Organic always is a great topic. So a little bit of background on me. I am actually a farmer. I actually looked at going into organic dairy farming myself. I have always been a conventional farmer. I also have friends of mine that are organic farmers. And no, I am not talking about backyard gardens. I am talking about actual Farms with acreage in the 200-500 range.
I think the video posted in the original post does an excellent job of breaking it all down. It is correct, just because it's organic, does not mean pesticide-free. Same goes for milk, there is a mechanism in place to be able to treat animals, and return them to the milk supply after a while.
People wish to have unadulterated food. I don't think it's a bad wish, I just believe that it is slightly misguided.
Go ahead and grow all the fruits and veggies in your backyard that you wish. Do it all organically if you want to. Do whatever makes you happy. The fact of the matter is, that billions of people go hungry without conventional farming.
Look at any population chart, and lay over a time frame with industrial technology and farming methods. You'll notice that the population went up exponentially at about the same time we got really good at farming.
One of the very liberal people that is local to me went on a Big Ol tirade about using ozone to treat vegetables. I tried to explain to her, it really isn't any different than washing your hands when they are dirty. They just figured out a process that does it, help to preserve the product by destroying all the bacteria that's on it, and let it last longer to get to the end distribution point. I like my hands clean, and I like my fruit clean.
Sadly, never in any point in history have so few fed so many. So what is the result? People are generally not knowledgeable about what actually happens, and have turned it into strictly an emotional issue. It's kind of like gun control, coming from people that don't own guns, have never used guns , and can let somebody else do their own bidding security-wise.
It's easy to be picky when you are not hungry and starving.
The other part that I also like also is that people who are usually really big on organic anything, seem to have no problem loading up going to a hospital or a doctor and taking advantage of all the latest technology possible. Much less putting all kinds of other prescription drugs or various anesthesia in their body. However, using new technology on food seems to be a real problem? In no other segment of society is technology frowned upon like it is in the food sector.
Government policy in this country is cheap food.
On the subject of commercial fertilizers, of course it depends on the ground that you are on, but overall, with the correct crop rotation, commercial fertilizer isn't really necessary. But, such as the cheap food policy of this Country is, everyone has to go maximize yields to attempt to obtain profitability.
If you had some flesh eating disease on your leg, you would like to do something about it, wouldn't you? But everyone seems to think that plants don't have feelings. What about when that wire worm is boring through that corn plant, basically doing a remake of the alien movie. Am I just supposed to sit there and let it get eaten from the inside out while it dies in complete horror?
Everyone acts like we are completely dousing plants in pesticides and herbicides. Do any of you guys have any idea what that chemical actually cost? It costs me about $32 an acre to spray corn with Roundup, resolve Q, an adjuvent, and the application.
On the subject of Roundup, we are only usually putting somewhere between 24 - 32 ounces per acre, and that is coupled with anywhere between 8 and 15 gallons of water per acre. 1 acre, is 43560 square feet. It's about the surface area of almost 30 regular homes.
So I want you guys to envision taking two to three cans of soda or beer , and spreading it over the entire surface area of 30 houses. What makes you guys think, that I want to spend more money than I have to? Even if I doubled the rate of gly phosphate and the other chemicals, it would add almost $25 of extra cost to that equation.
So instead of 2 to 3 cans of beer a chemical over the area of 30 houses, I'm just a crazy farmer that loves to soak the ground glyphosphate, and I threw six cans down worth. That's about the price of a really nice Knight's Armament company rifle every hundred acres.
You wouldn't go buy something, open the box, remove one third of it, and throw it in the trash right out of the gate would you? Everyone that uses the argument that we overuse chemicals, should ask that question. Why would I throw my money away? You wouldn't, would you?
I promise, every house in every subdivision in America probably use it 10 times or more the amount of fertilizer , pesticide and herbicide per acre. Runoff from those areas almost always drain into a tributary also.
On the subject of Monsanto, that is one crooked ass company. Their big schtick is technology and the intellectual property that goes with it. And they go completely overboard with guarding it.
I do buy one product that's organic, but I don't buy it because it's organic, I buy buy it because of the kind of brown rice it is, I like it, it comes from a big bag from Costco, and it's cheap.
Overall, organic is a very small industry. But, it is so noisy, that you would think it is a very large one. Having spent time on organic Dairies and farms, and walking through an organic field of potatoes , potatoes that looked like the culls that come off of a regular conventional Farm, My overall observations, as someone that actually works in the industry, is that organic is highly overrated, and filled with conjecture that revolves around clever marketing, feel good, and claims that aren't founded in anything in order to charge premiums for products that are in no way superior.
It's your money. Spend it as you wish.
Just my thoughts as an individual that has intimate knowledge of how organic and conventional farming actually works.
Originally Posted by cbx
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