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Jim Harkness of the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy in Minneapolis sends this link to a video showing what the floods have done to organic farms in the Midwest. Nobody ever said farming was easy, but this seems especially tragic.

I’m just back from participating in a panel discussion on alternative food chains at Yearly Kos in Chicago–the first time this group of Netroots Nation and blogging activists (many on Daily Kos) has discussed food issues at its convention (see the completely unbiased report on the panel, posted by its chair, Daily Kos diarist orangeclouds115). The convention was well worth attending if for no other reason than to see all of the Democratic party candidates for president (exception: Joe Biden) on stage answering hard-hitting questions from a very tough audience with highly diverse opinions. If you still have the idea that young people are not interested in politics these days, try this. I found it inspiring (not everyone agrees).

I have just seen Michael Moore’s indictment of America’s health care system. I think Sicko is a much more engrossing, compassionate, and important film than the reviews I’ve seen have suggested. Go see it and let me know what you think.

Today’s question, from a college professor in California, has to do with maintaining the integrity of the standards established by the USDA’s National Organic Program for defining foods as organic: “It seems to me that the non-organic food industry must love this chipping away at the underlying meaning of “organic”. I’m worried about whether these changes are going to negatively affect the future availability of organic foods in grocery stores — why would people want to pay the premium for organic if it’s not really? My question is: have you written on this topic? Are others who you can refer me to?

Here’s my response: I have indeed written about this topic, and it is an important one. In What to Eat, I discuss the chipping-away-at-organic issues in several places, most specifically in the section on “The Politics of Organics” on pages 42-44 (and see Endnotes for references). Organics are the fastest growing segment of the food industry. Because organic production methods constitute an explicit critique of methods used in conventional industrial agriculture, the producers of conventional foods–along with their friends in the USDA and Congress–would love to weaken the standards to make it cheaper for them to produce and market foods as organic.

The latest USDA proposal (Federal Register, May 15, 2007) is to allow non-organic substitutes to be used in foods certified as organic when organic substances are not available. For example, the USDA wants to allow non-organic beet juice to be used to color products certified as organic when organic beet juice color is not available. Is this a good idea? I doubt it.

Anyone concerned about this issue should be working hard to make sure the organic standards continue to mean that organic foods are really organic and the Certified Organic seal can be trusted. This means expressing your opinion to your congressional representatives, to the USDA, and to the National Organic Standards Board. The Organic Consumers Association is an excellent source of information about this issue and provides plenty of background information for taking action.