Organic VS Local (100 mile diet)

[WeatherWoman]

I choose some organic products because they are void of allergens that affect my son! I opt for local over organic.

[Thinktank]

What part isn't?

almost all

[grammafreddy]

So what you are saying is that almost all of the organic hype is not a scam?

[Thinktank]

the biggest scam in the world is the millions and millions of lbs. of carcinogenic pesticides
on our food, .... not some small organic growers that work really hard to grow the stuff without pesticides.

[Soundsprofound]

Some of you seem to have a real hate for organics. I sure hope you have all watched food inc. or some other doc on how the non-organic mega farms treat their land and grow your cheap food. the daily courier article is mostly about imported food which doesn't fit the topic title.

[Nom_de_Plume]

I don't have a "hate" for organics, having been a "certified organic" farmer myself I haven't changed any of my farming practices when I dropped my certification. I'm fully against huge factory farms and believe in the local farm where the customer can come and see they whole thing themselves. The organic system is broken, there is very few checks in place to ensure that farmers are actually doing what they say they're doing. It's all about submitting the correct paperwork. Any of the verification officers I dealt with only checked the paperwork, and not the actual product. No one ever checked for chemical residue, hormones or anything like that.
Farming is already a fairly low profit venture....the fees are high and subject to increase dramatically without notice.

[Thinktank]

http://soopa.ca/growers.php

Here is a group of organic growers.

Go to each of their farms and see if they're using 'roundup.' Take a look. You
will see that none of those growers are using roundup.

Maybe they're spraying their fruit with some other pesticide. Take a look. You can see
if someone is spraying a pesticide. Neighbours can see. Their neighbours all know they are organic
and if they were to cheat, they would be caught instantly. None of the growers on that list are cheating.
they are all reasonably small growers that DO NOT CHEAT.

But somehwere someone is cheating. Somewhere out there, someone is taking some non-certified organic produce
and mixing it in with the organic stuff to make a few extra dollars. We know that. Maybe we should have
people travelling around the world looking for the cheaters. Or make it $1,000,000 fine for anyone cheating.
That would discourage the cheater.

[WeatherWoman]

Some BC Products:



Please add some others!

Level Ground is here in Saanichton : Fair Trade Coffee, Cane Sugar, Dried fruit, Chocolate.
Even though the ingredients aren't from here, they practice fair trade and employee local people.

[flamingfingers]

"Organic"?? Really? Or "Organic Scam"?

The Province>Blogs >Opinion Opinion RSS Feed
Mischa Popoff: Canada’s organic food system is a nightmare
December 19, 2012. 1:19 pm • Section: Opinion

WINNIPEG — As the holidays approach, Canadians are spending more time purchasing and preparing foodstuffs for their family tables. They’re also looking for appealing, tasty, nutritious goods that will not upset their budgets.

Be prepared for the seasonal, united organic-food-movement appeal, calling on Canadians to buy certified organic turkey, organic vegetables and fruit, organic breads and pastries, organic milk and meats, organic nuts and even organic booze.
But is organic food purer, tastier and more nutritious?

A recent in-depth report on the Canadian organic sector published by The Frontier Centre points out that there is no systematic, empirical proof that food certified as organic is purer, tastier or more nutritious.

It turns out that a bevy of federally regulated, for-profit, organic certifying agencies sell the privilege to organic farmers, brokers/traders and processors to label their products “certified organic” in Canada. And with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency’s logo affixed to their products, premiums of 100 to 200 per cent are then garnered without a single test being performed. It’s all just a glorified, bureaucratic, tax-subsidized, public-private, abused honour system.

The politicized privilege to be deemed “certified-organic” in Canada is available to anyone, whether here in Canada or anywhere in the world. To qualify, just pay fees and fill out paperwork, even if you’re in China, Mexico or Argentina. The honesty of the applicants is not verified. When staff at the CFIA finally carried out some secret tests on organic products, they were so taken aback by the results that they actually tried to suppress them.

There was a time when the CFIA considered organic testing. Testing is, after all, how the regular food system is kept safe. But the idea of applying science to the organic industry in Canada was dead-on-arrival, thanks to the organic lobby, in spite of the fact that the cost of testing is one tenth that of the current paper-based system.

By relying exclusively on paperwork, Canada’s for-profit organic certifiers benefit from highly lucrative revenues which, in turn, provide donations to activist organic groups which may explain their opposition to testing in spite of support for the idea from rank-and-file Canadian organic farmers.

In addition to upfront application and inspection fees, organic farmers and processors operating under CFIA “rules” are forced to pay royalties to their private certifiers between one and three per cent on their gross revenue from each and every transaction. It is akin to the franchise fees that fast-food restaurant owners pay to their head offices, with the difference that Canadian organic farmers and processors are paying for the use of the CFIA’s logo on their finished products, not the private certifier’s. And yet, the CFIA requires no testing. None.

As every lifestyle section in newspaper across the land pays homage to the certified-organic turkey and all the fixings (never asking whether it’s worth it or whether it even helps a single Canadian farmer), remember that private organic certifiers only enforce the administrative rules of organic production in this country. While independent inspectors make pre-announced visits once a year to each farm and facility, they don’t do any testing. They only fill out paperwork.
In addition to organic foods, you’ll also be hit with the idea of bringing in the New Year with certified-organic booze. Such claim could not possibly get any more absurd. None of the alleged mystical attributes of organic barley or grapes even has a chance of surviving the fermentation and distillation processes. So save your money.

Whether you’re someone who only “goes organic” during festive occasions, or one of the millions of Canadians who buys organic food on a regular basis believing it’s purer, more nutritious and more sustainable than regular food, let the buyer beware. The “organic” label doesn’t necessarily give you what you think you are buying.

If you really want to help Canadian organic farmers, buy directly from them as you’re not likely going to find their products on grocery-store shelves this Christmas season.

Otherwise, you may want to save the money for the children’s toys instead.

http://blogs.theprovince.com/2012/12/19 ... nightmare/

[theyeti]

i have friends who are organic apple growers . my grand dad was an organic wheat farmer 60 yrs ago . some ppl do not use pesticides etc. in my grand fathers case he could not afford to pay for em !

[flamingfingers]

i have friends who are organic apple growers . my grand dad was an organic wheat farmer 60 yrs ago . some ppl do not use pesticides etc. in my grand fathers case he could not afford to pay for em !

Are your friends "certified organic"? If so, are their apples tested in any way by CIFA?

[theyeti]

they most certainly sell them as organic and they do not use any commercial type sprays . but if they had to be inspected i have no idea . i cant imagine the budget for inspection being too large .

[flamingfingers]

remember that private organic certifiers only enforce the administrative rules of organic production in this country. While independent inspectors make pre-announced visits once a year to each farm and facility, they don’t do any testing. They only fill out paperwork.

So my question then is: Do your friends have to fill out paperwork to have their product 'certified organic'?

They sound like responsible people who probably do not sell their product to big stores like Safeway, Save-On and probably their product can be trusted to BE 'organic'.

Like it says here:

If you really want to help Canadian organic farmers, buy directly from them as you’re not likely going to find their products on grocery-store shelves this Christmas season.

[theyeti]

ya they r all word of mouth and they use the farmers markets etc ..

[theyeti]

i think they must have filled out paper work the bags there fruit comes in are numbered i believe stamped with some official looking organic statement