Wake up and smell the compost. Today is Organic Monday, the day when foods free of pesticides, herbicides, et cetera, can stand up, green and proud with a brand new government seal of approval.
Organic food used to be fringe, grown by back-to-the-landers, and enjoyed by a few hippies and yuppies who didn’t mind paying more for slightly uglier, allegedly healthier foods, hold the genetic modifications, thanks very much. Today, organic food is an $11 billion industry, and theoretically, the new government regulations will move it ever more mainstream.
But now some of the movement’s founders say the whole point was that bigger is never better, and that unless organic food stays close to its roots, it’s lost.
Guests:
Eliot Coleman, owner of Four Season Farm in Harborside, ME
Kathleen Merrigan, Director of the Agriculture, Food and Environment Program at the Tufts University
and Jeff Stier, Associate Director of External Affairs, American Council on Science and Health.