. Do not plot harm against your neighbor, who lives trustfully near you." As Americans we wield tremendous power. As Christian Americans, let us use it, one organic apple at a time.
When God first created Adam, the Bible says that, "The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it." (Genesis 2:15) So man had a purpose even before woman was created and that was to take care of the Garden. In fact, it is only three verses later wherein God says, "'It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.'" Considering that Adam had just been put into the Garden "to work it and take care of it" it's fair to say that Eve was put there to help him with the gardening. J
The command to take care of the Garden is paralleled in Genesis 1 when God says to the man and woman, "'Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground." (1:28) God's definition of "rule" is not to "lord over" but to serve. (Luke 22:25-27) Therefore, our God given position as rulers over nature is not one in which we are given license to use and abuse nature, but one in which we are ordained to be gardeners, using the Earth in a sustainable manner, because it is God's earth we are managing. And how we treat the earth affects how we treat the inhabitants of the earth. When we poison the earth, we poison its inhabitants as well.
God's concern for his "Garden" is so strong, that he actually made laws about it. Leviticus 25:2-4 documents the following comments to Moses from God, "Speak to the Israelites and say to them: 'When you enter the land I am going to give you, the land itself must observe a sabbath to the Lord. For six years sow your fields, and for six years prune your vineyards and gather their crops. But in the seventh year the land is to have a sabbath of rest, a sabbath to the Lord.'" And again, after seven times of sabbaths, the ground was to be given an additional sabbath during what was called "The Year of Jubilee." (Leviticus 25:18-22)
For a very well laid out essay on why Christians should be concerned with the ecology, check out Marcia Bunge's article (online (of course) at: www.webofcreation.org/worship/biblicalviewsarticle.htm). The article includes several passages of Scripture and principles from the Bible that lead to a sound environmental policy.
One last note (on this topic): We often envision environmentalists as hippie-liberal types who hug trees and pray to "the goddess." Sure, many of them follow the wrong God, but they still obey God's first command better than many of God's own people do. They are also an unreached people group. They hear us preach of God's love, but they can't jive our words with our actions as we pollute, abuse, and use up the world around us. If we want to effectively reach environmentalists, then we need to be conscience of our actions as they affect the environment.
Meat (and the animals it comes from)
Not only is the earth the Lord's but every animal on it as well. The
Lord said, "for every animal of the forest is mine, and the cattle
on a thousand hills. I know every bird in the mountains, and the creatures
of the field are mine." (Psalm 
50:10-11)
Animals are not made in the image of God. They cannot commune with God
in the same way that mankind is able to. And yet, God knows every bird
in the mountains. He deems them important enough to know them.
How do we tend to treat animals? Either we lavish them with attention
(pets) or we treat them pretty harshly. (If dogs were ever raised the
way that cattle are in factory farms, people would be outraged.) We tend
to either treat animals as if they're people or as if they're garbage.
Our treatment of animals as garbage is often not direct. Rather, we are
complicit in a system that is based on profit and greed instead of ethics.
And we support 
not
just a system that treats animals harshly, but one that is endangering
humans as well.
In terms of human health issues, there are three items of greatest concern: 1. the abuse of antibiotics, 2. the problem of contaminants such as e. coli, and 3. the contamination such intensive farming causes to the environment and hence to people's drinking water, etc.
Despite the fact that children's picture books show cows grazing idyllically
alone in a field of tasty clover, that is not how factory farmed cows
are raised. Though they may spend the first few months of their lives
in a field, as soon as they're weaned they're sent off to be 
fattened
in a factory where they'll be crammed into pens with several other cows.
They stand in their own (as well as other's) waste and some of that waste
even makes its way onto their flesh once their killed. (That is how the
e. coli and campylobacter as well as other bacteria make it to your kitchen
and why you should always be sure to cook your meat thoroughly.) The cows
are also fed grain which stresses their digestive systems (which are made
for more grass than grain). All of these conditions lead to higher rates
of disease among the animals. Because of this, the animals are regularly
fed antibiotics. The problem, however, is that the bacteria are adapting
to these antibiotics. Doctors are finding strains in humans that no longer
respond to penicillin and tetracycline. In other words, by forcing these
animals to live in such cramped quarters (all for the sake of "profit")
we are threatening our own ability to treat diseases once they reach humans.
Consumer Reports did a study a few years ago (March, 1998) that documented high rates of e. coli and campylobacter in chicken meat. They pointed out several serious flaws not only in how animals are raised, but also in how they are processed (since that is the point at which most contaminants are spread among several carcases). I have a copy of the article if you would like to read it.
If a
single cow, or even a few cows, were raised on a farm, then the waste
produced could be used to fertilize that farmers fields. But if several
cows, thousands of cows, in fact, were raised on a single farm, then the
waste is no longer considered an organic fertilizer, but instead it poses
a threat to water systems near the farm and to the health of those nearby.
Cramming cows together is not only unpleasant and unhealthy for cows,
it is also an environmental hazard for humans.
I have only skimmed the topic of factory farmed meat here. I am not a farmer nor do I play one on TV. Everything I know I've mostly learned through magazine articles. I have some of those articles available if you would like to read them. In fact, I would highly encourage you to do so. There are also links included in the bibliography.