Reasons to go organic! 

Organic food is on the rise, which sounds silly to say, because there was a time when organic food was just, well, food. Before the over use of pesticides, herbicides, fertilisers, antibiotics and growth hormones, food was grown and farmed with the help of some well seasoned manure, good soil, a few tricks of the trade and little else. 

Thankfully, due to food movements like Clean Eating and Raw Foodism, initiatives from the Soil Association and tv shows highlighting exactly what is in our food, there is an increasing awareness and popularity of the benefits of farming, buying and eating organic. The benefits not only have a positive impact on your health, but are better for wildlife, the global environment and ecosystem, our local soils, the nutritional value of what we eat, and of course, the taste! 

Check out below all the reasons going organic can benefit you, your health and the planet! 

You are what you eat

• Choosing organic is an easy way to avoid pesticides, herbicides and many additives and preservatives

• Organic standards prohibit GM crops and GM animal feed 

• Organic, free range farming bans the routine use of antibiotics and drugs on animals

Pesticides

• Organic food and farming uses virtually no pesticides

• Pesticides can remain in the food we eat after cooking and washing

• Pesticides can pollute water, the environment and the human body

• Weed killers are banned on organic farms

Nutrition

• Organic farming affects the quality of the food we eat

• There is a higher level of Omega 3 in organic milk and meat due to grass fed animals

Animal Welfare

• Organic farming has the highest standard of animal welfare - including free range, living conditions, food quality, transport and slaughter

• Animals are raised without the routine use of antibiotics 

• Animals are raised in conditions that suit their natural behaviour and are fed a mainly organic diet

Wildlife

• Intensive farming practices are responsible for the decline and possible extinction of wildlife species

• Fungicides and herbicides are damaging to wildlife

• Organic farmland supports more wildlife than non organic by producing less CO2 and dangerous waste 

• Organic farms are havens for wildlife and provide homes for bees, birds and butterflies. On average, plant, insect and bird life is 50% more abundant on organic farms

Environment and climate change

• Organic means working more with nature, not against it, minimising disruption to the natural environment

• Organic farming takes account of local and regional balances and encourages the use of on-site resources

• Organic farming enhances soil life, natural soil fertility and water quality

• Organic farming can help combat climate change and reduce pollution through its ban on chemical pesticides which release harmful greenhouse gases. Instead there is a reliance on healthy fertile soil and crop diversity

• If all UK farmland was converted to organic farming, at least 1.3 million tonnes of carbon would be taken up by the soil each year – the equivalent of taking nearly 1 million cars off the road

• If half of all farming in the European Union converted to organic by 2030, we could cut almost a quarter (23%) of the EU’s greenhouse gas emissions 

Soil

• Organic farms have healthier soils, building soil fertility naturally with the use of compost and clover

• Soils store more carbon than the atmosphere and all of the world’s plants and forests combined, which means that soil is one of our most important weapons in the fight against climate change

• It takes a hundred years for just one or two centimetres of topsoil to form, and soil that is lost to pollution or erosion will need hundreds or even thousands of years to recover on its own

• Over the last 40 years almost a third of the world’s arable soils have been lost to erosion or pollution

• Organic agriculture helps reduce our dependence on mined phosphate, a non-renewable resource that is becoming increasingly scarce and expensive