We like to think they reduce costs, but we do not count the costs of spraying poisons across the land or eating pesticide residues in our food. It's because our foods are increasingly mechanized, industrialized, engineered, poisoned, and irradiated that organic foods are becoming popular. At present there are 6,600 certified organic farms in the United States, large and small, north and south, growing everything from grain to grapes. Doesn't sound like enough of a threat to mount a publicity campaign against it. But the organic food market has been growing at 20 percent per year in America, faster than that in Europe and Japan.
British supermarkets comb the world for organic produce.
Sainsbury's, a major U.K. grocery chain, has approached the governments of two Caribbean nations, Grenada and St. Lucia, to plant hundreds of acres of organic bananas, mangoes, coconut, and passion fruit, to be shipped exclusively to its stores. I have walked in a Central American banana plantation, where there were no visible living things other than people and bananas. I was cautioned not to touch the plants, not to pick up fallen fruit, to wash myself and my clothes thoroughly upon leaving, because of powerful sprays that were used on a weekly basis. This is the produce that Dennis Avery wants us to regard as healthy. After 10 years of planning, this set of rules for organic certification was announced on March 7 and will go into effect later this year.