Making the right choices at the grocery store for yourself and your family can often be a daunting task. Often, in an effort to stay within our budget, we select our foods based on their price tag or what we think will be easiest to prepare (more on these things in later posts!). But the vast majority of products at your grocery store are associated with hidden costs – to tax payers, our planet, and most importantly, our bodies. Need convincing? We have compiled a list of reasons organic food will help you on your path to becoming happier and healthier.
1. Organic foods are the easiest way to avoid GMOs
Not only does the organic certification ensure there are no harmful chemicals on our food, it also guarantees that they are not GMOs. Among other things, GMOs are engineered to be used in conjunction with a single harmful chemical such as Round Up. Therefore, buying organic is a vote against the large chemical producing corporations that have polluted the world’s food and fields.
2. Organic foods keep toxic pesticides out of our food
Chemicals designed to kill living organisms shouldn’t be considered food, right? Organically certified foods guarantee that the food is free of toxic chemicals and that it’s safe to eat.
3. Organic farming maintains healthy soil
Non organic foods are sprayed with extremely toxic chemicals that kill everything other than the crop itself. Much like the over-use of antibiotics in humans, the effect of spraying with these chemicals is to wipe out the necessary with the unwanted. That leaves the soil devoid of the nutrients plants need to thrive, the same nutrients humans should be getting from the plants when we eat them! The end result is that the plants no longer have a working immune system, requiring more toxic chemicals just to enable growth.
4. Organic foods inhibit the growth of super strains
Nature always adapts, so when we spray our fields with chemicals intended to kill off pests, the pests find a way to thrive while resisting our chemicals.The toxins we use will eventually become ineffective and plants and pests will become much more harmful.
5. Organic farming supports pollinators
Herbicides and Pesticides do not differentiate between good and bad bugs (think about our recent loss of honey bees!), it kills them all. Organic farming practices healthy growing techniques that maintain that necessary level of biodiversity.
6. Organic foods support a healthier farm lifestyle and a healthier community
Growing food organically supports the surrounding community in which it’s grown. Unlike non organic practices, organics keep toxins out of the air, the drinking water, and the soil. Farmers aren’t exposed to herbicides and pesticides all day and if food is bought at the market where it’s grown, it reduces transportation costs and emissions.
7. Organic foods are more nutrient rich
Organic foods get their nutrients straight from healthy, rich, organic soil. Non-organic crops get their “nutrients” from synthetic fertilizers made from fossil fuels. Years of not replenishing the soil with organic matter forces farmers to add synthetic fertilizers. This leads to nutrient deficient crops grown from the same thing that fuels our cars.
8. Organic foods are typically not monocropped
Planting a single crop in a large area (AKA: monocropping) leaves that crop vulnerable to being wiped out by a single disease or bug. Farmers are then forced to spray chemicals that kill absolutely everything other than the crop itself. As a result, that crop is the laden with chemicals which humans should not be ingesting. Having lots of different plants attracts lots of different bugs, all of which end up working in harmony to promote healthy plants and a healthy earth.
9. Organic foods are often more flavorful
Just as the meat of a stressed animal is not as tasty and tender as the meat of a relaxed animal, the flavor of a stressed crop will not be as good as that of a crop grown with ease. A plant the needs to dig deeper to find nutrients is stressed and cannot put that energy towards the growth of its fruit.
11. Organics don’t cost taxpayers millions of dollars
Farming is a tough job. The work is hard and the reward can be small. In order to keep the expensive, large scale, non-organic farming practice running millions of taxpayer dollars need handed out in subsidies. In addition, the impacts of non-organic practices need to be dealt with. That’s a few more million in clean up, restoration, and public health. Millions (perhaps billions) of dollars of taxpayer money goes towards making a big mess, then doing a questionable job cleaning it up. If we subsidized organic, permaculture farms instead, the savings in dollars and lives would be astounding.
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