John Michael: Eating Organic on Paleo

What’s the attraction to Paleo? Personal health. Where do we draw the line when creating our Paleo diets? If it’s just at eliminating grains, dairy, and processed foods, then we’ve taken a big step towards emulating an ancestral diet - but we’re not there yet. Before the 20^th Century’s Green Revolution, when synthetic fertilizers and pesticide-use became widespread, concern of industrial chemicals tainting fresh produce was, for the most part, non-existent. Nowadays, whether it’s contamination from the pesticides used to keep fruits and vegetables healthy, or from other chemicals employed during cultivation - or even environmental pollution from non-agricultural sources - that concern is ever-present. These contaminants can adversely affect human health: prenatal pesticide exposure alone has been connected to lower IQs in children.

In their 2008-2009 Annual Report, “Reducing Environmental Cancer Risk,” the President’s Cancer Panel advises citizens to lower their pesticide exposure. “Exposure to pesticides can be decreased by choosing,” the panel writes, “to the extent possible, food grown without pesticides or chemical fertilizers and washing conventionally grown produce to remove residues.” While this is an explicit warning to consumers, suggesting pesticides are quite harmful to human health, some believe that the term “foods grown without pesticides or chemical fertilizers” implicitly refers to organic foods.

What’s so great about organics? From the USDA Consumer Brochure: Organic Food Standards and Labels: The Facts, “Organic food is produced without using most conventional pesticides; fertilizers made with synthetic ingredients or sewage sludge; bioengineering; or ionizing radiation.” It’s probably the closest we’re going to get to the food our Paleolithic ancestors enjoyed. (You can tell if what you’re buying is organic by the seal it bears. It’s important to remember that, in general, if the food doesn’t have the seal, then it’s not organic.)

While organic foods are not pesticide-free, they are free of synthetic pesticide residues. Instead of synthetic chemicals, organic farmers protect their crops through a variety of strategies, like Integrated Pest Management (IPM), a precise approach to the control of crop-harming insects. In IPM, actions are taken against pests only when necessary, and only after carefully researching the pests in question. Pesticides, if used, are only employed as a last resort.

Additionally, organic agriculture has less of an impact on the environment, thus reducing the amount of environmental pollutants contaminating our food supply. According to the USDA National Organic Standards Board, “Organic agriculture is an ecological production management system that promotes and enhances biodiversity, biological cycles and soil biological activity. It is based on minimal use of off-farm inputs and on management practices that restore, maintain and enhance ecological harmony.” Which is important, since our food, being a product of the environment in which it’s grown, shares the condition of that environment. Simply put, a healthy environment generates healthy food, which leads to healthy people.

John Michael

John Michael: Pesticides in Foods

When you’re on Paleo, you eat a lot of fruits and vegetables. They make you feel great. They’re delicious. And there’s a wide variety from which to choose. At the end of each meal, you feel good, satisfied with your food, and with the knowledge that you’re eating healthy. But for myself, there’s always been a nagging thought: What about pesticide? 

I’d heard that pesticides were present in fruits and vegetables; the message that these residues were bad would pop up now and then on the radio, the nighttime news, and even once or twice at school. Additionally, I’d never really believed that washing my produce would eliminate the pesticides on it; I mean, fruits and vegetables are living things, with semi-permeable skins - of course they’re going to contain the chemicals they’d been sprayed with throughout their growth. 

So I decided to look into things. Here’s what I learned: According to WebMD, with regards to pesticides, “A rule of thumb is to avoid exposures that are a thousand times less than levels known to be toxic,” and, depressingly, “A 2009 study led by EPA researcher Devon Payne-Sturges found that about 40% of U.S. children have levels of one type of pesticide well above this 1,000-fold margin of exposure.” The Environmental Working Group, a toxic chemical watchdog, adds that “U.S. and international government agencies alike have linked pesticides to nervous system toxicity, cancer, hormone system disruption and IQ deficits among children.” An MSNBC article warns of the connection of pesticide exposure to the development of ADHD in children. There is even speculation that those who work with pesticides are more prone to developing dementia.

Then there are the worries that pesticides, having entered the food chain, will begin to show up elsewhere: ScienceDaily reports that farmed fish are being fed vegetable matter, causing the accumulation pesticides within them; additionally, Reuters reports that the active ingredient in Roundup, Monsanto’s popular herbicide, is present in significant levels in America’s air and water.

The news is disheartening, but not hopeless. There are guidelines we can follow to reduce the presence of pesticides in our foods. Washing produce with water can remove pesticides on the surface of fruits and vegetables. Peeling, if possible, can further reduce pesticide content, as well as cooking. By varying the produce we eat, we can reduce exposure to pesticide types. (Different chemicals are used on different fruits and veggies.) The Environmental Working Group publishes a list of the cleanest and dirtiest produce, allowing you to diminish your exposure by selecting cleaner vegetables and fruits. And, finally, you can reduce your pesticide intake by eating organic.

John Michael