Organics ARE Healthier, But What Will Really Convince People to Change?

Gulf of Mexico dead zone caused by fertilizer runoff from conventional farming. Image from NASA.

Yet another report comes out announcing that organic food is higher in nutrition (in this case, heart-healthy flavonoids in tomatoes) than conventionally-raised crops. While that’s not really surprising to me, I choose organics and vegetarianism not for the personal health benefits, which are a definite bonus, but because I know that organics are grown without soil- and water-destroying chemicals including pesticides and herbicides.

For just one example of the effects of conventional farming, fertilizer runoff from Midwestern farms pollutes the Mississippi River and has contributed to a 20,000 square mile dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. Organic produce doesn’t use artificial fertilizers, poison the laborers who pick it, and non-chemical farming is healthier for wildlife that lives on or around crops.

But it seems to me that to get people to really care about any environmental topic, from organics to global warming, you have to make it about them, directly effecting their personal health or the health of their families, or about their safety, or as a means to save money. Why don’t people see the big picture about these issues and do the right thing because we’ve only got one Earth?

{democracy:7}

Thanks to Michael Schwarz for the link!

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Starre Vartan is the founder and editor-in-chief of Eco-Chick and author of The Eco-Chick Guide to Life (St. Martin's Press). A problogger and oft-quoted green living expert who has been featured in the NYTimes, Elle, Glamour and Whole Living, she is a contributor to The Huffington Post, Inhabitat, and Hearst's The Daily Green, and is currently editor-at-large for Coco Eco Magazine. An active ecofashionista, she has style edited for Plenty magazine and coordinated runway shows. She splits her time between Connecticut and NYC and calls Sydney, Australia her second home, even though it was her first (as that's where she was born and most of her family resides). When not writing, blogging, or researching her next book, she is trailrunning, trying to cook, or snowboarding.

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2 Comments on “Organics ARE Healthier, But What Will Really Convince People to Change?”

Starre
Well, I guess I was mostly right in my rant above! More people seem to care about their health than the environment….I’m hoping that environmental reasons are at least a close second for those folks!
07/13/07 » 11:23 am »
Pequete
Hi. I just found your site and I’m really enjoying it. Now, regarding your question, I don’t see anything wrong in people thinking about their health first. After all, it is linked to the environment anyway. It is only natural that as all animals, we are primarily worried about our survival, then the survival of others and finally globally, on a planet scale. Also, it is often difficult to think in the long term (you tend to think first in the survival of your children, then grandchildren and only after that, about the generations to come). Now to another issue, and here I am talking about what happens in my country (Portugal), I don’t know if the situation is the same elsewhere. Organic products are not advertised as the other ones, most people don’t even know they exist and many of those who heard about them, don’t know exactly what they are. You can get them in the main towns and urban areas, but it is very difficult to find them in rural areas (that’s where I am, so I have to grow my own vegetables, which is actually O.K., for I really enjoy it). Even for those people that know what organic food is and would like to buy it, prices often prevent them from doing it, at least regularly, for they are pretty higher than those of conventional food. So, going back to the original question (and I’m sorry I am writing so much!), I think that what we need is: more advertising (the informative kind of), more availability (and maybe then, lower prices). And then there will be more people choosing organic. If they do it primarily because they are concerned with their health, I don’t really care.
07/19/07 » 6:00 am »