There is no doubt in my mind that organically grown produce is more nutritional and healthier for you. Come on, here is a tomato you have just gone out and picked, taken inside, washed off even though there are no pesticides on it and you either eat it like an apple, slice it, put it in a salad, feed it to your family and all in 3 to 30 minutes! Now let's take that tomato you bought in your local super market which has probably traveled hundreds if not thousands of miles to get to you, been packaged and handled by hundreds of people, has probably had chemical sprayed on it and been put in some sort of cold storage that has made it grainy. How much nutritional value do you think it has by now?
Awhile back I read that at the 2005 international congress Organic Farming, Food Quality and Human Health, Professor Carlo Leifert of Newcastle University reported findings that organically produced food had higher level of specific antioxidants and lower mycotoxin levels than conventional samples.
Our oldest son, Don, has been in the citrus industry for about 25 years and is the President and CEO of a couple of the largest citrus companies in Florida. We get wonderful fresh citrus from him each month and we know this is good stuff. However, when used to go down to visit him and his sister who also lived in Florida we could go outside to her orange and grapefruit trees each morning, pick what we wanted and walk back into the house, squeeze the citrus and drink it all in a matter of 10 minutes or less from tree to tummy. Of course it tasted better. It was fresher, no chemicals, no sprays, no picking early and gassing it into ripeness. As I said there is no doubt in my mind that was a lot healthier for us and more nutritious.
In June of 2002 at the Great Lakes Regional meeting of the American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society held at the Radisson the scientists expected to find conventional oranges healthier for you. Here is the report, "Conventional oranges are larger than organically-grown oranges, and they have a deeper orange color. Because of their size, "we were expecting twice as much vitamin C in the conventional oranges," said Clark. But to his surprise, chemical isolation combined with nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy revealed that the organically-grown oranges contained 30% more vitamin C than the conventionally-grown fruits - even though they were only about half the size."
In a report in the Feb. 18, 2005 issue of The Scotsman, a team of scientists at the Danish Institute of Agricultural Sciences reported that even rats fed organic food were slimmer, slept better and had stronger immune systems than rats fed conventionally grown produce.
In an 87 page report prepared for The Soil Association of the United Kingdom in 2001 it was reported that organically grown crops appear to be higher in vitamin C, essential minerals and phytonutrients.
In the Organic Newsline, Vol. 3, Issue, 3, September 2002, there was an Italian study that found organic pears; peaches and oranges had higher antioxidant levels than their conventional counterparts. The study, which began three years and is still ongoing, is being conducted by the Istituto nazionale di ricerca per gli alimenti e la nutrizione (National Institute of Food and Nutrition Research). In particular, researchers found that organic William's pears contained less fiber but more natural sugar, vitamin C and antioxidants compared to their conventional counterparts, and were more resistant to mildew and fungi. Organic Regina Bianca peaches, meanwhile, contained more antioxidants.
There have been studies going on for ages and will continue to be done. However, when you are an organic gardener, eating your own produce, you will be a living, walking result of your own study.
When you grown your own organically controlled produce you know what you get. However, when you buy it at the super market you need to make sure that organically grown is truly organically grown unlike the fraud found in the Science Daily, February 5, 2008 which showed in a recent study in Journal of Environmental Quality, scientists successfully use nitrogen isotopic discrimination to determine if non-organic, synthetic fertilizers were used on sweet pepper plants.
As an organic gardener you have the opportunity to grow things that you would normally not find in your area, as long as they are grow-able in your zone or greenhouse.
As a cancer survivor, who was given a 50-50 chance of being alive at the end of 6 months on April 2, 1992 unless I took chemotherapy, I opted to not take chemotherapy, but go off into the woods and quietly die. However, doing that changed my way of living and eating. Well, I am still here, older, crankier, creakier, wiser, but still here because I took charge of what I eat.
According to the Science Daily (Mar. 4, 2003) - Fruits and veggies grown organically show significantly higher levels of cancer-fighting antioxidants than conventionally grown foods, according to a new study of corn, strawberries and marionberries. The research suggests that pesticides and herbicides actually thwart the production of phenolics - chemicals that act as a plant's natural defense and also happen to be good for our health.
We, Americans, are so used to being brainwashed by Madison Ave. TV marketing, magazines that show women and men so perfect that there is no way we will ever look like them simply because all the photos are digitally enhanced and sometimes when we look at organically produced produce it may not be as perfect looking as the conventionally produced and packaged stuff, but you can bet it will be a heck of a lot better for you.
"Tread the Earth Lightly" and in the meantime May your day be filled with Peace, Light and Love,
Author's note: This article was originally written for GreenThumbArticles.com
