From: Elaine Hughes <tybach@sasktel.net>
Date: June 12, 2008 9:54:16 AM GMT-06:00
To: <Undisclosed-Recipient:;>
Subject: Hay Belly Nation.htm
Published on Wednesday, June 11, 2008 by The Land Institute's
Prairie Writers Circle
Hay Belly Nation
by Deborah Rich
Mum’s the word among federal officials about the health benefits of
eating organic foods.
The Department of Health and Human Services defers questions about
organic foods to the Food and Drug Administration. But the FDA has
no policy on organics because it says they’re the domain of the
Department of Agriculture, which will admit to using the “o-word,”
but says its mandate is simply to regulate use of the certified
organic label, not to judge the relative benefits of organic versus
conventional foods.
While the agencies entrusted with safeguarding our food and health
pass the potato, a fast-growing body of scientific literature
suggests that the connection between farm practices and the
healthfulness of our foods merits attention. Organic foods don’t
come out ahead of conventionally grown foods in 100 percent of
comparative tests, but they rise to the top often enough to suggest
that organic farming can increase, sometimes dramatically, the
nutrient density of what we put in our mouths.
Even a cursory look at recent peer-reviewed studies should be enough
to get public health officials talking.
Researchers at the University of California at Davis found that 10-
year mean levels of quercetin were 79 percent higher in organic
tomatoes than in conventional tomatoes, and that levels of
kaempferol were 97 percent higher. Quercetin and kaempferol are
flavonoids that studies suggest protect against cardiovascular
disease, cancer and other age-related ills.
Another Davis study compared organic and conventional kiwis and
found that “all the main mineral constituents were more concentrated
in the organic kiwifruits, which also had higher ascorbic acid (a
precursor of vitamin C) and total phenol content, resulting in a
higher antioxidant activity.”
A Spanish study measured 1.5 times more carotenoids — associated
with reduced risk of cardiovascular disease and some cancers — in
peppers grown organically.
And Swiss researcher Lukas Rist found that mothers consuming at
least 90 percent of their dairy and meat from organic sources have
36 percent higher levels of rumenic acid in their milk. Research
suggests rumenic acid may deter cancer and diabetes, and preserve
and improve immune system functions.
These and other studies give hope that organic farming can reverse
the nutrient decline of fruits and vegetables that appears to
accompany the widespread use of agricultural chemicals and produce
varieties selected primarily for yield. And while it’s true that
nutrition science is still a long way from understanding what the
amount of a specific nutrient in a tomato, kiwi or glass of milk
means for overall health, ignoring the opportunity to improve the
nutrient density of foods at the foundation of the USDA’s food
pyramid seems foolhardy.
Based on a review of data collected by the Centers for Disease
Control, Brian Halweil, senior researcher at the Worldwatch
Institute, says, “Thirty percent or more of the U.S. population
ingests inadequate levels of magnesium, vitamin C, vitamin E and
vitamin A, all nutrients we get from plants.”
In a paper he published in the Proceedings of the National Academy
of Sciences, Bruce Ames, professor of Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology at the University of California-Berkeley, noted that vitamin
and mineral deficiencies are common in the United States, and that
these deficiencies may accelerate degenerative diseases.
Even our ever-expanding waistlines may be due in part to nutrient
declines in our foods. Paul Hepperly, director of research at the
Rodale Institute, thinks we may be responding like cattle do.
“Cattle will eat more of hay that’s been rained on and had most of
its nutrients leach out than they normally would,” he says. “The
animals get these big bellies, and they’re unhealthy, but they’re
just trying to get their nutrients. Ranchers know that if they have
animals with hay belly, they have poor quality food. What we’ve done
with the erosion of nutrient content in our foods — what we’ve done
with additives, processing and artificial agriculture production
methods — is that we have basically produced a hay belly nation.”
Refusing to enter the discussion about how farming methods affect
the nutrient density of our food helps our government duck the
question of why it lends so much support to the status quo of
conventional, nonorganic agriculture. But failing to acknowledge the
connection between what happens on the farm and the healthfulness of
foods may be enough to make a nation sick.
Deborah Rich grows olives near Monterey, Calif., and writes about
agriculture for the San Francisco Chronicle and other publications.
She wrote this comment for the Land Institute’s Prairie Writers
Circle, Salina, Kan.
Article printed from www.CommonDreams.org
URL to article: http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/06/11/9560/
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