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Nutrition as therapy |
Organic food:
Organic food: the facts they don't want you to know
Deborah Collcutt and Jon Ungoed-Thomas
As Fernando Aldasoro surveyed his organic carrot and garlic crops in Mexico last week, he knew business was looking good. Rising demand for organic food in other countries promises him booming sales; for Britain in particular, a shortage of suitable farms means most organic goods have to be imported.
But what exactly do consumers receive in return for the high premium they pay for such produce? Under Mexican government regulations, for example, Aldasoro could put a substance called gybeleric acid on his crops - it is a growth promoter that is banned on British organic farms. He could even use human sewage - a practice also banned in this country. He is proud of upholding high standards on his farm and chooses to use neither of these methods, but there is little to stop other Mexican suppliers doing so and selling their food to Britain.
"The whole approach of organic standards is to minimise the risk of someone using chemicals, but the further afield it is, the more difficult it is to be sure what is happening," said Francis Blake, the standards and technical director of the Soil Association (SA), the leading regulator of British organic farms.
Ideally, Britain's organic farmers - who have some of the highest standards in the world - would supply the bulk of the UK market, but they cannot cope with demand that is growing by 40% a year. Nearly 80% of organic produce in the shops is now being imported.
Last week the supermarket chain Iceland announced it was switching all its vegetable sales to organic produce. To secure adequate stocks, Iceland claims to have bought up 40% of the world supply in organic vegetables.
The difficulties in finding suppliers that meet the standards consumers automatically assume are already evident. In its search for the chemical-free carrot and other vegetables, Iceland visited eastern bloc countries but found production processes in Poland, Serbia and the Czech Republic were less than desirable.
Even produce in more rigorously policed EU countries can be suspect. Organic oranges bound for the UK have been intercepted from Spain covered in pesticide, and consignments of wheat in France have been fraudulently labelled as organic.
Yet consumers largely accept the idea that if it's organic, it must be good. As she shopped at a west London store last week, Jane Tarbutt, 42, an IT systems consultant, conceded she had to take much on trust.
"I choose organic for my health and for the environment because organic food is free from pesticides." she said. "If it doesn't come from the UK, as many products don't, the fact that it's labelled organic takes precedence over anything else."
Nick Curnow, 37, from Bayswater, west London, also admitted he had little idea of whether the produce lived up to its claims. "I don't look at where the products are from," he said, "I just trust they get them from the right place."
Most people would agree that food produced with fewer chemicals and additives has benefits for the environment and the quality of nutrition. As Jamie Oliver, the Naked Chef, said: "Everybody thinks that organics is a fashionable thing, but I think it's really old-fashioned. Seventy years ago, everything was bloody organic. And the only reason it's expensive now is because you've got 90% of the country knocking up normal clobber and using sprays."
But most people also expect to get what they pay for.
IN A small office in Westminster is the government body charged with regulating farming, processing, packaging and labelling of organic food grown in or brought into the UK. The United Kingdom Register of Organic Food Standards (Ukrofs) - an arm of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food - has a permanent staff of four; it oversees six organisations in the UK that issue the licences needed to display the label "organic".
Of these, the SA and the Organic Farmers and Growers (OFG) are the largest; they regulate most of the country's 2,287 organic farmers and 1,102 processors and importers. They admit that for imports, regulation is a haphazard process.
"Take the example of organic coffee from central America," said Blake. "The coffee is often grown by peasant farmers under a co-operative arrangement. There may be 2,000 farmers with two trees each, so it is impossible that everything is physically checked by an inspector.
"An inspector - either from the government of the country if they have an organic control department, or from a neighbouring country if they don't - will check a sample farm, look at records and issue an organic licence." Beyond that, there are few checks; when imports arrive in the UK, all that is monitored is the paperwork.
Contaminated produce does slip through, according to Tokya Dammond, chief executive of Symbio Impex, an organic producer based in Warsaw that exports fruit and vegetables to the European Union and America. While his company adheres strictly to EU regulations, he claimed: "The Serbian certification system doesn't exist. So there is a blanket certification which says that this area is too poor to buy pesticides and therefore it's organic."
Dammond claims some Serbian strawberry growers have used non-organic pesticides on their exported crops. "I do not like the situation," he said. "The stuff is going through Holland. Germany doesn't allow direct importation from Serbia."
Even within the more closely monitored UK system, standards are not all consumers might want them to be. The SA regulations, for example, allow farmers to give chickens 20% non-organic feed and still call them organic; the OFG regulations allow 30% non-organic feed. The SA permits organic farmers to treat animals with drugs when they are ill, a measure bitterly opposed by purists.
Last week some producers, who asked not to be named, claimed the demands of big business were gradually undermining the original aims of the organic movement. They allege that organic livestock is being reared on farms with a history of BSE; that chickens laying organic eggs are now being debeaked to stop them pecking each other, in much the same way as battery hens; and that suppliers of organic soya can no longer be sure that their produce does not contain any genetically modified material.
The SA has recently allowed the use of sodium nitrate, a preservative linked to cancer, in organic bacon. The association says it approved the move because the chemical is more effective at preventing the spread of botulism bacteria than traditional curing methods. Critics say it has been done to extend the shelf-life of products.
LAST week the Advertising Standards Authority criticised J Sainsbury, a supermarket keen to promote its organic produce, for making misleading claims. It has asked the company to delete from publicity booklets statements that no chemicals are used to produce organic food; that it costs only "a little" more; and is "good for you". A month ago Tesco received similar criticism, and the ASA suggested the claim that organic food "tastes better" cannot be substantiated.
The companies dispute that their promotional material is misleading, but even independent food experts are divided on the benefits of going organic.
"The supermarkets are making a lot of fuss about organic food, but on many products, such as sugar, chocolate, tea and bread, it doesn't make much difference to your health if you buy organic or non-organic," said Ian Marber, a nutritional consultant. "I would, however, always buy organic meat because in non-organic livestock, the toxins and antibiotics are absorbed in the flesh."
Alison Craig, of the Pesticide Action Network UK, said: "I would always buy fruit and vegetables organically because you know they will be free from chemicals. But I would be less concerned about processed food because the residues are reduced - although they are often still there."
Simon Wright, of the Organic Consultancy, has helped Sainsbury to develop an organic gin. But even he said: "I admit it will make little difference to your health whether you drink that or a non-organic gin." The sheer quantity of alcohol you consume is likely to have a much greater effect, though Wright points out that some people will choose organic because "the ingredients used in an organic product have been grown using a method that is better for the land and better for the farm workers".
He questions, too, the value of buying organic wine. Some of the smaller French chateaus, he says, produce wines without any chemicals, but simply have not bothered to obtain permission to label it as organic.
To head off doubts about whether organic food is worth the price, Iceland has taken the bold decision to charge no premium for its new vegetables. It is ploughing £9m into subsidising its switch. But at other supermarkets, the consumer still pays heavily for the organic label, according to a forthcoming study by Dr Anna Ross, a senior lecturer in economics at the University of the West of England.
Customers are being asked to fork out up to 70% more for organic meat, vegetables and other foods than for the ordinary equivalents, according to her research. Yet Ross claims that the average production costs of organic food are only a third higher.
In the study a basket of organic goods cost 71% more than normal produce at Tesco, 65% more at Sainsbury, 62% at Waitrose and 60% at Somerfield. Nor is it clear that prices will fall as sales rise.
Indeed, Ross believes that the opposite is true. "Supermarkets are able to exploit huge consumer demand with excessive price hikes on organic food," she said.
In fact Waitrose, which has 600 foods in its Organics range, argues that the farming industry requires the higher prices. "We need to encourage more farmers to go organic and we won't do that if we beat them down on cost," it said.
As
Aldasoro surveyed his farm in Queretero last week, he hoped for progress in
establishing better regulation of his industry. He is helping to set stiffer
international standards for organic produce and wants to see them imposed
properly. But until they arrive or British farmers can supply far more organic
produce, many consumers may doubt that paying high prices for organic food
delivers what they expect.
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Clear advantages
Lettuce. Ordinary lettuce is sprayed an average of 11 times with pesticides before it reaches the kitchen table. Organic lettuce should be pesticide free, though it may have been tainted with chlorine during washing
Beef. Modern methods of rearing livestock may leave antibiotic residues in the meat
Pork. Pigs reared in the ordinary way can be given antibiotics to promote rapid growth and disease resistance
Chickens. Organically reared chickens will be free of the antibiotics fed to other poultry. (But even an organic chicken can be given some feed treated with chemicals)
Milk. Non-organic milk can contain traces of pesticides. The cattle may also be given drugs to increase production
Baby food. Organic producers are not allowed to use chemical preservatives or flavourings, whereas traces of a pesticide were found in 6% of non-organic baby foods in a government study
Soft drinks. Organic producers are not allowed to use artificial sweeteners, preservatives and colourings
Limited appeal
Apples and pears. Both can be tainted with pesticides. Washing or peeling, however, will remove much of any chemical traces
Potatoes. Organic produce contains less nitrate and lower traces of toxins such as lead
Cucumbers In some ordinary farming these may be cultivated with pest control similar to organic methods
Low benefit
Oranges. Once peeled, ordinary oranges are unlikely to have significant traces of pesticides
Lamb. British lamb is essentially free range and there is likely to be little difference between a non-organic lamb reared on the Welsh mountain-sides or an organic label - except for the price
Eggs. Few chemical residues are found in eggs. There is likely to be little difference between ordinary free range eggs and those that are additionally labelled organic
Wine. Few wines have any traces of pesticides and some producers use the same methods that have been passed down for generations.