Organics in the News

France`s highest court has ruled that Monsanto lied about the safety of its weed killing herbicide Roundup. The decision came just days ago and confirms an earlier court judgment in France finding that Monsanto had falsely advertised Roundup as being "biodegradable" and that it "left the soil clean."

The original case was brought to court in 2001 by several French environmental groups alleging that Roundup's main ingredient, glyphosate, has a classification as "dangerous to the environment" by the European Union. That case drug on for years and finally ended in a ruling against Monsanto in 2007.

IS eating a hamburger the global warming equivalent of driving a Hummer? It’s true that food production is an important contributor to climate change. And the claim that meat (especially beef) is closely linked to global warming has received some credible backing.

But that’s an overly simplistic conclusion to draw from the research. To a rancher like me, who raises cattle, goats and turkeys the traditional way (on grass), the studies show only that the prevailing methods of producing meat — that is, crowding animals together in factory farms, storing their waste in giant lagoons and cutting down forests to grow crops to feed them — cause substantial greenhouse gases. It could be, in fact, that a conscientious meat eater may have a more environmentally friendly diet than your average vegetarian.

"What time is it?" her friend Jessica Stanley calls. She's busy looping string from a box at her waist around the stakes to support the tomato plants.

"Ten-thirty, and we're halfway done," Jabbar, 26, replies. They've been working since 7 a.m. and staking for the past two hours. "Sore back?"

Stanley says with a sigh: "There's no way to avoid it. I try to move my hands in a different way -- doesn't matter. Well, I guess I'll pound with you."

Stanley, 26, who's working in a camisole tank top, lives in an uninsulated barn on the farm and spends more than 50 hours a week weeding, mulching, harvesting and selling at farmers markets.

Just a year ago, she was making $110,000 a year at Cisco Systems in Herndon, often telecommuting from the two-bedroom condo she owns in Georgetown. Now, she makes $7 an hour. She and Jabbar, along with Jabbar's fiance, Steve Hirschhorn, work for Chip and Susan Planck on Wheatland Vegetable Farms in Loudoun County.

They're part of a growing pool of young, educated, politically motivated workers drawn to farming. Books such as bestseller "The Omnivore's Dilemma," in which Michael Pollan championed the local food movement, are sparking interest in sustainable agriculture, or small-scale farms that embrace humane and eco-friendly practices. Such operations are getting a boost from Community Supported Agriculture, a system that lets customers pay in advance for a weekly share of a nearby farm's crop; the number of members participating in CSAs grew 50 percent between 2007 and 2009. The number of farmers markets in the United States has jumped by almost 13 percent over the last year. Even the White House now has its own organic garden.

Farming, which many city folk once associated primarily with children's books and distinctive if not entirely flattering tan lines, is suddenly in vogue. Never mind that most of the food we eat comes not from cozy acreages reminiscent of the setting of "Charlotte's Web" but from big corporate operations. Never mind that census data tell us that fewer than half of family-run farms show a positive net income (in other words, most farmers need day jobs). Even though farming no longer quite makes it as "a way of life," it's somehow become the next best thing (or maybe an even better thing): a lifestyle.

Perhaps it started with last year's reality dating show, "Farmer Wants a Wife," which spent eight weeks assaulting viewers with footage of low-rent Carrie Bradshaws chasing chickens in an attempt to win the heart of an improbably chiseled Missouri farmer. That show didn't exactly achieve "Bachelor"-level ratings, but a few weeks ago, when the Huffington Post featured a photo gallery of "hot organic farmers," the response was so overwhelming that it did yet another spread. From a pallid hipster growing organic vegetables on a Brooklyn rooftop to a strapping Californian whose specialty lettuce crops are bathed in golden sunlight, the photos suggest that running a farm -- at least the kind that appears far removed from pesticides, corporate contracts and furtive meth-cooking in abandoned barns -- is very similar to modeling for the Sundance catalog.

Old MacDonald had a farm… but was it organic?

Two young organic farmers representing Organic Valley presented a workshop entitled, “An Introduction to Organic Farming and Gardening,” at the 2009 National FFA Convention. About 300 FFA members and guests attended the first of two workshops presented by Organic Valley, a farmer-owned organic cooperative based in Wisconsin. This marks the fourth year that Organic Valley representatives attended National FFA Convention and the second year Organic Valley has presented a workshop.

Joe Pedretti, Organic Valley Farm Outreach Manager, said the relationship between National FFA and Organic Valley is an important one to garner interest in younger generations. “One of the big misconceptions is that organic is trying to promote itself as better than other types of agriculture. But really what we want to show folks is that’s an alternative… it’s another option,” Pedretti said.

Preston Green and Sarah Holm, both college students in Wisconsin, presented the workshop, citing their farms as examples of organic success stories. “I can honestly say if it weren’t for Organic Valley, my family wouldn’t be farming today,” Green said. “My dad can tell me honestly that he wants me to farm. He knows there’s a future in organic agriculture and he knows there’s a future in agriculture for me.”

The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Protection Agency are asking farmers to use coal ash to grow their crops, despite a paucity of research on possible risks, according to documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). USDA endorses use of coal combustion wastes by farmers "for crop production" while acknowledging uncertainty on the extent to which "toxic elements" are absorbed into produce entering the market.

This month, USDA enters the final year of a three-year partnership with the Environmental Protection Agency as part of a larger effort by the American Coal Ash Association, the Electric Power Research Institute and others to "promote appropriate increased use of" coal ash in agriculture. The implementing Memorandum of Understanding obliges USDA to generate "documentation of the effectiveness, safety and environmental benefits, including bioavailability of trace elements such as mercury, arsenic and selenium...to satisfy the concerns of producers, generators, regulators and the public."

A report from GRAIN discusses how agriculture can put back much of the excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere into the soil.

Soils contain enormous amounts of carbon, mostly in the form of organic matter. The report shows that industrial agriculture, and thus the global food system, has spewed large amounts of this carbon into the atmosphere. Policies focused on restoring soil fertility - restoring the organic matter in the soil which has been lost - would make a huge contribution to resolving the rapidly escalating climate crisis.

In 50 years, soils could capture about 450 billion tons of carbon dioxide - more than two thirds of the current excess in the atmosphere.

We need a revolution in our food delivery system because the global $3.2 trillion processed-food industry is undermining our health and significantly contributing to our carbon footprint.

Let’s take a quick look at how produce in Massachusetts makes it to our grocery store shelves. Quite likely it was picked in California’s Central Valley, the mother of all breadbaskets. The produce journeyed across the country from the field to the wholesaler to a retailer and finally to your dinner table. Total travel time, about 12 to 14 days.

The Environmental Protection Agency plans to conduct a new study about the potential health risks of atrazine, a widely used weedkiller that recent research suggests may be more dangerous to humans than previously thought.

Atrazine — a herbicide often used on corn fields, golf courses and even lawns — has become one of the most common contaminants in American drinking water.

For years, the E.P.A. has decided against acting on calls to ban the chemical from environmental activists and some scientists who argued that runoff was polluting ecosystems and harming animals.

More recently, new studies have suggested that atrazine in drinking water is associated with birth defects, low birth weights and reproductive problems among humans, even at concentrations that meet current federal standards.

The E.P.A. is expected to announce on Wednesday that it will conduct a new evaluation of the pesticide to assess any possible links between atrazine and cancer, as well as other health problems, such as premature births. The E.P.A. may determine that new restrictions are necessary.

When traditional farming created health issues for Tim Kimpel, he decided to give organic farming a try.

He became allergic to the chemicals he was using on his fields and, coming from several generations of farmers, he did not want to give up farming. His alternative was to go organic.

"I think there are some definite human health ramifications to the whole thing (going organic)," Kimpel said. "I think most organic growers are trying to produce a very superior produce. Just because it's organic doesn't mean it's superior, but most farmers are trying to raise food that's more nutritious and safer."

In July, the Kimpel Farm became the first certified organic farm in Muskingum County, receiving a USDA Certified Organic certificate from the Ohio Ecological Food & Farm Association (OEFFA).