Tuesday, April 21
Organic Foods
Our group presentation as you all know was about the industry in science. Just something that I didnt quite go into was organic foods. I am not against organic foods even though I may seem to appear that Im against it. I do believe that there needs to be a balance though. I do not like to support industries that hide behind peoples fears and concerns of the envirnment... organic foods today seem to be more of a market scheme then anything to me and I guess that is what bothers me the most. I believe that we should be supporting local farmers and getting away from dangerous pesticides. I do believe that pesticides are important though, we just wouldnt be able to produce enough forages to take care of our population of both humans and animals. The pesticides protect our crops from disasterous losses. Maybe what we need to put more research in developing less dangerous pesticides? I know we are having some very negative outcomes from using our past pesticides, such as the farmers that are using them are now coming down with cancers and such. I think anything we do is going to come with a price which is to bad... unfortunately we cant have everything. I think people need to start looking at the big picture though. I dont have an answer to how we can "make" people look at the big picture. Maybe it we just need to move back to older morals. It seems the further we move away from morals and ethics the more we lose. I dont know what morals need to come back and I realize I am walking on thin ice when it comes to even mentioning morals and what morals are. I cant define a good person, there must be something we strive for though, so maybe going back to older generations morals where life revolved more on family values then everything today being bigger is better and such. I think organic food is a great idea... i would love to support it... but i think it is just as corrupt as any other industry which is led by profit. Who blames them for being led by profit though... many of us are in college just so that we can make more money when we graduate compared to if we hadnt come to college. I know many people that have jobs that make great money but they hate the job... So I dont blame big industries for being led by money. It is just sad to me that something that could be such a good thing is being ruined, and people dont even realize it. I doubt many people stop and thing about how food is labeled and where it comes from and they blindly follow the labels that they feel safe with. I had no idea until I researched it that organic food in the US is being imported from China and other countries! That is crazy to me. There is so much more to the industry that many people would even think about... I think we do need to stop and think about things... people arent using their brains like we should be! Of course I am speaking very generally... but I think even I need to think more so I dont feel to bad about thinking that others should too.
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I think the whole “organic” labeling of products also ties into what Alex said in the presentation as well. A lot of companies will market their product so it will sell. They may say that their product is “all-natural” or “organic”, but in reality they are playing to the misinformed public. There are many people that by organics products just because they say they are organic, but they don’t even know what that really means; the consumers aren’t doing their research. This ties into the problem of educated vs. uneducated that Jenny talked about in class. Some people may not care that they don’t really know what organic products are or how they are made. But there are those consumers that DO care and just haven’t been given correct information. Now, there could be two issues that cause the misrepresentation of organic products. 1) The companies are not making the information about their organic product available or 2) The consumer has not tried to look further into the product to see how it was made or what goes into it. I think that the latter problem is the more prevalent of the two. If we want to know what our organic products really have in them, WE should be asking the questions and doing the research. It is our responsibility to find out what we are buying.
ReplyDeleteDoing more research into less dangerous pesticides might help the situation, but I think that there will be people who won’t like anything that uses the new, less dangerous pesticides because they are associated with the “pesticides”. The word “pesticides “has a bad connotation, and I think it will be difficult to change that. This goes back to the public being misinformed on the topic. It is possible that there will be a new pesticide that will revolutionize agriculture. But if people hear that pesticides are being used on certain foods, they won’t buy that food. I think more education on the subject of organic food would be beneficial to the public. We will need to realize that the companies putting out these organic products are primarily trying to make a profit, and consumers will need to do their own research before buying from them if they feel strongly about buying “organic”.
There is definitely more to the issue of organic foods than initially meets the eyes. Yes, there is definitely a problem with people being uneducated or misinformed. This problem often compounds any initial flaws that buying organic foods has in relation to its supposed benefits. Organic foods may be healthier for the public and for the growers. Organic foods may have less negative impacts on the environment (lack of pesticides leaking into groundwater and limit of genetic enhanced plants leaking into the ecosystem). And, if people overlook the problems such as scarcity, and shipping problems in lieu of these advantages they often hide and enhance the problems as greedy companies seek to further mislead the public.
ReplyDeleteHowever, the issue that bothers me the most about organic foods is the human one. While organic foods are probably healthier for both the people who utilize them and the environment that grows them, they often do more harm to those who cannot use them then benefits those who can. Organic foods are hard to grow. People often forget that the technologies of pesticides and others have greatly increased our food production. There are not enough foodstuffs to feed people in the world as is, and any detraction from this food production will further hinder these people from getting needed sustenance. There is a very important question people often forget to ask in the issue of organic foods and that is the value of individual humans are more important, or humanity as a whole.