Organic food in supermarkets

Edwardia

There's a film called Soylent Green from the 70s which I've seen once. It's sci-fi,set in 2022 and the world is ruined. People are only allowed to live until they are 30 and food is just some processed stuff called soylent green, It stars Charlton Heston and Jenny Agutter is in it. The people approaching 30 want to escape and they make a shocking and macabre discovery about soylent green...interesting film, sort of shades of 1984 by George Orwell like it's fiction but spooky how some of it has happened already or is getting close to happening.

A process like carbon dating can be used to analyse the genetic makeup of food and humans. Back in 2007, Dr Sanjay Gupta of CNN was tested and 69% of the carbon in his body was derived from corn as it has a really distinctive 'signature'. Corn (maize) is put in animal feed, it's processed into tortilla chips and popcorn and corn flakes, it's a vegetable, it's used in packaging, it's an oil, it's everywhere. In the US most of it is genetically modified.

The food our great-grandparents and grandparents were brought up on was much less contaminated than the food we and our parent have consumed.

I was watching a video rap today by the CEO of an American organic yoghurt producer called Stonyfield. In it he talks about a report that says a baby girl born in Boston, Massachusetts today will have 300 toxins in her cord blood.

Chef Antony Worrall Thompson (who has pre diabetes) was tested for toxins years ago along with other celebs and traces of DDT were found in him, although DDT has been banned since the 60s.

In Germany and Sweden organic food is much more accepted and mainstream than it is in the UK. In the US it's in Walmart and Target so not just for wealthier people. Here the whole image is either Volvo drivers or festival-going hippies.

If the only difference between conventional yields and organic is only 20% more it surely shows that the chemicals aren't all that ?

In the USA organic farming is growing by 20%, In India and China the new middle classes want organic food and in Turkey where 100% of it used to be exported, organic food is growing and in Dubai too.

Big business is happy to exploit parental fears and churn out organic baby food, it seems to be the norm now. So what happens to those kids when they start eating solids ? Will they cope with non-organic without allergies ? Will they want the toxins once they can read the labels ?

Maybe agribusiness needs to go back to its roots..

Edwardia

There's nothing more sobering than reading the ingredients on non organic food - unless it's reading the labels on American food and knowing that they don't have to tell consumers about GM or irradiation or bovine growth hormones..

bornintoit

Edwardia wrote: »

There's a film called Soylent Green from the 70s which I've seen once. It's sci-fi,set in 2022 and the world is ruined. People are only allowed to live until they are 30 and food is just some processed stuff called soylent green, It stars Charlton Heston and Jenny Agutter is in it. The people approaching 30 want to escape and they make a shocking and macabre discovery about soylent green...interesting film, sort of shades of 1984 by George Orwell like it's fiction but spooky how some of it has happened already or is getting close to happening.

A process like carbon dating can be used to analyse the genetic makeup of food and humans. Back in 2007, Dr Sanjay Gupta of CNN was tested and 69% of the carbon in his body was derived from corn as it has a really distinctive 'signature'. Corn (maize) is put in animal feed, it's processed into tortilla chips and popcorn and corn flakes, it's a vegetable, it's used in packaging, it's an oil, it's everywhere. In the US most of it is genetically modified.

The food our great-grandparents and grandparents were brought up on was much less contaminated than the food we and our parent have consumed.

I was watching a video rap today by the CEO of an American organic yoghurt producer called Stonyfield. In it he talks about a report that says a baby girl born in Boston, Massachusetts today will have 300 toxins in her cord blood.

Chef Antony Worrall Thompson (who has pre diabetes) was tested for toxins years ago along with other celebs and traces of DDT were found in him, although DDT has been banned since the 60s.

In Germany and Sweden organic food is much more accepted and mainstream than it is in the UK. In the US it's in Walmart and Target so not just for wealthier people. Here the whole image is either Volvo drivers or festival-going hippies.

If the only difference between conventional yields and organic is only 20% more it surely shows that the chemicals aren't all that ?

In the USA organic farming is growing by 20%, In India and China the new middle classes want organic food and in Turkey where 100% of it used to be exported, organic food is growing and in Dubai too.

Big business is happy to exploit parental fears and churn out organic baby food, it seems to be the norm now. So what happens to those kids when they start eating solids ? Will they cope with non-organic without allergies ? Will they want the toxins once they can read the labels ?

Maybe agribusiness needs to go back to its roots..

I haver just looked up that Soylent Green it sounds like a very thought provoking film that I will check out. I studied film tv and theatre at University so I am very interested in messages in films and analysing them. Alot of people think film is purely just for entertainment but some films really do have an important message they are trying to put across.

I tried to find a couple of clips on youtube and found this comment thought it might invoke some discussion.

"Thank you for posting this. We see this coming to fruition with "The Pink Slime" that our government has been feeding the American people."

I looked up Pink Slime and will post abit of what I found.

"Pink slime refers to mechanically separated and disinfected beef products known in the meat industry as lean finely textured beef (LFTB)[3] and boneless lean beef trimmings (BLBT).[4] It is also known by the dysphemistic slang term soylent pink.[5][6][7][8] It is a processed beef product that was originally used only in pet food and cooking oil and was not approved for human consumption.[9] In 2001 in the United States the product was approved for limited human consumption and began to be used as a food additive to ground beef and beef-based processed meats as a filler at a ratio of usually no more than 25 percent of any product. The production process uses heat in centrifuges to separate the fat from the meat in beef trimmings.[10] The resulting product is exposed to ammonia gas or citric acid to kill bacteria.[10][11] The product is sold in the U.S. to food companies which use it as a filler product in ground beef production. It was reported in March 2012 that approximately 70 percent of ground beef sold in U.S. supermarkets contained the additive at that time."

I actually feel physically sick right now. If I was an American I would feel very angry.

Kirri

Am behind with all the posts on here so not sure if this link has been posted, I'd used them years ago pre allotment but came across them again this morning on the search for more ethical food production, this places has more ethical egg/dairy production than most (+ non homog milk) and has organic foods - not sure how they compare with A&C plus it's run by a veggie I think so no meat but a good selection of other things. Anyone used them recently??

http://www.farmaround.co.uk/index.php

wouldbeqaulitymoneysaver

I love Riverfords earth encrusted fruit and veg it keeps longer.

Edwardia

Not for the faint-hearted
Jamie Oliver's American Food Revolution - look for Pink Slime on youtube.com - sorry couldn't get link to work.

It's totally disgusting how pink slime is used in the USA, I'd never eat anything non organic if I ever go there again. Because it's not labelled millions of people just don't realise.

Over here, things aren't as bad BUT there is NO requirement for farmers and supermarkets to label NON organic meat, poultry and products and tell consumers if the animals/poultry were fed on GM fees.

From my own research, I know that Waitrose is currently the ONLY supermarket in the UK which doesn't allow farmers to feed GM feed across ANY of their own brand ranges.

At some supermarkets eg Sainsbury's and Lidl farmers ARE allowed to feed GM feed for some non-organic ranges and these packs won't be labelled 'fed with GM feed'.

ASDA and Morrisons allow farmers to feed GM feed across all non-organic ranges and they are not labelled.

I asked DEFRA why there's a lack of labelling, and it's because of an EU regulation. As this is a regulation, not a law, the UK govt could overrule it and stipulate that meat and poultry should be labelled fed on GM feed or this milk comes from cows fed on GM feed. But NO government has done this since the regulation came into force during previous Labour govt.

Another reason, to me to be organic..farmers aren't allowed to feed organic animals and poultry on GM feed.

Edwardia

Bet studying movies was fun bornintoit ! I think you're right and that there are messages in movies. In Twilight for example it's a thinly disguised abstinence message but I'm not sure what teenage girls are supposed to think of the sparkling stuff. IF vampires were real (and who knows) and I came across one that sparkled I think my reaction is more likely to be side splitting mirth not shock n awe..just saying

Allo WBQMS :T I don't live in a Riverford area but on the bright side, Kirri I can get deliveries from Farmaround When I lived in the country I had allotments and they were near enough that I go could wander with a bucket and bring home fresh new potatoes or carrots for dinner.. now I just grow fruit and herbs in my back garden,

bornintoit

Edwardia wrote: »

Bet studying movies was fun bornintoit ! I think you're right and that there are messages in movies. In Twilight for example it's a thinly disguised abstinence message but I'm not sure what teenage girls are supposed to think of the sparkling stuff. IF vampires were real (and who knows) and I came across one that sparkled I think my reaction is more likely to be side splitting mirth not shock n awe..just saying

Allo WBQMS :T I don't live in a Riverford area but on the bright side, Kirri I can get deliveries from Farmaround When I lived in the country I had allotments and they were near enough that I go could wander with a bucket and bring home fresh new potatoes or carrots for dinner.. now I just grow fruit and herbs in my back garden,

It was interesting I didn't like the sparkling vampire idea either. When I was a child I loved vampires and had a real problem trying to find the Vampire Diaries by L.J Smith but now those books are everywhere and they even have a series based on the books now. It feels strange considering how difficult it was to track down plus noone else apart from me liked those types of books.

I have ordered a second hand book called The Organic Food Shopper's Guide by Jeff Cox. It's an American book so I imagine not all of it will be applicable for the British market but I got it for £1.06 and free delivery so for a 320 page book I thought it was worth the risk.

The author has a blog Organic Food Guy Blog - http://organicfoodguy.com/ that I thought people might find interesting.

Edwardia

Thanks for sharing bornintoit, I have bookmarked it to read later.

Kirri

Finally got to As Nature Intended and felt so at home there... managed to spend quite a bit though but got loads of stuff I can't get in the supermarkets, just wish there were more shops like this.