Organic Food Craze

Americans are becoming more and more concerned about the use of pesticides, growth hormones and chemicals in the process of growing their foods. They are choosing farmers market produce, joining CSAs, and buying organic meat, dairy and grain products at the grocery store. Restaurants are also reacting to the organic demand by offering meals that are made with organic ingredients.

Is organic food all that it is cracked up to be health-wise, or are we consumers spending our money under false pretenses? This debate will run and run and we will ultimately make our own decision, but these decisions are heavily influenced by facts about the food that we eat. While the health benefits may have been exaggerated by some, it makes sense that something grown organically will be good for us. There is enough data out there that supports this- many tests have been run in the past and there is concrete evidence to back this up. It is clear that the craze for Organic food makes it one of the fastest-growing groups in the food industry today, to the extent that Organic foods are costing more than double the price of our usual foods and may end up hurting some household budgets. Because of multi-million dollar advertising campaigns, the consumer believes that organic food is healthier for you. Also, there are a number of talk shows or programs on TV that will always have some nutritionist come on TV and talk about what organic foods us consumers need to be buying in order to be healthy. There are also many books on organic food, internet websites, etc. This certainly affects our decision-making when it comes to food shopping. We have now become obsessed with the “nutrition facts” and how much saturated fat something has or what ingredients we should look out for that can be harmful to us, etc. There are also always new reports on the news about what food may harm us, or which foods promote weight gain and we get to the point where we think: Everything is bad for us! So we are spending all of our money on organic food, because the media is telling us to and because there are enough reports to show that farming organically is good for both our bodies and our planet.

I personally do not make my decisions based on all this information because I like to eat what I want- however, it does kind of scare me sometimes and I will think twice or quickly take a look at the “nutrition facts”. But it doesn’t impact me to the point where I will not buy something just because it has something “bad” for you in it.