safety of non-organic and GMO foods

[pradheep]

People from india take it for granted that non-organic and GMO foods are healthy without understanding the fact that it is not really tested for safety. Like idiappam , many of my friends asked me " Don't you think 'organically grown' is just a gimmick, just to get a few more bucks for a bag?".

it is sad that we often go for "cheap things compromising quality. We dont care to even educate ourselves to know the safety of the food we eat. Here I like to give a link about safety of rBGH milk.
click this link to know more
http://www.preventcancer.com/consumers/general/milk.htm

[Idiappam]

Did you call me?? Ok, Pradheep, for the benifit of hubbers (including me) please explain the following briefly!

1. Organic food
2. Non-Organic food
3. GMO
4. rBGH milkl

[pradheep]

Organic foods are grown using natural means of farming without use of chemical pesticides and chemical fertilizers.

GMO
Since food crops are prone to the attack of insects, bugs and pests, scientists found a smart way by engineering the plants to produce toxins. In nature, some plants like producing thorns, secrete toxic chemicals naturally as a means of protection to keep away attacking creatures. Now scientist mimic this condition artificially by making our food crops to produce toxins. The make the plants secrete toxins by taking toxic genes from bacteria or virus and introduce them into plants. These plants are genetically modified plants having genes from other organisms.

Organic milk is from cows fed with plant foods, not given antibiotics and hormones and also no animal feed (animal feed contain dried animal carcass- left-overs from slaughter house).

rBH milk
cows injected with rBGH hormone to boost 30% of their milk production


http://www.preventcancer.com/consumers/general/milk.htm

http://sakthifoundation.org/organic.htm

[Idiappam]

Organic farming yeild is very much lower than conventional farming. Plants are expected to draw nutrients from 'naturally digested compost' resulting in lower yeild.

And a large portion of the harvests go to the insects. High level of safety!

But, we have to note that millions, especially children, die every year because they don't have anything to eat, not because they ate 'unsafe food'.

Don't starve the world!

[Idiappam]

I don't think anyone would want a lesson here on 'plant physiology and biochemistry' to explain the misunderstandings that come with the terms 'chemical', 'chemical fertilisers', 'toxins' and 'GM Food'.!

But please understand that plants can only 'drink' inorganic fertilisers. Organic stuff has to be broken down to their inorganic components before plants can draw them - put simply!

[pradheep]

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v410/n6831/abs/410926a0_fs.html

Escalating production costs, heavy reliance on non-renewable resources, reduced biodiversity, water contamination, chemical residues in food, soil degradation and health risks to farm workers handling pesticides all bring into question the sustainability of conventional farming systems. It has been claimed, however, that organic farming systems are less efficient, pose greater health risks and produce half the yields of conventional farming systems. Nevertheless, organic farming became one of the fastest growing segments of US and European agriculture during the 1990s. Integrated farming, using a combination of organic and conventional techniques, has been successfully adopted on a wide scale in Europe. Here we report the sustainability of organic, conventional and integrated apple production systems in Washington State from 1994 to 1999. All three systems gave similar apple yields. The organic and integrated systems had higher soil quality and potentially lower negative environmental impact than the conventional system. When compared with the conventional and integrated systems, the organic system produced sweeter and less tart apples, higher profitability and greater energy efficiency. Our data indicate that the organic system ranked first in environmental and economic sustainability, the integrated system second and the conventional system last.

The above is from peer reviewed journal "Nature".

There are more like this my friend idiappam. It is a fallacy that modern technology gives more yeild. Do you need more info?

[pradheep]

Now I will tell about a scientist turned farmer . ONE STRAW REVOLUTION Masanobu Fukuoka. I saw his farm on DVD and amazing.

Dear Idiappam
we are all from india and we know how rice is grown, right?. We plough, sow, then we transfer to new field after flooding the soil with water...what a mess!. Look at this guy, he does not do any of these and he gets I think 2200 kilo rice per acre, much higher than his neighbor farmer who uses a tractor and modern technology.
He was a scientist who got enlightenment knowing the "Truth" that modern science take man away from knowing the truth. He was a plant pathologist by profession. I read in his book "Action in action and inaction in action", from which he derived the concept of No-farming. I easily good correlate with Bhagavad Gita's statement of a wise seeing action in inaction and inaction in action. Any way let us not go to this here in this thread.

So this guy just threw paddy seeds on soil , did not flood his fields, no fertlizer and now scientists all over world visit his japan farm and astonished to find the high quality of his soil. Highly fertile.

I understand that organic substances has to be converted to inorganic substances. i was one's like you reading Plant physiology and biochemistry, but what i failed at that time to understand the holistic view of several micro-organisma and micronutrients involved in the soil that is vital for the plant. what we know only is a bunch of nutrients and its mechanism of absoption. there is more to this aspect.

I highly recommend to read this one straw revolution book where he talks about health. I see his views are the same as in ayurveda siddha etc...so holistic and he says organic farming is good but superior to than that is his n0-farming way. He gives beautiful evidences on that aspect.

Bottom line, this holistic apprach is the solution for the world and not the parasitic apprach of modern technology which strips nature instead of hormoniously works with it.

[pradheep]

http://www.lifepositive.com/body/nature/fukuoka-organicfarming.asp

the above is an article about this japanese farmer.

[Idiappam]

Please Mr Pradheep, don't dump text from unscientific sources copied from the web. I can reply line for line on the wrongness of the text you posted, but that would be a real chore. Just an example:

Pradeep quoted:
the organic system produced sweeter and less tart apples, higher profitability and greater energy efficiency.

How much sweeter were the apples and how less tarter?? How much more profit was made? HOw much energy was saved?? Can you get those answers for me, Pradheep.


I easily good correlate with Bhagavad Gita's statement of a wise seeing action in inaction and inaction in action.

Stop that crap. In Tamil, that is called 'motta thalaikkum molankaalukkum mudicchu podurathu' - meaning 'Trying to knot your bald head to your bare ankles'. I should have guessed, that eventually this will end up promoting Vedic Brahmanisim.

And that Japanese Masanobu Fukuoka's story on the site you quoted related organic farming to Vedanta. That is very un-Vedic as the Vedas say that agriculture is an occupation of Sins - done by the outcastes.

Please control yourself mr Pradheep, Keep to just farming, will you!

Note to Moderators
Please watch this thread. Looks like it is not going to keep withing the boundaries of Science, and as a man of science, I don't quite like that. (You can remove this thread now if you want).

[pradheep]

Please Mr Pradheep, don't dump text from unscientific sources copied from the web. I can reply line for line on the wrongness of the text you posted, but that would be a real chore. Just an example:

Pradeep quoted:Quote:
the organic system produced sweeter and less tart apples, higher profitability and greater energy efficiency

Dear diappam
It is not form unscientific source. It looks you did not read the source. I kinow a person like you would only trust scientific source. that is why instead of quaoting other journals, I took from "Nature", the top peer reviewed journal in which only highly validated science is published. Please follow the link. It looks you are not from science background to know the worthy of "Nature".

Sorry if I had emotionally disturbed you quaoting Gita. what can I do. I said I read it from the japanese scientist turned farmer who is well respected in Japan.

Any way as I said I will stick on to farming and food here and I will clarify your doubts in another thread.

[viggop]

Dear Pradheep
Thanks for the link to Nature magazine.It is a very prestigious magazine.Another important article I saw there(though not related to this topic)
http://www.nature.com/news/2005/050606/full/050606-8.html

[pradheep]

Dear Viggop
I read the link too. Thanks that you shared with all.