Link: Organics Going Mainstream
The rising popularity of organic foods is encouraging and troubling at the same time. The fact that people’s health and that of the environment is of growing concern to the populace takes one step toward restoring my faith in humanity. It’s wonderful that people care about issues like BGH, pesticides, and genetic modification of plants. Conversely, this means big corporations want to get a piece of the organic pie. Producing foods organically is more costly than through conventional factory farming. The easiest way to please the customer and keep costs down is to pressure the USDA to relax standards.
Edit: Still more scariness about organic food!
I tend to shop organically thru the mainstream because it is cheaper than going to the co-op. I am glad that there are more and more offerings available. And it seems like in the grocery stores there are many of the same products/brands as in the co-op. My concern would be that the corporate food producers would buy the original organic producers and people wouldn’t even know the difference. Like when Tom’s of Maine was bought. Sigh.