Growing disillusioned with organic

Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil, and you’re a thousand miles from the corn field.
~Dwight D. Eisenhower

After I finished writing Irrational Chemical Fears, I realized something: this is why I’ve been growing increasingly disillusioned with organic products. There are other reasons why, such as the high price premium I can no longer afford due to barely being able to buy food at all, but this one is a biggie.

A caveat: I’ve never really been closely associated with conventional agriculture. I’ve grown my own food, yes (in quantity, even), but I’ve never worked with or seen in detail large crop operations. I’ve heard a few things about them, but the details are fuzzy. I’m much more familiar with Confined Animal Feeding Operations than I am with the crops that go to feed them.

I don’t really agree with organic in theory. Throwing out all “artificial” pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers seems a little counter-productive. This is especially true when there are methods such as Integrated Pest Management available…methods that are, from what I understood from one of my old professors, becoming increasingly under fire from corporations like Monsanto. Yes, by all means use the herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizer…when necessary and only in the doses required. No need to use more, no need to throw it out altogether.

Now, my professor may have been wrong, and I may have a pessimistic view of large crop operations, and if so, whoohoo! But I doubt it. I don’t think we’d have the massive amounts of chemical run-off from farms if IPM-like strategies were common in agriculture. I’ve also heard rumors that farmers tend to use fertilizer with a “more is more” strategy. Considering the volatile nature of some fertilizers, I don’t think this is quite as true as “more is more” would imply, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see fertilizer applied at levels over what is recommended.

Probably one of the bigger hurdles with this kind of thing is that it can’t be regulated. It’s easier to regulate “no” than it is to regulate “only when necessary.” How do you know that the application of a pesticide to that particular area was necessary or if it was just a broad application without other methods being tried first? It’s easier just to ban it all across the board. And again, everyone always takes the quick route out.

Public perception would be a different hurdle. People are becoming convinced that organic is significantly healthier than conventional, when it may or may not be true. There are a lot of people unwilling to accept any form of scary chemicals on their food. There’s a video clip in my head playing of a guy who buys only organic food for his son because of scary chemicals, but I can’t remember where I saw it or what it was contained in.

And then there’s the issue of price. Organic food is sold at a premium. That’s a red flag. Premium equals luxury, luxury equals the Joneses, therefore people will continue to buy organic food at these inflated prices simply because it’s a mark of affluence. Even should organic food prices drop to effectively the same as conventional, I doubt anyone is going to give up that nice profit margin. And if it does and they do, organic will lose that mark of affluence…it would be interesting to see if it would sell as well, better, or worse.

And with that nice little niche organic food has for it, those large corporations pumping out most of the organic food sold in stores have quite a say in the standards that are required to meet the organic label. There have already been massive fights about what is or is not organic, with a huge disparity between what the public thinks organic should be, and what organic is defined as by the USDA. Who do you think the USDA listens to? Certainly not me, but I’ll give you a hint. Add in to that the fact that a lot of small farmers can’t afford to get the certification necessary to claim their food is organically grown. Organic is about money…who has money, who doesn’t have money. If you have money, you can have organic, be it organic food or organic labeling. No money, no organic for you.

If I had the money would I buy organic now? Yes, I would, because while it’s not great it’s at least better than conventional agriculture, at least in some respects. But I do think that what we need isn’t organic. Nor what most people think organic should be. There are enough food issues on this planet as it is, we don’t need to add more. Although if corn crop yields dropped, that might actually be helpful. Huh. Everyone go buy organic corn. And bananas. Organic bananas just fucking taste better.