And is there an Albert behind Albert's Organics?

But I guess there is the First Amendment to consider.  And no less important, advertisement is (or at least has been called) the "great American art form."

I applaud the direction you are going in, regarding undocumented immigrant farm-workers.  From your mouth to God's ear.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

I am ALL in favor of the little guy. I hate Wal-Mart, don't go into Whole Foods and shop at a local food co-op and am proud of it. When I remember on the right day, I go to the local weekly farmers market. I believe in eating locally produced foods as much as possible. I do all that because it's good for me and the planet and because I have a disposable income that allows me to do so.

But you know what? The folks that shop at Wal-Mart because it's cheap and that's what they can afford, they're the little guy too. And because what they can afford right now is generally twinkies and frozen dinners chock full of fat and sugar, they have a higher incidence of diabetes and weight problems then the rich people like me who read Grist do (we're all rich compared to most of the country and you know it). Those folks should be able to afford to eat organicly (healthy) too.

It's not a perfect world and I don't want my co-op to be overrun with organic tomoatoes from Chile since being shipped by massive boats spewing diesel hardly conforms to my idea of organic or my politcial ideals. But you guys, the price of organics has to come down. If not for my pocketbook (which is hardly bottomless) but for the health of the industry in the long term. And if the little, local guy can't do that, you've got to find another reason to charge the prices you feel you deserve and convince me and all the other people like me to do so.

Your bottom line isn't going to do it for me, since I need to look out for mine at some point.

www.charlesredell.com www.tripletake.org

    This is a great post, and the responses, particularly axis42 point to the current American dilemma.

    On the one hand, we have organic farmers who need to charge high prices to be able to pay for the intense labor needed to produce their goods.  (Even though that labor is poorly paid, and it is not clear how much they would have to charge to pay a decent wage with benefits.)

    On the other hand, we have workers who can't afford the high prices that organic farmers need to charge, so are forced to seek lower prices at retailers who will drive the market price of food lower by delivering it from places that can produce it cheaper still.

    We need to be clear on what happened.  For the last 30+ years, both major parties have tended rightward (towards favoring large corporations at the expense of the small workers and farmers).  

      This means that two things happened without much of a squawk from the American public.  One, manufacturing moved to other countries.  Two, service jobs were eliminated primarily through a massive wave of mergers (not outsourcing) between large corporations.

    So, the rich get richer, and the rest suffer from lower real wages.  The rise in housing prices has covered this up somewhat by making people real estate rich, even though they are income poor.

    (None of which addresses the fairly miserable plight of farmworkers (and I am not picking on Tom personally here, I have not reason to believe he treats his workers poorly, it's not the individual, it's the system!)).

    Isn't this just the free market at work?  Actually, not.  As Tom points out, the two large corporations that dominate the market "fix" the prices through their size.  (One of the reasons progressives have traditionally opposed monopolies).

    Ironically, despite Tom's complaints about cheap food shipped from overseas, the farmers in those countries face the same dilemma he does.  Their prices are set not through a true market, but are forced on them by the same monopolies that force prices on Tom.

    The basic problem is not really globalization, but rather monopolization.  

    Monopolies are able to fix not only prices (Tom) but wages (axis42) so that the wealth always stays at the top (them).

    They have been remarkably successful at convincing Americans that this is just the way things are, and that this is somehow a fair and just system.  

    If we buy into that, Tom can watch his profits disappear (eventually ConAg or someone will buy his farm), and Axis42 can keep shopping at Walmart.

    The alternative would be to have different values, values that seek to give everyone a good life (this is where we bring the farm workers back into the equation!).

    It would mean rejecting the myth of the free market (what I call the manipulated market).

    There are tendencies in this direct with the living wage movement, but they are local, and don't really touch the global giants that cause most of the problems.  Nor do they address the ability of monopolies to manipulate prices and wages sheerly due to their size.

    At one time, there were farmer-worker alliances in this country that worked against monopolies.  We've lost that perspective.

    Things will not change unless we regain it.

patrick

This isn't an issue of big organic v. small organic, local organic v. imported organic, small retailers and wholesalers v. large / corporate players.

We have to start from the assumption that the entire  food / agriculture production system (from the perspective of the small, mid-sized players) is screwed, and it's going to take a LOT of work, from all sectors (including not only enlightened individuals at corporations and enlightened corporations, but also a tremendous amount of creativity and flexibility from the farming community) to develop and implement a vision that will meet many (and often conflicting) needs.

/ Michael Straus
Michael@StrausCom.com

• Straus Communications
  
• Beyond Organic Radio
  

Besides supporting sustainable farmers we each need to bring new people into this discussion- we need to do more than grow healthier food, we need to grow the movement!

CarlF

In response to axis42, one of the reasons that organic food is so much more "expensive" than conventionally grown food is that conventional food prices are completely artificial; driven by "market" forces and with absolutely no relationship to how much it costs to produce the food, how much it costs to ship it to it's final destination, etc.  All Americans "pay" a portion of conventional food prices when we pay our taxes, which (in part) go to support billions of dollars worth of farm subsidies. Unfortunately, when buying organic and/or local, we are screwed because we pay the full worth of non-subsidized food, while also paying the conventional food subsidies.  This system is unfair and it sucks - but what are our choices?  We could abandon organic/local food, and opt for the "cheap" conventionally produced food.  Of course, we would also abandon taste, freshness, supporting our local economy and keeping damaging chemicals out of our soil, water and air.  We can choose to pay the price for organic/local, knowing that we are also subsidizing conventional agriculture and accept with Taoist serenity that it is simply "the way things are."  Or, we can advocate and agitate to change the system.

To MooreHavenGardens, I think it is wonderful that your customers are educated enough to distinguish between fresh, local produce and organic that has been shipped from Chile.  I would imagine that a produce manager who loves his or her job would be just that type of discriminating customer. However, you may be over-estimating the knowledge and the palate of the average consumer.  Give people a real tomato - fresh, local, organic, heirloom, plum or cherry... fresh from the farm and quite literally bursting with flavor, and they are truly amazed. Same with lettuce, cucumber, peppers, squash.  People are thrilled and come back for seconds, thirds.  But do they then seek out such local farms?  Do they hear me when I tell them it is not my skill as a chef, but the farmer's skill that ensures the taste?  Quite rarely, unfortunately.  They go back to the supermarket closest & most convenient to their house (apt, condo, etc), back to tasteless watery pink tomatoes. lettuce like soggy tissue paper, potatoes that taste like they come from a box.

Convenience is a key thing.  Habit is another. Price is yet another.  All of these factors will overwhelm the "fresh is best" argument for most, if not all, consumers, unless we start factoring in the real costs of shipping food thousands of miles.

And fund university research into labor saving, water saving, organically fertilized ways to farm.  Even on large fields, with renewable energy powered electric robots instead of diesel tractors.

A small produce operation of a few acres could be manually weeded, planted, fertilized, watered, and harvested with one person and run PC connected robot, of the right design.  

In a mass production effort, all of agriculture could be unchemicalized and still remain every bit as productive.  And organic soil, built up with carbon storing, CO 2 removing organic matter, year after year helps stave off global climate disaster.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin

I think it's unfair to lump Whole Foods with Wal-Mart, since Wal-Mart is, in environmental circles, the equivalent of Darth Vader.

Whole Foods is at least making an attempt to mitigate the big problem Philpott is talking about:  they've started a new local foods initiative.  You can read a fairly nuanced discussion of it here:
http://www.reclaimdemocracy.org/articles/2006/whole_foods...

On the home page today is an article by Auden Schendler called "Coming Clean," in which he asks people not to castigate those businesses who have good intentions and are making a difference, but aren't 100% there yet.  That's exactly what Whole Foods is doing in terms of Philpott's commoditization of food--getting there.  And castigating a business that's getting there is exactly what Philpott is doing to Whole Foods by placing it next to Wal-Mart, a national whipping-boy for corporate evil.

And not to defend corporate evil, but I'd like to add to the point made above about making organic affordable to lower socioeconomic classes.  What about simple availability?  Wal-Mart is a fact of life in rural Texas where organic food has mostly been absent from the radar.  That's just an example from close to home.

Bienvenue, Christa, and thanks for the research.

You are absolutely right that Whole Foods and Wal-Mart do not belong in the same ethical category at all.  And I think Tom is expecting most of us to know that already.  Or, I hope so.  

Anyway, I know we Gristmill writers and readers have talked about Michael Pollan's book, and other contributions, in the recent past.  So I suspect many of us know he has some serious misgivings about Wal-Mart going with selling organics, but has had a productive discourse with Whole Foods on the basis of his criticism.  Your "not 100%" seems to represent his position.  Of course, 0.005% is not 100%, and is far from it.  But, rhetorically, you have the positive slant on your side -- i.e., "not 100%" means "oh, let's say, 90%" -- , so I agree with you, and expect that Michael Pollan himself more or less agrees with you too.

On "lower socioeconomic classes": Pricing is a hugely important issue, which has not been addressed adequately in Grist thus far.  The latest Grist wisdom seems to be: "We want to support organic growers and local growers; but, given their circumstances, they cannot help but charge non-competitive prices; and so they sell less and less; and so they will die out and fade away."  And write up their memoirs, as farmers of great virtue and zero profit.

So tell us, dear Christa, something encouraging.  We have this class gap in this country, at the same time as we have this quality-of-food gap.  But the producers at the high-end of the quality-of-food gap feel a terrific responsibility for the folks toward the low end of the class gap.  So how in the world do we build a serviceable bridge?

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

The issue is a combination of things such as advertizing, media, and misunderstanding what the actual cost of shopping there is.  For example, Walmart depends on those who think that they are getting the best prices because the shoppers buy everything at Walmart whether it is something they need or not - they buy because it appears to be cheap.  As a consequence they spend more, stay poor, eat bad food, and fill up their houses with junk they do not need and seldom use.

Box stores like Walmart take everything out of a community and put nothing in - although they would have you think they support local people - another way they scam trusting shoppers.  We have somehow allowed an entire generation - nearly two to become uneducated (even those who have a college degree are often truly uneducated)with no skills to understand what they should have learned when they were in school and college.  Their educator is television, movies, and "reality" news.  

If people truly were aware of what is in the food they eat, most would change immediately.  Food appears to be so cheap, that it is "cheaper" to go to "fast food" family resturants who purchase prepared products from the ubiquitous Sysco Systems.  If they calculated what they spend on going out all the time, organic food would seem like a bargain.

I have approximately 100 students a semester and encourage them to get an education AND a degree. Quite often I see students after they completed classes with me and they often remark that they learned more in my class than in any other they took anywhere!

It is so sad that true learning cannot happen in the classroom, that people have few real life skills, that they believe everything they see on television, that they never save money and instead shop Walmart because they think they cannot afford to shop elsewhere.  They are the true consumer who willingly turns over their hard earned dollar into the pockets of the multinational corporations who have been given the license to steal by our government.  

Someone who always wanted to make a positive difference locally and has!

        You make some good points about the real cost of food and the flaws in our educational system.  The problems is, how many more students a semester can you handle? (smile).  Seriously.  It is part of the problem that most poor people don't have good access to the information you are providing.  It would be nice if there was a television channel that carried this kind of information, but there isn't.

       The problem of dissemination of available knowledge and information is a serious one.  I don't honestly have many ideas, but would welcome yours.

       There are two issues with places like Wal-mart.  One is shopping by working class folks, who fit into the category Jean is talking about.  The other is the real poor (say the bottom 20%) who don't even have access to Wal-marts, and shop in expensive inner-city markets (I am leaving out the rural poor here, I know).

       These groups face different issues in terms of their access to high quality, reasonably priced foods.

       How can we communicate with and improve access to information, as well as access to the good food for these folks?

patrick

Now, it is important to know that food shopping is not a light affair in my life. In fact, shopping in general is about more than spending money. I look at every single thing I buy and wonder if I need it enough (or want it enough) to justify the additons to the waste stream. I notice also, the other people around me and how easily they consume without regard for the planet (or so it seems to me). So, when I go shopping, I am aware of my impact already.

Anyway, yesterday when I walked into the local Trader Joe's where they have pretty good quality staples for lower prices (because, unfortunately, I can not shop exclusively at my local co-op... it is just too expensive for me to do that) I looked even more closely at the packaging, the quality of the food and, more importantly at the origin of it all.

Then I went to the co-op, a block away, and shopped for the things I have to get there (produce for sure and bulk items) and looked at the same things... I noticed that there are a lot more local choices there (obviously) but, unfortunately, most of those local choices are much more expensive than the larger scale organics (and I am talking everything from porduce to ice cream to cheese to beer). It occurs to me that if we are really wanting to force the market to provide for us in a fair way (based on economics) we should support locally grown and produced goods. And yet you all contend that simmply buying local isn't going to do it.

Well what can I do then to make locally produced goods affordable for all because, dam it, rich white people like me are not the only ones who should have access to these goods, no matter how hard it is for small farmers to stay afloat. If not for their health, then for the health of the planet, because there are a lot more poor, folks at Wal-Mart than there are of you and me. And giving them the chance to eat well and locally will help the planet a heck of a lot more than if just you and me do it. no?

www.charlesredell.com www.tripletake.org

         You've hit it right on the head.  Unless our solutions can reach many more people than the few, the well off, the white connected to the internet (at our fingertips) mostly males, we aren't going to save the planet.

         And in America, if we propose solutions that are affordable to only a few, we are talking about solutions that make those few feel good, but don't save the planet.

         So, is our goal to let the planet die but we feel okay, or is it to really, really save the damn thing?

patrick

OK, enough singing. I'm scaring the guy down the hall.

MooreHaven, you said:

oh, and you think the general population is ignorant of the issues.....
  Let's take the last one first - Wrong!!! The general public would have to have been kept in solitary confinement for all of their adult life not to have some basic knowledge on the subject of organics and health. That debate is over, it's topic has saturated every media outlet for a few years now. That line of thinking tends to lend itself more to the "educated elites" who think the rest of us are just a little bit too country to know what's best for us.

I find this a bit unfair.  Firstly, I did not see anyone make the statement "if only those dumb hicks would learn that they need to eat organic."  I think your assumption that the "educated elite" are the ones who buy organic and think that the rest of the country are too stupid to know that organic is good for you is elitist in and of itself.  In the comment I made earlier, the people I refer to who, even after marveling at the wonderful taste of a fresh, local tomato, go back to their local produce store and buy tasteless, mass-produced produce from all the world, are, arguably, the "educated elites."  These are upper middle-class white folk, most with quite high levels of education.  They admit that organic is "probably better for them," and they fully enjoy the flavor of local organic produce when I serve it in my home, but they go back to their old, easy habits of buying conventional food at the most convenient grocery store.  That was my point - even people who are fairly convinced that organic is better for their bodies, and better for the planet, are not necessarily buying organic because of the expense and/or inconvenience of doing so.

The general public may well believe that organic food is more healthy; but this does not necessarily change behavior.  The general public knows that smoking causes cancer, and will likely end up killing you and/or your loved ones, but this does not necessarily stop smoking.

You also said:

The point is, organics don't have to cost more, they cost more because the consumer is willing to let them cost more.

I find this difficult to believe.  Granted, I'm not a farmer, and really, couldn't be farther from one... I can't even manage to keep basil alive.  However, there are several farmers and food writers whose comments I respect and who have noted the higher expense of organic farming; mainly related to human-labor hours of weeding, pest control, etc., as compared to the chemical management of same. In addition, as I noted above, current food prices for conventionally grown food are artificially low given the farm subsidies paid by our government.  Given these two facts, I do not see how organic could possibly be priced on a level with current conventional produce and allow a small farm to produce without actually losing money.

And the reason they tend to be overpriced is because the guy gowing them wants what his 9 to 5, factory-working cousin has; the nice toys, the upwardly mobil lifestyle, a paid vacation, the "better" things in life.

Well, I am a city girl after all, because I don't really see what is wrong with wanting some of the 'better' things in life. The way I see it, the organic farmer is providing a service to me and to the planet;  producing food that requires more manual labor, yet sparing the earth, and us her inhabitants, chemical pollution. Therefore, if the organic farmer gets to drive a nicer tractor, take a vacation, splurge on the latest solar panels for the barn... hell, I'm all for it. Unfortunately, I would guess reality is somewhat far from this... the small farmers I buy from seem to be happy people, in that they are doing what they love, but I tend to see rusted out Ford pickups in the drive, not shiny new SUVs, an old rowboat maybe, not a Skidoo, Wal-Mart flip flops not Manolo Blahniks.  

Kaela

1.  i am a non-white, non-rich proponent of eating local organic food.  i'll pay whatever i have to pay for it;  my mantra is--pay the organic farmer, or pay the medical/pharmaceutical/insurance industry--take our pick.  i'll pay the organic farmer.

2.  however, i won't pay walmart.  i'll starve first or eat grass.  walmart is the devil, as is any corporate engagement in organic farming.  once corporations get into the mix, there's not telling what will happen to the food.  actually, several have made very valid comments.  i particularly like the possibility that local grown will become the 'organic standard' as organics will become as rotten as conventionally grown produce.

3.  who in their right mind could trust walmart to sell true, fresh anything.  walmart in the organic food game only means they will figure out a way to sell sludge grown veggies with an organic label on them.  if you haven't seen the walmart movie, before you buy organics from walmart, watch it.  (can be purchased at www.wakeupwalmart.com.  if after watching that movie you could possibly stomach eating anything walmart sells, well, ok--those beaten women in bangladesh are a damn far ways away, aren't they?  

4.  the whole point of buying organic for me was the buy clean food, hopefully locally grown, but not grown in sludge, chemicals, etc.  from small farmers who cared about their products and the people who would eat them.  there's no way, it's not in the corporate model, for agribusiness to produce such a crop.  if they could do it, the small organic farmer would have never existed in the first place.

5.  lord, what am i gonna eat now?  guess if i want clean food, i'll have to grow it myself!  wow, there's a thought!  what if everyone just grew their own veggies and most of their fruit.  recycled their distilled water, composted their own soil, grew the cleanest food possible, indoors even.  now that sounds like a labor intensive, expensive, but fool-proof way to keep agribusiness from taking over the clean food (or local organic) market.  

  Dear Narcysus,

      Everyone doesn't possess the money, resources or knowledge to grow their own food. (smile).  But if you wish, you will go ahead.  Enjoy it.

      If Wal-mart buys organic food internationally, a fair amount of it will come from small farmers.  Large corporate farming is not the only farming model in the world.

      Sorry, I haven't seen the Wal-mart movie, it's not available here yet, and I can't afford a copy.  (Developing nation income and all that.)

      As to Wal-mart being the devil, I don't believe in devils nor gods.  

        I have a number of complaints against Wal-mart, mainly labor, sourcing and wages (smile).  But wish them to be as green as possible, since they are not going away any time soon.

      We need to praise the good behaviour (to encourage more) and criticize the bad.  We need the change now.

patrick

Many progressives continue to hail the global trade in agricultural goods as a way for "Third World" farmers to "pull themselves out of poverty." Meanwhile, global commodity prices continue their inexorable downward trend, pressured in part by the consolidation of buyers as represented by Wal-Mart's rapid growth.

Victual Reality

        Maybe I am wrong?  People keep saying Wal-mart is buying organic in China (at least that is what I read here from you).  As far as I know, the farms in China are generally small and thus non-industrial.  I have never seen anything to indicate otherwise.

        Maybe people are just saying Wal-mart buys from China because they know people are prejudiced against China, and are throwing it in to take advantage of that prejudice.  

        I doubt Wal-mart buys direct from small farms, but the middlemen it uses would be doing so.

        A web search doesn't turn up much about Wal-mart buying international foods such as organics.  Here is what I found.

http://www.tdctrade.com/alert/cba-e0307h.htm

A general article, no real details.

        Ironically, Wal-mart watch quotes your article above.

        Here is a useful article from 2003 (not that long ago as things move slowly).

http://www.ers.usda.gov/Amberwaves/June03/Features/Chinas...

        It says that the average farm size in China is 1.6 acres.  What I would call a small farm.  Not an industrial farm.

        Ironically, America (that's us, me and you , Tom) is trying to pressure China into allowing more private ownership of land.  This would allow consolidation of small farms and the farm industrialization you speak of.  

       Perhaps you should call for the abolition of private property!

       So far (as I have read), the Chinese government has resisted the calls for private property and so the farms remain small.

       If I am wrong, please tell me.  

patrick

   Controlling Wal-mart and making it behave must begin not in the producing countries, but in it's home, the United States.

   Saying that because Americans won't control their companies, then poor nations should not have access to their markets is disgenuous to say the least.

   Wal-mart is the largest player in the United States because of the people of the United States.  It is not the only player in the world.

   Poor nations have historically had three ways up out of poverty.  First, sell resources.  This is the favored way of rich nations, since it allows them better control over jobs and prices.  It has done very little to fight poverty.  (An exception is the current regime in Venezuela which is trying to fight poverty, but it is an anamoly historically.)

   Secondly, agriculture, which allows them to use their labor to produce suplus and get money back from well off countries to build schools, hospitals and the like.  This is better in some ways, because it involves more people and some of the wealth is spread around.  It is hardly perfect, since often farm workers are treated poorly (like they are in rich countries) in poor countries.

   Finely, there are manufactured goods.  As people sell more, they move up the ladder economically and go from producing cheaper goods to more expensive ones.

   Are there other models of development?  Maybe.  So far, most of the American environmentalists seem to be mainly concerned about a model that freezes their wealth in place and says to the poor, sorry, you have to stay poor.

   I will support any model that can eliminate poverty for as many people as possible.  One of the interesting things is that in recent years, it  is the policies of Communist China that have done the most to eliminate poverty, not the policies of the Capitalist West.

   (Based on UN statistics).

   My challenge to environmentalists is to find a way to eliminate poverty as part of protecting the environment.  Not only because it is just, but because nothing else is likely to succeed in doing either.

patrick

This development includes low-income housing AND a neighborhood organic garden.  I want to live here!  Somebody build one of these in Austin!

This is exactly the kind of solution we're looking for, I think, and I find it encouraging.

While I was reading this article, I was reminded of another article I read 5 years ago in "Conscious Choice" Magazine. I hunted for and found it. Written by another organic farmer, I think you will find it interesting, as well. You can find it at http://www.consciouschoice.com/2001/cc1410/organicmatters....

Reading that article was the first time I realized that "big/non-local organic" is very different from "small/local organic."

My website http://www.honestmedicine.typepad.com, contains some interesting postings (and one audio) addressing this topic. The audio is my interview with nutritionist, Dr. Elizabeth Lipski, in which she talks about this very topic, and comes to the conclusion that she would recommend locally grown produce, even if it is not labeled organic, because the organic label costs so much to obtain, and small organic farmers cannot always afford to pay for the label! To access her interview, please click on "PODCASTS/INTERVIEWS" on the right side of the page. Dr. Lipski makes her points extremely eloquently.

And, on the left side of my site, under "letters to editors and corporate executives" is the letter Dr. Lipski wrote to the President of WalMart, discussing all her concerns about "cheap organic." I am not sure if this letter was ever answered.

I hope you enjoy listening to the interview, and reading Dr. Lipski's letter to the editor.

"Grist" is amazing. Keep up the great work!

Thanks so much.
Julia Schopick
http://www.honestmedicine.typepad.com