Feature

Organic food for thought

Growing organic food benefits the environment – but not if it has to travel thousands of miles, warns Sarah Sexton

In June, the food chain Iceland announced that all future own-brand frozen vegetables would be organic but that their price would not increase – organic food often costs up to twice as much as conventionally-produced food.

A leader in challenging GM foods, Iceland is now moving to make organic food available to more consumers (although it may well remain beyond the incomes of the quarter of the British population living in poverty).

But ironically the company’s announcement raises other health and environmental concerns. British smallholdings cannot supply enough organic vegetables – just three per cent of British farmland is in organic production or under conversion. Government aid to would-be organic farmers is less than to conventional farmers and Iceland must therefore source much of its organic produce from other countries.

Growing organic food uses far fewer fossil fuel-based fertilisers and chemical pesticides than those used in conventional farming, so its production contributes far less to climate change, soil erosion and water shortages as well as having fewer adverse effects on the health of growers and consumers.

But long-distance air and road transport of food – even food with impeccable organic credentials – is environmentally damaging. Air transport creates twice as much nitrogen oxide as road transport, and 25 times as much as rail and sea transport. Despite this, air freighting of food is expected to double in the next 20 years. Road transport creates 50 times as much carbon dioxide as rail transport for each ton of food moved. Worse, food that travels long distance usually needs more packaging.

At present, at least 70 per cent of the organic food consumed in Britain is imported – rising to 80 per cent for fruit and vegetables (most organic eggs and meat is domestically produced).

Food which has travelled a shorter distance before it gets eaten should be fresher and have more nutrients – and should also benefit consumers’ immune systems. Some researchers believe that the dramatic rise in allergies and autoimmune diseases, particularly among the urban poor may, in part, be a result of people no longer eating food which has been produced in their local environment. Eating food produced locally enables people’s immune systems to learn which particles are harmless to the body. Hay fever, asthma and allergies to certain foods, for instance, occur when the immune system overreacts to benign airborne particles such as pollen or components in food as if they were highly toxic. Autoimmune diseases such as arthritis, multiple sclerosis and early-onset diabetes occur when the immune system mistakenly attacks healthy cells or tissues in the body as if they were ‘foreign’ cells.

The majority of people in Britain live in urban areas far from green and pleasant fields. Supermarkets may be one of the few places where they can buy organic vegetables – as long as they have access to transport to out-of-town stores. Supermarkets’ take-up of organic food in Britain, particularly in the wake of the lack of confidence about GM foods, has been a welcome outlet for many organic growers.

But because they are the biggest food buyers, supermarkets have gained a stranglehold over the conventional food industry – from seedbed to dinner table. They dictate the prices, terms and conditions under which produce is grown and delivered.

The same thing could well happen with organic food. Some 70 per cent of organic food sold in Britain is already sold in supermarkets. Iceland claims that it has already bought up nearly 40 per cent of the world’s organic supplies. Sainsbury’s, meanwhile, which claims that it accounts for 30 per cent of Britain’s organic food sales, is reported to be ‘working with suppliers to bring down prices’.

Globally, a relatively small number of companies control the worldwide food trade, and are able to organise not just the sale of food but also its planting. Increasingly the production of fresh vegetables and fruit in developing countries, where land and labour is cheaper, has been integrated with sales in affluent markets. Organic food could well be the next cash crop.

It could be argued that at least Iceland’s decision provides a new healthy market for hard-pressed growers in poor countries. Overall, pesticide poisonings, the cause of much morbidity and mortality, are at their highest in the countries of the southern hemisphere and income from sales of organic food provides much-needed livelihoods, particularly if it is higher than for conventionally-grown crops. For individual farmers who can comply with the exacting standards, high volume and bureaucratic procedures of overseas sales, this may well be true.

But many farmers are unlikely to be able to comply – even if they have access to land – and will be left out of this privileged loop, their own food production and food security undermined by global organic trade. Food security stems from a country growing most of its food itself, not buying it on distorted world markets.

A move towards cheaper organic food is certainly a boon for some people’s health – but it should not be to the detriment of the health of others.