Issue link: https://cp.revolio.com/i/341630
Abby's Magazine - July / August 2014 | Page 21 the general population. GRACE, a nonprofit agency dedicated to increasing public awareness of the relationships among food, water and energy systems, explains it thus: "Similar to how immunization helps the human body fight disease by exposing the immune system to small amounts of a virus or bacteria, when bacteria are continually exposed to small amounts of antibiotics they can develop immunity to them…These are called 'resistant bacteria' because they have adapted to the point where antibiotics are no longer an effective means of killing them. As a result, some antibiotics have lost their effectiveness against specific infectious diseases. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that each year in the United States almost 2 million people acquire bacterial infections in hospitals, 70 percent of which are resistant to at least one commonly used antibiotic." In 2011, the FDA took its first steps toward reducing the amount of antibiotics used in farming, calling the agricultural use of the antibiotic cephalosporin "a serious health threat" to humans. Buying food from producers who eschew the widespread overuse of antibiotics can directly reduce antibiotic resistance in the bacteria that make people sick. Better Flavor & Sometimes Better Nutrition Not all organic food is nutritionally superior to conventionally grown food—but some of it is. The Stanford study compared, literally, apples to apples—one variety grown conventionally compared with the same variety grown organically. But organic farmers' ability to sell locally makes them more likely to grow nutritionally superior varieties because they don't have to choose varieties that will remain viable in shipping containers and on supermarket shelves for extended periods of time. Growers who must prioritize shelf life and durability often end up sacrificing nutritional quality. Donald R. Davis, a retired nutrition scientist from the University of Texas, has studied the nutrient decline in wheat varieties over the past 50 years as farmers have transitioned to industrial methods. "Beginning about 1960, selective breeding and modern production methods gradually increased wheat yields by about threefold," Davis says. Meanwhile nutrient concentrations have been dramatically slashed. Because industrial farming robs soil of nutrients, some of today's wheat varieties have half as much protein and substantially fewer phytochemicals than earlier varieties, Davis says. Because they don't have to focus almost solely on yield, organic farmers can choose varieties of wheat specifically because they are rich in high-quality protein. Another area of the food sector in which organic techniques do yield nutritionally superior food is meat, eggs and dairy. The food an animal eats directly affects the nutritional content of its meat or milk. Grass- fed (also known as pasture-raised) organic meat, eggs and dairy offer a wide range of health benefits over conventionally raised livestock (including conventionally raised organic): Grass-fed meat and eggs are lower in fat, calories and cholesterol; contain healthier fats and fatty acids; and have been found to be higher in several vitamins (read about numerous studies confirming these findings at eatwild. com/healthbenefits.htm). For Our Collective Health Conventional industrial farming practices are detrimental to the health of soil, air, water and wildlife, something that matters to our collective health as much as or more than the nutrient levels of organic or nonorganic apples. If our soils are farmed intensively for one crop and sprayed with chemicals that kill even beneficial forms of life, the food grown in them ends up nutritionally deficient. In a landmark study, Davis and a team of University of Texas researchers compared the nutritional content of 43 fruits and vegetables based on the USDA's data from 1950 and 1999. They found "reliable declines" in the levels of calcium, iron, phosphorus, protein, riboflavin and vitamin C. They report that there are likely declines in other nutrients such as magnesium, zinc and vitamins B6 and E, but there is no data on those nutrients from 1950. A combination of lifeless soil and agricultural practices aimed at improving traits other than nutrition (for example, yield) are the likeliest culprits. The Organic Consumers Association has compiled similar data, and concludes that the key to healthier food is healthier soil—soil that is regularly replenished with organic compost, in which crops are rotated to use and replenish nutrients in a cycle, in which beneficial insects and other lifeforms are allowed to play their vital role in soil health. The U.S. food system creates at least 7 percent of the nation's global warming emissions, according to a conservative estimate from the EPA. Many experts bring that figure closer to 25 or 30 percent when the various arms of agriculture, such as the manufacture of pesticides and the impact of food transportation, are factored in. Toxic fertilizer and farm waste runoff is also responsible for a devastating amount of water pollution every year. For example, an Environmental Working Group report on water quality in one important agricultural state, Iowa, found that 60 to 98 percent of the stream segments evaluated had "poor" or "very poor" quality water. The two pollutants responsible for most of the contamination were two hallmarks of industrial farming: nitrogen and phosphorus. High levels of nitrogen and phosphorus in our waterways make it dangerous for the humans who need to drink it and the wildlife that need to live in it. Every year, scientists measure the extent of deadness in a massive area of the Gulf of Mexico. A stretch of the Gulf is so contaminated by agricultural fertilizers that all organisms requiring oxygen to survive cannot be found anywhere in sight. As of 2010, the dead zone was the size of Massachusetts.