Do you try to buy organic produce? Do you worry about food additives? Do genetically engineered food crops worry you? Are you a vegetarian? If not, do you try to avoid meat that has been subjected to hormones or antibiotics?

If you don't worry about these things, is it because you think your food is probably safe, or because (like me) you're just kind of lazy?

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Answers

I am a vegetarian because I can't stand the idea of eating a living creature and not because I am afraid that the meat isn't safe. I do have a terrible paranoia about eating bad fruit or vegetables. I will only eat produce grown in the USA -- no South African Grapes, thanks very much -- and I wash my produce so much that it sometimes loses its coloring. I washed a pint of strawberries so much ones that they turned out to be a white color.

On the same subject: has anyone used that FIT fruit and produce wash? It is available in most grocery stores and I was tempted to try it, but the idea of washing my food with a chemical makes my stomach turn.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

I've started worrying, recently. I do buy organic and wash everything, but I'm not a vegetarian. I worry about e. coli and hepatitis, malathion and other pesticides.

I am of two minds about genetically engineered food. I am all in favor of selecting crop strains that show unusual resistnce to common pests. I worry about inserting genes that enable the plant to create new toxins and such, because there's no guarantee that the new gene won't be as poisonous to humans as current pesticides. At least you can stop using the pesticide, but you can't un-splice genes.

Y'know, it might be better to be lazy about this stuff because, face it, I can't have any impact on what's in my food.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

There was an interesting article on Monsanto in the New Yorker a few months ago. It talked a lot about the humanitarian impact of GM foods (they can be used to inexpensively and very effectively increase crop yields in areas plagued by famine).

As for Meghan's comment about not wanting to wash her food with a chemical, I'd just like to remind her that water is a chemical and vegetables and fruits are made out of chemicals! I know it's intuitive to assume that foods we have been consuming for millenia are safe and that newly isolated chemicals aren't, but it's not an accurate assumption. This page contains a list of rodent carcinogens which occur naturally in the fruits and vegetables we eat.

As for organic produce, did anybody see 20/20 last weekend? They did a study of organic and non-organic produce and found that while neither group had measurable levels of pesticide, certain organic vegetables had elevated levels of e. coli. Organic produce is more likely to have e. coli contamination because it's grown in fertilizer made from manure.

Granted, their sample size was small, and if you wash your produce before you eat it, it shouldn't be a problem either way. But I haven't seen any studies actually demonstrating that organic produce is any safer than the non-organic kind.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

I wouldn't trust anything I learned on 20/20. This article about a special they on on PTSD is why. They have their own agenda. I'm not a conspriracy theorist or anything, but I don't think they have a clue about objectivity...

As far as eating organic, I try. I'm trying to migrate to a vegetarian lifestyle to help increase my health and most of the health food stores have organic, so you do the math. I really go either way... The idea of modifying my watermelon so it doesn't have seeds is kinda weird to me... I mean, what is the point? So you eat a bit slower, big deal. I'd rather have the natural produce in that instance than the modified.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Seedless watermelons aren't genetically engineered, they're a result of selective breeding.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

...and they're great for fruit salads!

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

That 20/20 story is a very old repeat, and it's been pretty thoroughly discredited -- mainly because Avery is employed by an organization that is sponsored by Monsanto, Dow, and other chemical companies, a fact that wasn't mentioned in the piece. Also, the type of e. coli found in the study is NOT the same lethal type that is found in raw hamburger, etc., and it was present in both organic and non-organically grown samples -- the former just showed higher amounts. The "manure" bit was misleading, as well, as many commercial growers use manure even if they do not practice other organic growing methods, because it is such cheap fertilizer.

Here is a letter sent by Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting to 20/20 after that segment first aired. Here is another rebuttal. The topic is also being discussed again on an organic gardening forum I read. Organic Gardening Magazine had an extensive rebuttal to this piece, but I can't find it online.

Organic Gardening does have a piece online about the dangers of genetically engineered foods, however.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Oh, yeah, this is another article I remember reading when it first came out: w hy is our food becoming less nutritious? The conclusion here is that non-organic farming practices have led to a decline in the nutritional value of produce. I've since read about some studies that suggest the nutrients present in fruits and vegetable have nothing to do with the nutrients in the soil. I don't know which to believe, but if this article is correct, that would be a case for the argument that organically grown food is better for you.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Meghan::::

The meat's supposed to be dead when you eat it.

Isn't the wheat we've all been eating for years been "genetically modified" for years?

I think it's silly to believe that anything "organic" is de facto superior. And unless you're rolling in money, it's vastly overpriced.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Oops, here is that rebuttal from Organic Gardening.

As for seedless watermelon, that actually calls up the issue some gardeners have raised: what constitutes "engineering"? Seedless watermelon was created in a lab and worked on in laboratories for years, which is a little different than the type of greenhouse "selective breeding" that most of us think of.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Beth, the points in "Organic Gardening" article you linked are full of holes. I'm not an expert on food safety, but anyone with a basic understanding of biology can see the following errors of logic:

-They claim that genetically modified foods are harmful to wildlife, but do not mention that naturally grown crops are also harmful to insects. Virtually all crops, organic, non-organic, or GM, are grown with pesticides, and to my knowledge, nobody has shown that GM crops are more harmful to animals than the traditional sort

-They say that GM crops leave pesticide residues in soil. Again, they do not mention that the same thing happens with traditional crops.

-They mention that GM foods may have hidden allergens. It is now U.S. law that Genetically Modified foods containing residues of known allergens be labelled as such.

-They state that many GM crops contain antibiotic resistance genes used for selection of cells containing the gene, and that this gene could be transferred to bacteria living in the gut. There is no evidence that this can happen. In addition, the antibiotics used in molecular biology are not routinely used in clinical practice.

The "why is our food becoming less nutritious" site cites a lot of scientific data, but the connection between the studies mentioned and changes in the nutrient content of food are 100% speculative! They don't have a single piece of data which directly supports their assumption!

Finally, it's true that practically everyone involved in this debate has some outside incentive in defending their position. That's why it's important to look at the scientific merits of the claims and not just the rhetoric.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

-They say that GM crops leave pesticide residues in soil. Again, they do not mention that the same thing happens with traditional crops.

How? Assuming you mean organically grown crops. How does this happen? This is a serious question; I don't understand how organically grown crops would leave pesticide residue in the soil. If you mean crops that are not grown organically, you should understand that some of this was written in the context of proposals to allow certified organic farmers to grow genetically engineered crops, and there was concern about dilution of organic certification standards.

-They mention that GM foods may have hidden allergens. It is now U.S. law that Genetically Modified foods containing residues of known allergens be labelled as such.

... as a result of this and other articles that called attention to the problem. That is a fairly new requirement ... at the time this article was written there were few if any labelling requirements for genetically engineered foods.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

In answer to Beth's question: all crops expel their metabolic byproducts into soil. If a plant has been treated with a pesticide, then that pesticide will be absorbed and metabolized by the plant and will end up in the soil.

Almost all commercially-produced organic crops are grown with the use of "organic pesticides" which are derived from plants and other "natural" sources. However, these pesticides are still dangerous to animals--in fact the BT toxin which you mentioned was shown to kill butterflies is an organic pesticide according to the California Organic Foods Act of 1990.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

No, I don't worry, mainly because I'm just lazy. I also figure it's probably safe. The FDA does an okay job as far as I'm concerned.

I don't buy organic produce - I have to nag myself to eat produce, period, so I make it easy on myself by getting frozen vegetables. I try to avoid prepared foods as opposed to making things from scratch because it's cheaper & has less preservatives, etc.

I don't like the idea of genetically engineered foods and it's surprising to me how few Americans seem to know or care about it - it's a big issue in Europe. At the least, I think they should have to label them clearly.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

"I think it's silly to believe that anything "organic" is de facto superior."

Assuming that the term "organic" actually connotes a specific standard limiting the products which can be used while growing the plant, there are two differences from traditional crop-growing methods which *I* consider superior.

a) Less toxic residue on the fruit: benefits the eater. Organic produce is subjected to fewer pesticides, relying more heavily on beneficial insects and insect eaters (I read recently about someone who rescues injured hedgehogs and puts them in his strawberry fields; they eat the slugs). Also, organic gardening methods emphasize prevention--for example, certain types of fungus and mildew are much less common if you water in the morning rather than the evening, or maybe the other way around. So a smaller quantity of pesticides is used, and I believe it's much less toxic; possibly, in fact, toxic to some bugs but not all, and not to humans. I've stuck to the non-chemical methods entirely, so I won't make firm statements here.

b) Less toxic residue in the whole ecosystem: benefits just about everyone. Although organic gardening does sometimes involve killing bugs, and it's true that plants often secrete pesticides and even herbicides (some California bunch grasses are knocked right out by the stuff that comes out of the roots of European grasses), these can be handled by the normal process of decay and growth and so on. I don't know, maybe a teaspoon of one is as dangerous as a teaspoon of the other; but the natural poisons degrade instead of building up and up. This was the most dangerous feature of DDT, of course: it was stored in the body and concentrated more and more at each level of the food chain. To a lesser extent, the same disruption is caused by chemical fertilizers, which are also not used in organic gardening.

I don't know of any major clinical trials studying the various health factors involved; it would have to be huge and very long-term. I do know that many doctors (a very conservative group as far as this kind of hippie-dippie(TM) stuff goes) are beginning to recommend that people try hard to eat organic or at least non-sprayed produce, because they believe it's having a long-term negative effect on overall health. I can try to find sources, but they're likely to be medical journal cites, not on the web.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

Jessie wrote:

Organic produce is subjected to fewer pesticides, relying more heavily on beneficial insects and insect eaters.

It can be, but it isn't necessarily. By law "organic" produce can only be sprayed with "organic" pesticides, which are naturally derived. However, there's no limit on the number of pesticides organic farmers can use, and the "organic" pesticides are not necessarily any less toxic than their non-organic counterparts, nor are they necessarily any less harmful to the ecosystem.

I've frequently heard organic advocates saying things like "this organic pesticide is 500 times less toxic than normal pesticides." This may be the case, but if they're having to use 500 times as much of it to keep the bugs away, the point is moot.

The way I see it, the bottom line is that pretty much all farmers need to use pesticides to produce high yields of healthy produce. All pesticides are toxic to pests, and since people are made out of the same basic stuff as pests, they may also be vulnerable.

The organic industry has a good thing going--they're selling their products at twice the cost they would usually bring (or more), despite a lack of scientific evidence indicating that their products are in any way superior. Frankly, I think they're conducting a propaganda campaign, and since what they're saying seems intuitive (of course vegetables grown naturally are safer and better for the environment than vegetables made with chemicals, right?) people are buying it.

-- Anonymous, July 12, 2000

With all due respect, Jen, I don't think you know as much about organic farming as you think you do. It's not a simple trade-off, i.e., traditional farmers spray with x amount of pesticides; organic farmers kill the same number of bugs with "natural" pesticides. It doesn't work that way. First of all, one of the most basic principles of organic farming is reduction of pesticide use in order to encourage beneficial insects. Bt and other "natural" pesticides kill beneficial bugs like lacewings, ladybugs, and assassin bugs, and can have adverse effects on other insect predators such as birds and bats. Thus, quite a few organic farmers shun those products except in times of extreme infestations. Second, good organic farming practices actually reduce reliance on pesticides altogether; there have been plenty of studies, for instance, that show that crops treated with high nitrogen chemical fertilizers are far more attractive to many insects. Organic farmers focus on soil maintanance, crop rotation, cover crops and companion planting rather than heavy duty applications of nitrogen, and their crops actually attract fewer harmful insects. Heck, you can demonstrate this in your own garden; grow one rose bush with Miracle Grow and another with lower nitrogen, slow release organic soil amendments, and watch which one is covered with aphids in a month or so.

And there have been many, many studies that show that our "traditional" farming practices cause soil depletion and are not sustainable over the long haul -- which is why many traditional farmers have begun incorporating selected organic gardening practices into their programs -- like cover crops, crop rotation, and crop diversification. It has been very clearly established that you can't just keep dumping chemicals on the soil every year, never replenishing the organic material in the soil, and always planting the same crop in the same location, and expect to have soil that's anywhere near as fertile ten years down the line as it was when you began.

In other words, the more you use chemical fertilizers and pesticides, the more you need to use them. The point of organic farming is not simply to improve food safety; it's to provide an environmentally safe and sustainable method of food production.

Yes, crop yields are lower. This is one reason I'm not totally opposed to genetically engineered foods -- if scientists can create crops that can produce heavily without resorting to the chemical dependency that currently exists in traditional farming, and if they can establish that those crops are *safe* for consumption and the environment, more power to them. I wish we could live in the world envisiond by organic farming activists, where most crops are locally produced in small, self-sustaining farms, but I don't envision that occurring. Large-scale food production is here to stay, but that doesn't mean that the methods currently employed are healthy, safe, or smart.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

This is a really interesting discussion on one of the forums I frequent, about small scale organic farmers vs. big organic operatios vs. conventional farming, and what "certified organic" really means. These are mostly small scale farmers talking about how they do business.

For what it's worth, I don't buy organic produce except at farmer's markets. The regulations are too haphazard and I'm not sure I trust them, anyway, because the process of adopting those regulations is so incredibly political -- in the end, I'm not sure how much it has to do with food safety. We wash the heck out of everything. We grow most of our own vegetables in the summer and we plan to plant fall and spring crops this year. I'm adding another vegetable garden next year, and that will probably mean we don't buy anything except asparagus and artichokes (our favorite vegetables, but they take too much room to grow). And of course we don't use any pesticides at all, not even the "organic" ones (I just don't see why they're necessary for a one-family garden), and I don't even use manure of any kind.

Really, I think the only way to know exactly what you're eating is to grow it yourself. Obviously not an option for most people, but it's the option with which I'm most comfortable.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

Beth, I have no doubt that things like pesticide reduction and soil maintenance are goals of "the organic farming movement." But there is absolutely no guarantee that the organic produce you buy in the grocery store conforms to any of these ideals. You're right that I'm not an expert on organic farming, but I have read the California law whose provisions I linked above, and I also know that this law is being used as a model for federal organic standards, so its guidelines are likely to be widely implemented. And under this law, none of the goals you stated are mandated.

"And there have been many, many studies that show that our "traditional" farming practices cause soil depletion and are not sustainable over the long haul -- which is why many traditional farmers have begun incorporating selected organic gardening practices into their programs -- like cover crops, crop rotation, and crop diversification."

Cover crops, crop rotation and crop diversification are not practices unique to organic farming. In fact, they were used by the Native Americans for hundreds, if not thousands, of years before the white people showed up, so I don't see how the organic movement deserves any credit for these "innovations." And again, there's no guarantee that certified organic produce results from this type of farming...or that "traditional" produce doesn't.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

Here's a link to the full text of the CA Organic Foods Act.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

Cover crops, crop rotation and crop diversification are not practices unique to organic farming. In fact, they were used by the Native Americans for hundreds, if not thousands, of years before the white people showed up, so I don't see how the organic movement deserves any credit for these "innovations."

I don't think anyone is trying to take credit for anything. Most organic activists freely acknowledge their debt to Native Americans and other indigenous cultures; the whole process of conforming farming practices to climate and other environmental factors is something that organic farmers learned by studying their indigenous predecessors. However, cover crops, crop rotation and crop diversification are practices that were abandoned outright for many years by traditional farmers in the wake of miracle pesticides, heavy machinery, and cheap chemical fertilizers.

As for certification and organic guidelines, read the link I included in my last post. This a fairly typical exchange judging from articles and letters to editors I've read over the past couple of years. Many small-scale organic farmers are thoroughly disgusted over the proposed organic certification guidelines and consider them fairly meaningless. The reality is that there are large organic farming operations that are essentially run by the same agribusiness corporations that produce crops through conventional means. So yeah, I agree that you can't tell much from the "organic" designation at your supermarket, which is why (as I said) I don't buy that produce. I'll pay extra for fresh, organically produced fruits and vegetables at a farmer's market (farmer's markets have their own regulations regarding local production and small scale operation), but not at the supermarket.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

I buy organic every now and then, but I really don't care that much. If I have to worry about what might be in my food as well as the harmful effects of pollution, radiation from my microwave, and stress from working on a computer all day, I may as well seal myself in a padded cell now and be done with it.

I can understand people getting antsy about genetic modification, but I kind of think it's a sign we have life far too good if the idea of bigger and better vegetables is such a worry. I bet people in the Third World would be very happy at the prospect of crops which can grow in adverse conditions.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

Beth asked:

Do you try to buy organic produce? Do you worry about food additives? Do genetically engineered food crops worry you? Are you a vegetarian? If not, do you try to avoid meat that has been subjected to hormones or antibiotics? If you don't worry about these things, is it because you think your food is probably safe, or because (like me) you're just kind of lazy?

I don't worry about these things because if I stopped for a second to think about what harmful chemicals might be running through anything I was eating or drinking, or what ghastly processes it may have gone through to achieve its final form, I would never eat anything again. Whereupon I would, of course, eventually die of starvation. Don't like vegetables and am happy to keep chowing down on that delicious medium-cooked dead cow

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

I try not to worry too much about food, for the reasons that James mentioned.

But, has anyone else noticed how much better a lot of the organic/health food store stuff *tastes*? I buy all of my dairy products at the health food store just for this reason. The milk produced without steroids or antibiotics tastes like milk used to when I was a kid. The yogurt is much better - creamier and less bland. The free range eggs seem richer. Even the canned organic beans and tomatoes that I've tried are much more flavorful. The difference between chili made with the organic stuff and chili made with all regular grocery store stuff is amazing. I don't know about a significant health difference, but my taste buds say "YES!" to organic food.

I am more worried about cleaning chemicals. I've recently switched to all natural cleaning supplies. I had no idea how useful vinegar and baking soda could be. I don't even miss the soft scrub.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

To confirm something from 'way up at the top, a local news show in the Twin Cities went around to about a dozen local supermarkets and bought a bunch of organic & inorganic vegetables, then had them tested for residue. Results: zilch, for both types of vegetables. Throughout their shots of the testing process, they were playing interviews with local organic farmers, who were saying that of course the inorganic vegetables would show chemical residue; it can't help but be there because they spray it right onto the vegetables.

They then went back to those same farmers with the negative results and the farmers said, well, it's not so important what's in the food as what's in the soil, and that's what you really need to test...

We bought into an organic co-op one summer and got a couple boxes of vegetables a week. They also offered organic honey, and I asked if we could get a couple gallons so I could make some mead from it. They said sure, and the great thing is, it's not pasteurized!

Yippee, I thought. I went ahead and pasteurized it myself, thank you very much. I did wonder, though, what part of the pasteurization process renders it inorganic? It's not adding chemicals; all it's doing is killing bacteria, which you don't want in a food that's going to sit around at room temperature for months before you eat/drink it, right?

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

Angie wrote: "But, has anyone else noticed how much better a lot of the organic/health food store stuff *tastes*? "

Not much of it, but I have tried some of the fruit/veggies and a couple of dairy items. Most of the fruit/veggies look deformed, diseased, or otherwise less appealing than the commercial stuff (but yuck on most commercial tomatoes, even though they are prettier). However, the dairy stuff tasted like as_. Also, the fasination with soy amazes me. THAT is an aquired taste. For milk? ack ...

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

Beth wrote:

However, cover crops, crop rotation and crop diversification are practices that were abandoned outright for many years by traditional farmers in the wake of miracle pesticides, heavy machinery, and cheap chemical fertilizers.

Is there any evidence that this is the case? I know that my grandparents used all of these techniques, and they had a big, industrial farm. If these techniques improve soil quality, then why would industrial farms give them up, even with the advent of other powerful farming tools?

As for certification and organic guidelines, read the link I included in my last post. This a fairly typical exchange judging from articles and letters to editors I've read over the past couple of years.

It may be, but I don't think you can use posts to a message board to draw any conclusions about organic farmers in general. Those farmers who are more socially conscious are probably also more likely to speak out about them. You can't say whether these people represent 90%, 50% or 10% of all organic farmers based on their visibility.

I'll pay extra for fresh, organically produced fruits and vegetables at a farmer's market (farmer's markets have their own regulations regarding local production and small scale operation), but not at the supermarket.

Some farmer's markets may have such regulations, but most don't. In addition, I question what sort of oversight these farmer's markets have. I sort of doubt that a farmer's market has the resources to ensure that farming is being carried out in a certain way, and even if they did, it's a difficult sort of thing to truly oversee.

I suspect that's why the state laws are written the way they are. It's easy to inspect a farm once a year and make sure there are no cans of chemical pesticide sitting around. It would be much more difficult to monitor the frequency of pesticide application, the amount of pesticide used, and the prevalence of cover crops, crop rotation and crop diversification, especially since all of these things will be contingent upon the conditions from season to season.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

I didn't know that about the Watermelon.

I agree with Angie, though, for different reasons. When I eat organically, or with fresh food people (the organic advocates) have prepared & frozen or canned, I *feel* like I'm taking better care of myself – and I feel like it tastes better. More flavor, less bland....

Maybe I'm just buying into the whole marketing spiel, but if I causes me to think about what I put in my mouth, I'm better off in the long run - right?

Now I just have to kill my sweet tooth. Any suggestions for that?

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

Is there any evidence that this is the case? I know that my grandparents used all of these techniques, and they had a big, industrial farm. If these techniques improve soil quality, then why would industrial farms give them up, even with the advent of other powerful farming tools?

If your grandparents were doing those things in the 60's through the 80's, they were pretty unusual. I actually took two courses in college that included an overview of farming techniques and the environmental impact of modern farming; farmers genuinely believed for a time that all they needed was Dow Chemical.

To be fair, I think that depended on the location and the crops that were being raised. I know that out by my parents' home, which is big rice farming country, one farmer is creating a huge stir by planting a winter crop of soybeans and tilling his rice stubble under instead of burning it (not that they're allowed to burn anymore, anyway, but he was doing this before the new regs went into effect). The rice farmers are all amazed that he goes to all this trouble. I grew up with a rice farm 100 feet from my bedroom, and there was never a cover crop, never any crop rotation, no crop diversification. They sprayed on herbicides, sprayed on pesticides, sprayed on fertilizer (all from airplanes), burned the crop in the fall, disked the soil in the spring, and started all over again. I don't think the new farmer is certified organic -- it's really hard to use exclusively organic farming techniques if neighboring farms aren't doing the same. Nonetheless he is seen as some kind of hippy wacko, when he's just using smart methods that have been used for generations.

As for farmers' markets, you're wrong. In California, a certified farmers' market requires that the person who sells the food be the same person who grew it. You can't hire someone to hawk your vegetables; I believe a family member can do it, but the rules are there to encourage local production and small farming operations.

That doesn't mean the food is grown using organic methods, but it does mean that it's grown by a person, not a corporation, and you can ask that person what methods they use for raising their produce. Of course they can lie to you, but I've had sellers at farmers' markets tell me they used some pesticides or chemical fertilizers and why they did so, so at least some of them are honest.

Of course the major advantage to farmers' markets is that because they are necessarily local and small, they can sell better vegetables. Big commercial farms have to worry about how well the tomatoes will pack and how long they will keep on the shelves; small local producers can grow the varieties that actually taste good. Tomatoes are the best example of this trade-off, but there are also excellent varieties of squash that go soft after a day or two, so you can only buy them at farmers' markets.

Jarvis made a comment above about organically produced fruits and vegetables being ugly. There was a big environmental campaign in the 80's about "ugly fruit" and the number of pesticides that were used only for cosmetic purposes. I guess I'm just not terribly sympathetic to people who'd rather have their fruit sprayed with chemicals than deal with the occasional scab or chomp mark; I grew up on a farm and we grew our own food (not using organic methods, for what it's worth, but a lot of the fruits and vegetables were pretty ugly) and it's just not a form of squeamishness that I understand.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

Beth wrote:

As for farmers' markets, you're wrong. In California, a certified farmers' market requires that the person who sells the food be the same person who grew it.

Yes, but California is, to my knowledge, the only state which has such a requirement, and even within California, there are only a few hundred farmers' markets which are certified (this is according to the ), so I do think it's accurate to say that most farmers' markets do not adhere to these standards.

In addition, the law states that:

"Except as provided in subsection (g) below, certified producers may sell or offer to sell only their own agricultural products to consumers at a certified farmers' market. The certified producer's immediate family or employee(s) may also act for and sell the certified producer's agricultural products."

"(g) A certified farmers' market may allow a certified producer or his/her employee to sell for up to two other certified producers, provided the following provisions are specified in the certified farmers' market's rules and regulations:

"(1) The agricultural products shall be separated and identifiable by each certified producer's valid certificate at the point of sale."

"(2) The certified producer selling for other certified producers must also sell or offer for sale agricultural products which he/she has produced."

So basically, anyone can sell your produce at a farmer's market as long as they're your employee, and you can sell other farmers' products, too, as long as they're labeled as such and you're also selling something of your own.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

Arrrgh, screwed-up html tags. Sorry about that...

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000

I'm not overly concerned with the safety of the food I eat....because fundamentally I know that eating a bag of cheetos is going to be far worse than eating a tomato, modified or not (well, unless you're Lohr....).
I'm not too fond of genetically engineered food simply because I don't think there's been enough research done on it. While I know enough genetics and molecular biology (my undergrad degree's in biology) to know that we aren't going to spawn the 5' man-eating cabbage, there are plenty of unforeseen consequences when you start splicing and substituting strands of genes.
Definitely *not* a vegetarian...... I don't really go out of my way to avoid meat subjected to hormones and antibotics. If I avoid it, its more for incidental reasons; for example, I avoid McD's simply because I don't like it, the fact that the meat used has hormones et al. is incidental. I'm with Beth on this one, I'm just lazy about it....if if tastes good, I'll probably eat it.

-- Anonymous, July 13, 2000