Eco Child’s Play

“Papa, dis food is o-ganic?”

Whoa…

My three year old knows how to ask about her food. Very cool.

She doesn’t truly understand what we mean when we say organic, or organically grown, but she knows that to our family, there is a distinction.

If there’s a choice, we go for the organic. Even better is locally grown. The farmers market is one of our primary food sources, we have a share in a CSA, and the rest we get at our local co-op.

We might pay more, but we’re OK with that. Here’s why:

• » Read more on Food and Recipes

• The pesticides and herbicides used in conventional farming are too new to be declared safe.

The results aren’t in. Most of the chemicals and fertilizers in use now were introduced after WW II, during the industrialization of farming. We don’t know yet what the effects are on humans, because there’s been only three generations since then. And our health isn’t getting better.

• Everything flows downstream.

Clean water is probably our most valuable resource. We can’t live without it. We can’t grow food without it. Nearly every substance applied to the plants or the soil ends up in the water, either in the water table or in rivers and lakes. Not good. Again, we don’t fully know the effects. Supporting organic agriculture helps keep some of that contamination at bay.

• Our kids deserve the best.

We are what we eat. I believe in the superior quality of organically grown food. I think it tastes better, and I think it’s better for us and the environment. I want my children to have the best. They can eat junk when they grow up.

• Buying direct from an organic farmer is a vote for clean food.

I overheard someone at the farmers market complaining about prices. She wanted high quality freshly picked produce, but wasn’t willing to pay what the grower needed to charge to make a living.  The relationship that we have with our favorite growers is one built on trust. We trust them to feed us with clean food. We trust them to steward the soil and the water. Why shouldn’t they get a living wage?

• Buying organic food is our health insurance.

I don’t have insurance. Even if we could afford it, I wouldn’t buy health insurance. I’d rather insure my family’s health by giving them the best (see above). We believe that good health comes from being active and eating nutritious food. The rest is up to nature.

Choosing organic doesn’t have to break your budget. We don’t eat out very often, because we know that we can make a better meal at home for less money, and we have more control over the content of our food. It will always be cheaper to prepare your own meals. We buy in bulk and we buy in season. We garden. We buy seconds at the market.

Good food is a high priority for us.

We choose organic.

Related posts about organic food:

• Budget Stretching Advice for Organic Foods
• Four More Ways to Buy Organic Without Breaking The Budget
• Food Additives Suck!

Image: ILoveButter on Flickr under Creative Commons License

You might also like:

New Study: Kids Prefer Vegetables Over Candy

Holiday Recipes: Auntie Andy’s Canadian Maple Applesauce

Vegan Thanksgiving Holiday Recipes: Organic Homemade Cranberry Sauce

World Diabetes Day and a Moment of Outrage: Pfuck Phiser?