Eating with a Conscience

Organic Food
Eating with a Conscience
to protect health and the environment

Our food choices have a direct effect on the health of our environment and those who grow and harvest what we eat.  That’s why food labeled organic is the right choice. In addition to serious health questions linked to actual residues of toxic pesticides on the food we eat, our food buying decisions support or reject hazardous agricultural practices, protection of farmworkers and farm families, and stewardship of the earth.

The Organic Choice is Clear
It is important to eat organic food –nurtured in a system of food production, handling and certification that rejects hazardous synthetic chemicals. USDA organic certification is the only system of food labeling that is subject to independent public review and oversight, assuring consumers that toxic, synthetic pesticides used in conventional agriculture are replaced by management practices focused on soil biology, biodiversity, and plant health. This eliminates commonly used toxic chemicals in the production and processing of food that is not labeled organic--pesticides that contaminate our water and air, hurt biodiversity, harm farmworkers, and kill bees, birds, fish and other wildlife.

Food Choices Based Only on Pesticide Residues Fall Short
To help explain the urgent need for a major shift to organic food consumption, Beyond Pesticides has begun the Eating with a Conscience database which evaluates the impacts on the environment and farmworkers of the toxic chemicals allowed for use on major food crops, grown domestically and internationally. We have started with those foods that have been identified widely in the media as “clean.” While the Clean 15/Dirty Dozen list generated by Environmental Working Group is helpful in alerting consumers to hazardous residues on food, food residues are only part of the story. It turns out that those very same “clean” food commodities may be grown with hazardous pesticides that get into waterways and groundwater, contaminate nearby communities, poison farmworkers, and kill wildlife, while not all showing up at detectable levels on our food.

Choosing Organic: For you, the environment and workers
Eating with a Conscience looks at the toxic chemicals that are allowed in the production of the food we eat and the environmental and public health effects resulting from their use.

Choose a fruit or vegetable.

For more information, read the Eating with a Conscience press release or download the print brochure.

"Who" Is Slow Food?

What you put into your mouth goes into your body.  Everywhere in you body.  I am not being sarcastic but pointing out the obvious that we should all think about when we peel off that plastic wrapper imprinted with unpronounceable words and shove it into our mouths without looking at it.



"Slow food" is a direct counter balance to the fast-food culture. Instead of eating fries while driving one-handed through traffic, it means taking the time to enjoy good food raised in clean, safe conditions and sold at a fair profit for the farmer. It means taking the time to know the food you eat is healthy - for you, for the people who produce it, and for the land. According to USA Today, SlowFood "claims to be everything that fast food is not."

SlowFood is an idea, a way of living and a way of eating. It is a global, grassroots movement with thousands of members around the world that links the pleasure of food with a commitment to community and the environment.

Just 30 plants feed 95 percent of the world's 6.5 billion people, according to Slow Food, which is encouraging a global effort to broaden that diversity.

Many foods we love (specific grains, vegetables, fruits, animal breeds) are disappearing due to the overwhelming amount of convenience food and industrial agriculture. What's grown by industrial agribusiness is based on what's hardy, easiest to grow, and easiest to ship across the continent - not necessarily taking taste, health and variety into account.  Like the proposed square banana or genetically engineered or modified food. 
 
Some people are tired of the degraded flavor of our foods and of health issues raised by an industrialized food supply, so they find the "slow food" message appealing. Preserving our resources, tradition and culture ensures that food is produced for taste and variety. This is ultimately what makes food enjoyable.

The Daily Green embraces the Slow Food manifesto that promotes taking the time to teach and share the rewards of raising and eating food that is good, clean and fair.

To read the first chapter of Michael Pollan's book, "The Omnivore's Dilemma," which explains where food comes from, check out: www.michaelpollan.com.

In researching this post, I found the following links to be excellent reads:

http://www.slowfoodusa.org/index.php/slow_food/blog/

http://michaelpollan.com/todays-link/


http://green.blogs.nytimes.com


http://civileats.com/

Bee Die-Off...What We Need To Know

Bee-Die off is a phenomenon that is so in our faces and up front and evident that the causes behind it simply must be addressed. Once in a while I do a rant and name names, push a position and ask you to take a stand.  Please read this information from CredoMobile. You can open the link, go to their site and sign a petition if you like.

Since 2006, U.S. honey bee populations have been in precipitous decline, with some estimates suggesting losses as high as 30% per year.1 While that's terrible, the problem is far greater than just the destruction of a species. Without bees, a big piece of our food supply is in serious danger. Pollination by honey bees is key in cultivating the crops that produce a full one-third of our food.

One  chemical, called clothianidin, could be the cause.  It is produced by the German corporation Bayer CropScience. It is used as a treatment on crop seeds, including corn and canola, and works by expressing itself in the plants' pollen and nectar. Not coincidentally, these are honey bees' favorite sources of food.

Shockingly, no major independent study has verified the safety of this pesticide. While clothianidin has been used on corn -- the largest crop in the U.S. -- since 2003, it was officially approved by the Environmental Protection Agency last year on the basis of a single study, conducted by Bayer. However, recently leaked documents show that the study was actually debunked by the agency's own scientists, so the pesticide was effectively approved with no scientific backing.2

Additional independent studies have shown that neonicotinoid pesticides like clothianidin are highly toxic to honey bees, providing compelling evidence that they should be immediately taken off the market until the E.P.A. can conduct a full and valid scientific review.

This appears to be a case of the E.P.A. catering to the needs of a large chemical corporation at the expense of a lynchpin species in our ecosystem. France, Italy, Slovenia, and Germany -- the home of Bayer -- have already banned clothianidin.

The stakes are simply too high to continue the use of this chemical in the absence of any scientifically verified evidence that it is safe to use. Tell the E.P.A. to immediately prohibit the use of clothianidin and conduct a full scientific review to determine its impact on honey bee populations.

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1 secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Colony_collapse_disorder
2 www.grist.org/article/food-2010-12-10-leaked-documents-show-epa-allowed-bee-toxic-pesticide-
3 www.panna.org/sites/default/files/Memo_Nov2010_Clothianidin.pdf

Note to readers:  I have not closed comments for this post, but since this is my own personal rant  I do not intend to engage in arguments over the facts presented here.