Produce: Is Organic Always Best?

Take an inventory of my shopping cart on any given Sunday and chances are you will see a good number of organic products in it. But I do not exclusively shop organic. For this post I’m just going to focus on produce. Fruits and vegetables. Yes, I buy the organic mac n’ cheese, organic juices, and some other items, but it is the produce where I find myself having a hard time committing. It’s not so much the higher prices that bother me, or the limited selection. For me it’s all about quality.

My number one consideration when choosing ingredients is TASTE. The fresher a piece of fruit or a vegetable is the better it is going to taste. Much of the organic produce in supermarkets just doesn’t have the same quality of their conventionally grown counterparts. From the organic domain I’ve had woody celery, pulpy apples and pears, oranges that taste like they’ve been refrigerated and thawed multiple times, and grapes that were dead before they hit my cart. I am seeing a lot of organic produce wrapped in plastic and Styrofoam so that its shelf life can be extended. Since not as many people buy organic produce it has a lower turnover. Supermarkets pay more for this organic produce and lose more money when the organic goods expire. So they try their best to keep it on the shelves as long as they can. In addition to this a lot of the organic produce is warehoused and trucked from far distances because of limited number or lack of local suppliers. The longer it takes fresh produce to reach the supermarket and your kitchen the less fresh it is going to be.

What about the environmental impact of organic produce? I never thought much about it before, I always assumed that going organic would always be the green way to go. But there have been some studies that argue organic goods have a worse impact on the environment compared to conventional produce, this article in the UK talks about it. I strongly disagree with these findings and I am suspicious of who and what groups are behind these studies (I’m thinking big-time corporate industrial farms). The transportation of organic produce is cited as a big carbon emitter, but if you look at all the conventional fruit in stores this time of year – much of it is from South America! What if I want to eat a low-emission peach or nectarine? Do I need to fly to Chile? Oh wait, no that would use gas.

NY State Bigger Better Bottle Bill

Ever notice all the trash strewn along the roadside all over Orange County? Fast food wrappers, plastic bags, styrofoam containers, and empty plastic bottles. Drive down any high traffic road in our area particularly here in Middletown, NY and I guarantee you will see empty plastic bottles that have been tossed out the windows of cars. Now, of course if people didn't litter it wouldn't be a problem, but people do.

If you look closer at this trash you will notice that the large majority of the bottles will be empty water bottles. You will hardly ever see a soda bottle or can and if you do I bet it will be gone in a day or two. That's because there are people who walk the roads and pickup the bottles and cans for the 5 cent refund. But they don't pickup the water bottles because under current NY State law non-carbonated beverage containers have no deposit and therefore no refund. Look at a water bottle and you will probably see that it only has a redeemable value in the state of Maine. Since a lot more people are drinking bottled water these days, which itself some argue is questionable behavior, this garbage has become a big problem.

This past year a bill got introduced to the NY State Legislature called the Bigger Better Bottle Bill. It adds non-carbonated containers (water, juice, etc...) to the list of containers to be required to have a deposit and redeemable value. The good news is it passed in the House. But it never got voted on in the Senate. So I encourage you if you are in NY, or do the same in your state, to contact your local State Senator and ask him/her to support this bill when the Senate session resumes. Don't know who your local NY State Senator is? Find them here.

If it helps, here's the Email I wrote my local Senators. Feel free to copy it and fill in the blanks:

Dear Senator [Your Senator's Name Here],

I am disappointed that the NY State Bigger Better Bottle Bill (A8055A, S5850A) did not get the chance to come up for a vote in the NY Senate before the 2008 session ended. I am not sure what you position on this bill is, but I encourage you and others in power to support it.

I live in [Your Town/City Here], NY where the rural roadsides are littered with trash from drivers. But if you look at the trash closely you will hardly ever find a soda bottle or can. You will mostly find water bottles making up most of the beverage container trash. Part of this may be the bottled water industry taking a bigger share of the beverage market. But I also suspect that the folks who walk the roads, collecting bottles for refund money just let those water bottles lay there because they under current NY State law they can't be redeemed like soda bottles can.

I think adding a five cent deposit to water bottles will help clean up the environment as well as provide the state with potential revenue (from the bottles that end up not getting returned). Those funds could be invested in other areas where we need help with in our state. This bill will help clean up the environment and lessen the eyesore of trash that really takes away from the natural beauty of our area.

Thank you,

[Put your Name and FULL ADDRESS here]

You can learn more about this issue at BottleBill.org