The Benefits of Organic Food
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A little goes a long way
One hurdle to going organic is the cost. According to Consumer Reports, you’ll pay about 50 percent more on average for organic produce. But to benefi t your family’s health, you don’t need to buy organic everything. In fact, you can lower your pesticide exposure by 90 percent simply by avoiding the 12 most contaminated fruits and vegetables (see “Best Foods to Buy Organic,” left) and opting for the least contaminated ones instead.
Alternately, you could start slowly and purchase just a few items each week. Right now, only 23 percent of American consumers buy organic products on a weekly basis. “If we can get a lot of people to do a little, it will make a big difference,” maintains Greene. “Make one out of every 10 foods you buy organic. Pick one thing—apples, peaches or milk, for instance.”
Greene recommends joining a new campaign called Mission Organic 2010, in which you pledge to buy just one organic food for every ten items on your grocery list through the year 2010—just 10 percent of your cart! (See organic-center.org/about.join.html to sign up.) Here are two ways to make organic shopping easier— and cheaper—for you:
Think globally, eat locally
Organic products at your local farmers’ markets tend to be cheaper than those in the grocery stores. Visit ams.usda.gov/farmersmarkets or localharvest.org to find a farmers’ market or food co-op near you.
Mail-order your organics
You can even shop online for organic meats and produce; some grocers offer next-day delivery anywhere in the U.S. For more information, visit theorganicpages.com.
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN TODDLER MAGAZINE, SPRING ’07
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Comment by Babytime Organics on Feb 15 2011 12:59:47:
What an excellent article. We recently started switching our regular food out for organic, when possible, mainly for general health reasons. But, I never realized that children receive a higher concentration of pesticides than adults because of their body smaller body sizes. Makes sense though. Now I’m going to be even more vigilant about switching to organic. Great information!
Comment by Leslee on Feb 18 2011 05:10:00:
Whenever possible we try to buy organic produce and dairy products for our children to minimize the amount of pesticides, antibiotics and hormones, but also for the taste. We think they taste better. Take a look at the ingredients in a non-organic half and half – a large part of it is corn syrup, while the organic half and half is cream and milk. Likewise with packaged products, high fructose corn syrup is rarely an ingredient.
Also, we try to grow our own organic foods (non-certified) during the spring/summer.
Comment by Becky – Resident Mom on Feb 21 2011 11:24:32:
Love this article…it’s a real eye opener for many. I fed my 2 1/2 year old exclusively organic until age one and felt wonderful about it. I continue to buy organic as much as possible (cost permitting) and only feed my son organic fruits and vegetables. I think all parents need to take a closer look at what they are feeding their children these days. Things are much different than when we were kids!
Comment by Terrie on Mar 04 2011 12:52:32:
well i live on a farm and we use fertilizer and some pesticides for some stuff, we even spray melons and its not a pesticide its for the blight, we would lose more w/o em i just dont see how organic foods are “organic” but we only have to worry about slugs and a certain butterfly and raccoons and porccupines, those critters we trap or watever cuz theyre no good to the farm, its not just critters we have to worry about but also blights and wat we use is safe and i dont see anything wrong with fertilizer we just cant grow nything w/o it, wat i would concentrate on is reducing the carbon footprint, we not only grow veggies but we also buy cherries, peaches, pears, apples, plumes from a few growers in our state and sell em for profit in our area and we know they use some pesticides that are safe… we just cant grow certain fruit in our area and there is a such thing as safe pesticides for us, and i tottally get with more concentrated in kids, it does make sense but i dont know how they can grow anything w/o that stuff, i think they should replace that corn syrup or watever with real sugar, the real stuff is better and a good thing about local foods, theyre picked riped, major difference between from the tree and store bought becuz wat u get at the store is picked too early becuz theyre being shipped accross the country and they spray em with perservatives at the store, i dont think our growers do perservatives… i do like that organic is safe for the animals and environment and theyre all about conservation so something i would try for my kids but cant do on our own farm, our land is too rocky
Comment by Lizzette Jimenez on Feb 28 2012 07:14:45:
Excellent quick read article for all Mommies and Daddies. Becoming a parent definitely makes you think differently, I became more aware after having my little human almost three years ago.
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Comment by Champagne Baby on Mar 02 2012 04:19:24:
Very interesting! We've always tried to eat healthy, but recently, with the arrival of our 2nd little punchkin, we have been trying to eat more organic fruits and vegetables. We have been using the Door to Door Organic program. I definitely recommend it if it comes near your house!