The Science of Organics: Peeling the Onion to Reach Core Truths (continued)
Zoe Helene Interviews Dr. Charles Benbrook, Chief Scientist of The Organic Center
ZH: How would you describe the role of bringing science into the comparative evaluation of organic farming and conventional farming?
CB: When studying the unique benefits of organic farming, in comparison to conventional farming, careful science is needed to control for a number of variables like plant genetics, the weather, and harvest and storage practices that have either direct or indirect impacts on nutritional quality, food safety, and taste. It is possible to grow tasteless food with low nutritional quality using methods that are in compliance with the organic rules. It is also possible to grow very high quality, nutritious and good tasting foods using conventional methods. It is also all-too-easy to mishandle high quality organic (or conventional) food after it is harvested and leaves the farm, eroding quality along the way. All sorts of things can happen to degrade food quality before the consumer actually eats it, including things that happen after the consumer has bought the food and taken it home. It is unrealistic to expect the average consumer to understand how all of these other factors influence food quality and come into play in determining how nutritious a given apple, or potato salad actually is.
We need science and well-designed comparative studies to explain to people the impact of various factors on food quality, both how to grow high-quality foods on the farm and preserve that innate quality as food moves from the farm to the consumer. Science will lead to a set of widely accepted “first principles of food quality” that can be used to better understand the sources of food quality and how it can be compromised. Such “first principles” will help people place into perspective the results of future studies, as well as their own experiences with conventional and organic foods.
Science is also going to make it possible to make stronger and more unequivocal statements about the unique benefits of organic farming and organic food. By carefully adhering to the scientific process, we will be able to isolate, and control in a given experiment, most of the variables that impact conventional and organic food quality. In a properly designed comparative study, a field growing organic strawberries should be managed in terms of tillage, planting methods, irrigation, and harvest practices in much the same way as a nearby field growing conventional strawberries. The two farms should be managed equally well, so that each has the same chance to produce a superior crop. By making these kinds of rigorous and unbiased comparisons, science is going to help peel away the layers of the onion to expose more clearly the core features of conventional and organic farming systems that directly and routinely, or indirectly and/or only occasionally, impact food quality. Once the unique attributes of organic systems have been carefully documented and traced to their source, the organic community will have solid facts and science to back up what most consumers experience when they seek out and consume high quality, fresh organic food.
ZH: What led you to become engaged in a professional capacity studying the benefits of organic foods?
CB: That’s a really complicated question in my case. To be to totally honest, starting in the early 1980s and for about fifteen years of my professional career, I didn’t believe that organic farming and organic food was that terribly important of a topic. I thought organic farming was of marginal significance because it accounted for such a tiny part of our food system and did not seem poised, or even terribly interested in growth. As a scientist working in Washington, DC on national policies that relate to food safety and food quality, my interest was how agriculture and food impacts the health of 275 million Americans and environmental quality on 350 million acres of farmland. I was interested in the broad impact of agriculture and our food system on soil and water quality, on public health, farm income and farmer well being, and the environment. Organic farming did not strike me at the time as a viable alternative to the conventional food system, and I felt that way through the nineties. It’s only been in the last few years that I’ve become convinced otherwise. The growth potential for organic farming is very great now, I can see it having a substantial impact on the health of the American public and the quality of the environment.
