Is Organic Produce Better?

A lot of us are concerned about what’s in our foods these days, and doing our best to avoid added chemicals and pesticides. The idea of eating only organic food is great – these products must be healthier, cleaner and better for us, right?

Well there’s a few factors worth exploring in helping to decide whether its worth spending the extra money on organic produce. How do products get that “organic” label, is there actually evidence of harm to our health from consuming non-organic produce, and are organic foods more nutritious?

What kind of regulations surround Organic labels?

Foremost, it’s important to note that the ‘organic’ certification is meant to inform consumers a product was grown through environmentally-friendly means, and is not inferring any type of health benefit from the food. In Ontario, third party bodies are responsible for inspection and ultimate approval of farms that want to claim their produce as organic. They follow the ‘Canadian Organic Standards’ laid out by the federal government, which outline the requirements for growing and processing, as well as allowable pesticides and herbicides (Yup, organic products are still grown with certain pesticides/herbicides – just nothing synthetic, and ones with negligable toxicity). The standards also include a disclaimer:

"Organic practices and this standard cannot assure that organic products are entirely free of residues of substances prohibited by this standard and of other contaminants, since exposure to such compounds from the atmosphere, soil, ground water and other sources may be beyond the control of the operator. “

While organic certification has become more tightly regulated than previously, due to the nature of farming and the whole process of growing to transportation to storage, it is near impossible to guarantee that organically labelled veggies and fruits you purchase from the grocery store are completely free of pesticides.

Should we be worried about exposure to pesticide from non-organic produce?

It’s near impossible to avoid being exposed to not only pesticides, but other chemicals in our environment as well – they are everywhere. However, we don’t actually have strong research showing a clear correlation between an average person’s exposure to pesticides and poor health outcomes or disease. Many pesticides have evidence of being neurotoxic and harmful, but most of this information comes from animal studies where they are exposed to LARGE amounts of the chemicals at once, not necessarily representative of what we are exposed to from our fruits and veggies – especially when well washed. Our bodies are built to deal with toxins (of course to a certain limit); your liver and kidneys function to bind up harmful chemicals we ingest, and send them out in our pee. If you are an otherwise healthy individual, your body should be able to handle these things. We can also make changes to reduce our toxin exposure from other sources – choosing natural cleaning products, drinking filtered water, avoiding plastics, regularly changing air filters in our homes, etc. Pesticide exposure is absolutely something to be mindul of, and more research may come out in the future, but for now the best is to minimize exposure where you can, and work at staying healthy in general so your body is well equipped to handle what you can’t avoid.

Is organic produce more nutritious?

Various studies have compared organic with non-organic produce in terms of the quantity of vitamins, minerals and protein. Some have shown that certain organic vegetables and fruit may be higher in certain vitamins or minerals or have a higher quality protein, but the results are quite mixed. The nutrient content of produce is also heavily tied to the soil quality and the environmental conditions it is grown in, so it is tricky to unravel whether organic growing processes are able to produce more nutrient-rich produce. With regards to looking at the overall health benefits from eating organic, we are lacking in long-term studies to help delineate if eating organic is associated with a reduced risk of disease. There are a few short-term studies, but most have failed to be able to show a strong difference in health outcomes between those who regularly consume organic products only, and those who rarely do. The jury is still out whether or not eating organic has specific health benefits, beyond that of a healthy (non-organic) diet!

The bottom-line: If organic produce is beyond your spending limits, don’t sweat it! We have ample research to support the endless health benefits of eating a large variety of fruits and vegetables, organic or not. It’s much more important that we are all consuming lots of fruits and veggies daily, and not letting the cost of organic produce reduce our intake. By taking the time to wash your produce thoroughly, you are reducing your exposure to pesticides that are potentially harmful. If you are going to spend a bit more on organic products – use the Environmental Working Groups “Dirty Dozen” + “Clean Fifteen” lists, so you’re putting your money where it’s worth it. And if you do have the ability to buy only organic, local produce, by all means go for it! It’s wonderful for our planet, and hopefully will help encourage more organic growing – reducing costs, and making it more accessible to us all in the future.

For a breakdown of the best ways to wash your fruits and veggies – check out this article by Dr. Michael Greger: https://nutritionfacts.org/2017/04/20/the-best-way-to-wash-fruit-and-vegetables/

Link to the EWG’s Dirty Dozen: https://www.ewg.org/foodnews/dirty-dozen.php

Link to the EWG’s Clean Fifteen: https://www.ewg.org/foodnews/clean-fifteen.php

Feel free to comment with any questions or ideas you may have around eating organic!