{"id":11430,"date":"2015-03-26T20:04:40","date_gmt":"2015-03-26T20:04:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/?p=11430"},"modified":"2015-03-26T20:04:40","modified_gmt":"2015-03-26T20:04:40","slug":"just-how-safe-is-your-organic-food","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/b\/just-how-safe-is-your-organic-food\/","title":{"rendered":"Just How Safe Is Your Organic Food?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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This is a guest blog that explains a little about organic and non-organic foods and the reality that we all need to eat more produce–regardless!<\/p>\n

Posted by <\/span> IowaMeetsMaui<\/span><\/a><\/span> on <\/span> March 25, 2015<\/span><\/a><\/span> in Organic vs Conventional<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

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Organic food is all the rage right now, and the practices used in organic growing are worthy of our attention. \u00a0All farmers need to be supported and encouraged no matter what growing methods they use on their farm. \u00a0However, consumers have been told by groups like Only Organic<\/em> that foods grown under USDA Organic guidelines are healthier, tastier, and safer.<\/p>\n

Are \u2018organic\u2019 foods healthier? \u00a0No<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

CNN.com posted an article by Aaron Carroll<\/span><\/a>, a professor of pediatrics. \u00a0He did a great breakdown of several large studies conducted. \u00a0The bottom line\u00a0was that, \u201cthere\u2019s a lack of evidence that organic foods are significantly more nutritious than conventionally grown food<\/em>.\u201d \u00a0There are minor differences between both growing methods, some in favor of organic, some in favor of conventional, but all differences were small. \u00a0BOTH are healthy and humans should be eating far more vegetables than are currently consumed.<\/p>\n

Are \u2018organic\u2019 foods tastier?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Taste is a matter of personal preference and the \u201ctastiness\u201d of any food is dependent on its quality, ripeness, and many other factors that are independent of \u201corganic\u201d or \u201cconventional\u201d growing practices. \u00a0Clinical studies<\/span><\/a> find there is no taste difference between the two production methods. \u00a0Penn & Teller do a funny taste test at a farmer\u2019s market HERE<\/span><\/a>, and a Dutch show\u00a0passes off McDonald\u2019s as \u2018organic\u2019 at an organic food convention HERE<\/span><\/a>.<\/p>\n

Are \u2018organic\u2019 foods safer? \u00a0No.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Many claims are made that \u2018organic\u2019 food is safer because it is produced with little or no pesticides. \u00a0This is simply incorrect. \u00a0Organic farming can use lots of different pesticides<\/span><\/a> \u2013 just not synthetic products. \u00a0Synthetic options are often safer, and require less applications<\/span><\/a> compared to their \u2018natural\u2019 counterparts. \u00a0Organic produce (when anyone bothers to test it), shows residue from both synthetic and \u2018natural\u2019 pesticides in up to 43% of samples tested. \u00a0Melinda Moyer\u2019s article, \u201cOrganic Shmorganic<\/span><\/a><\/em>\u201c,\u00a0points out that even the Environmental Working Group (author of\u00a0the\u00a0\u2018Dirty Dozen<\/span><\/a>\u2018 list) throws in a disclaimer to their findings:<\/p>\n

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\u201cWhat all this means for parents is that we should stop worrying so much about whether the apples we buy are organic or conventional\u2014we should just start giving our kids more apples. (And, sure, wash them when you can.) The Environmental Working Group agrees: In the first sentence of the executive summary\u00a0of its 2013 Shoppers Guide to Produce, the organization points out that \u201cthe health benefits of a diet rich in fruits and vegetables outweigh the risks of pesticide exposure.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Again, we must recognize that while conventionally grown produce may have a slightly higher level of pesticide residue on them, they are still well within safety standards<\/span><\/a> set out by the FDA. \u00a0We just need to eat more of them, not fear them for their production method.<\/p>\n

But wait, are organic foods safer when it comes to bacterial\u00a0contamination?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The FDA puts out a list of recalls (here<\/span><\/a>) that can be checked against your pantry. \u00a0They give detailed information about\u00a0why\u00a0an item is recalled and\u00a0how to tell if you have that item in your home. \u00a0Here\u2019s the breakdown of the products on the recall list for the past 60 days. (Jan 26, 2015 to March 26, 2015)<\/p>\n

There were 52 conventionally produced items recalled. \u00a0Of those, the vast majority were recalled due to possible allergens in the product. \u00a0Eight products were recalled due to illness-causing organisms like Listeria and Salmonella. \u00a0This comes out to 15% of conventional products recalled due to bacterial contamination.<\/p>\n

There were 19 organically produced products recalled. \u00a0Of those, 17 were due to organisms like Listeria and Salmonella. \u00a0 The percentage of recalls of organic products\u00a0due to\u00a0bacterial\u00a0contamination? \u00a089%<\/p>\n

\"Tell<\/a><\/p>\n

Of further interest is the fact that organic food sales account for only 4% of the total food market<\/span><\/a> in the US. \u00a0Four percent of the market made up about 27% of the recalls. \u00a0If you want to rule out the recalls due to allergens, that figure soars to 68%. \u00a0Think about that. \u00a0Four percent of the food in this country caused 68% of the salmonella, listeria, and staph related recalls in the last 60 days. \u00a0 This should give us pause as we consider the safety of this sector of our food supply in the US.<\/p>\n

If you buy only organic food, ask yourself:<\/p>\n

\"DO<\/a>
\n<\/a><\/p>\n

But more importantly, have you consumed your\u00a0daily dose of fruits and vegetables,<\/p>\n

regardless of the growing method used to produce them?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    This is a guest blog that explains a little about organic and non-organic foods and the reality that we all need to eat more produce–regardless! Posted by IowaMeetsMaui on March 25, 2015 in Organic vs Conventional Organic food is all the rage right now, and the practices used in organic growing are worthy of our attention. \u00a0All farmers Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11433,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44,780],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-b","category-nutrition-2","cat-44-id","cat-780-id"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/do-you-feel-lucky-today.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11430"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11430"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11430\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11432,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11430\/revisions\/11432"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}