The UK press are full of it today, organic food is not better for you according to a report from the FSA (food standards agency.) Just why the FSA should persist in denigrating organic food is anyone’s guess. The more cynical amongst us might argue that it has something to do with the agrochemical industry especially as the two groups seem to share staff.
But what of the findings of the report. They say they re-examined research going back 60 years and could not find any evidence that organic food has a higher nutrient content. They obviously did not look very far as there have been recent studies which say that it has. Take, for example, the press release from Newcastle University of 27th May 2008; “Organic milk is cream of the crop” which details work that proved organic milk contained 60% more omega 3 than conventional milk.
There has been other work which shows that organic food does contain higher levels of nutrients. One of the most comprehensive was published in March 2008 “Nutritional Superiority of Plant-Based Organic Foods”. This project looked at 100 studies and concluded:
The magnitude of the differences in nutrient levels strongly favored the organic samples. One quarter of the matched pairs in which the organic food contained higher levels of nutrients exceeded the level in the conventional sample by 31% or more.
What bothers me is that the FSA continues to say that it is neither for nor against organics yet takes every opportunity to discourage consumers from buying organic food. I have to wonder what hidden agenda is at work. Could it be lobbying from the agrochemical industry?
There are good reasons to eat organic food chief of which (for me) is that it is not soaked in pesticides. Then there is the evidence that it is higher in nutrients. That should be enough to convince any sane person that it is better.
Update 30 July 2009, 1545
Like many other newspapers The Guardian printed a story on the FSA report today including a note from the appendix of the report saying that levels of nutrients such as betacarotine were 53% higher on organic food. This was not mentioned in the conclusion. Seems like that is just spin, spin and more spin. So much for the food standards agency!
The problem is that the media will grab the headline and that it will stick. Maybe that is what they wanted?
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