Are Organic Foods More Nutritious than Conventional Foods

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Are Organic Foods More Nutritious than
Conventional Foods?

• Created by Kasey Mixon
• Georgia Agriculture
• Education Curriculum Office
• July, 2003

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Objectives

• Define organic foods
• Introduce the issue
• Look at research
• Answer Why isnt there sufficient research?
• Conclude

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Organic Food

• USDA
• emphasize use of renewable resources
• conservation of soil and water
• no conventional pesticides, fertilizers with
  synthetic ingredients or sewage sludge
• no bioengineering
• no ionizing radiation

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Organic Farming

• been around for decades
• during past decade
• became fastest growing sector in ag.
• annual increase 20 or more

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Organic Agriculture

• controversial claims
• one such claim organic is more nutritious than
  conventional
• is this true? is there proof?

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Is This True?

• The Soil Association says so Vitamin
  C minerals phytonutrients less water
• That sounds good, doesnt it?

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Is There Proof?

• Alex Avery Dennis Avery (Hudson Institute) say
• the organic industry is attempting to promote
  their products by degrading the foods that made
  Americans taller, stronger, and longer-lived than
  any people in history there just isnt enough
  evidence to prove their claims.

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What Does Research Conclude?

• Virginia Worthington, M.S., Sc.D., C.N.S.,
  examined all of the 41 research studies on this
  issue
• compiled data
• calculated difference between organic and
  conventional values for 35 vitamins and minerals

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Worthingtons Study

• Formula used
• organic value conventional value
• conventional value X 100

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Worthingtons Results

• Organic crops were
• Higher in
• Vitamin C
• Iron
• Magnesium
• Phosphorus
• Lower in
• Nitrates

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Nutrient Content of Organic Versus Conventional
Crops Mean Difference (Worthington, 2001)
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Worthingtons Comments

• no extensive research conducted to determine what
  health effects may result from the difference in
  nutrient contents if people stayed well on an
  organic diet but got violently ill as a result of
  consuming food grown with chemical fertilizers,
  then the difference would be perfectly obvious
  however, that is not the case

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Worthingtons Comments

• more research needed
• great amount of variability in agricultural
  measurements
• fertilizing methods, sunlight, temperature,
  rainfall, shipping and storage handling

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More Research

• Consumer Reports researchers cannot give the
  nutritional edge to either group
• variability in crop or cropping system?
• report included quote from Willie Lockeretz,
  professor at Tufts University School of Nutrition
  and Science Policy the growing system you use
  probably does affect nutrition, but it does it in
  a way so complex you might be studying the
  problem forever

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Organic Farming Research Foundation

• the definitive study has not been done
• why? too many variables to control
• like what?
• crop variety
• time after harvest
• post-harvest handling
• soil type
• climate

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The Soil Association

• Organic foods have higher levels of
• Vitamin C, minerals, phytonutrients
• less water
• makes a real difference to peoples and animals
  health
• good results for alternative cancer therapies
• no proof of research for these claims

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United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)

• non committal on the issue
• USDA makes no claims that organically produced
  food is safer or more nutritious than
  conventionally produced food
• why? not enough research, most likely

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Other Journal and Magazine Articles

• Tufts University Health Nutrition Letter on
  this issue
• no one knows
• We just dont have enough data Kate Clancey,
  PhD of the Henry Wallace Institute for
  Alternative Agriculture

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Other Articles

• Andrea Chernus, MD, RN, CDN there is no
  scientific proof that someone eating a
  well-balanced organic diet is healthier than a
  person eating a well-balanced conventional diet

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Other Articles

• Sir John Krebs, Chair of the United Kingdoms
  Foods Standards Agency the current scientific
  evidence does not show that organic food is any
  safer or more nutritious than conventionally
  produced food

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Other Articles

• Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics
  under the basic standards of organic farming,
  there is no sufficient evidence for a
  system-related effect on product quality due to
  the production method (Lotter, 2003)

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Other Articles

• Journal of Sustainable Agriculture many of the
  health claims for organic products remain
  unresolved (Ding, Wang, Xie, Yang, 2003)

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Why Such Little Research?

• several parts to this answer
• organic farming just recently experiencing
  significant growth
• Sales
• 1990 - 1 billion
• 1996 - 3.3 billion
• 2000 - 7.8 billion

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Growth

• Acreage
• more than doubled between 1992-1997
• more than doubled again between 1997-2001
• The following table shows the changes by
  individual years

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US Certified Organic Farmland in 1,000 of acres
(Green Kremen, 2002)
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Why Such Little Research?

• Increased demand recognition of a need for more
  research
• What do you need in order to conduct research?
• FUNDS!

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U.S. Research Funding

• 1999 1.4 million
• 2000 3.6 million
• Funding is growing, so answers should come

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U.S. Research Funding
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Why Such Little Research?

• Such a complex issue with many different parts
  needing to be researched
• Hard to perform a fair comparison and analysis
  between the two systems

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SO.

• Organic is most likely here to stay
• We need answers to the many questions about it,
  so.
• MORE RESEARCH NEEDS TO BE CONDUCTED!

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What Have You Learned Hopefully?

• What an organic food product is
• The issue organic vs. conventional, is there a
  nutritional difference?
• What research says why there is so little

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Any Questions?