Chapter Nine: Big Organic

1. SUPERMARKET PASTORAL

What makes this
TV dinner organic?

"Cage free," "humanely raised," "free range," "ultra pasteurized," "certified organic" "free from unnecessary fear and distress." These terms are just a few of the many seen on supermarket shelves these days, no wonder it is so confusing to shop these days. Yet, somehow price is the main think consumers take away from a product. And yet, the organic industry is now the fastest growing sector of the food economy--and it's worth $11 billion! So what is organic? Is it a farm like Joel's? Or just another industrial food plant with a new name? And how do you marry the pastoral ideas of past farming and the industrialization needed for profit? Maybe these questions all lead up to Pollan's conclusion that "organic" doesn't necessarily mean, well, organic. It is the industrial beast--the "organic empire." Some organic milk comes from factory farms (no grass or space) and is ultra pasturized so it can travel hundreds of miles to reach a consumer. That certainly doesn't seem organic. And neither do some of the "organic" TV dinners, which contain synthetic food additives, among other things. And Rosie the chicken? She sure doesn't live on any farm like Joel's.

2. FROM PEOPLE'S PARK TO PETALUMA POULTRY
Born April 20, 1969 was People's Park: a vacant University of California lot seized by the Robin Hood Commission and turned into a garden. These "agrarian reformers" wanted to grow their own uncontaminated food--they were influenced by 17th century England Diggers--and it was going to be organic. This movement brought attention also to the Organic Gardening and Farming magazine. And so the countercuisine, the "anti-white bread" and the anticaptitalist food co-ops all began.

A leader in Supermarket Pastoral.

Perhaps two of the greatest influences to the organic movement were Gene Kahn, founder of the Cascadian Farm, and Sir Albert Howard, an agronomist. Their thinking, of going back to the land and being chemical free (that means N-P-K fertilizer (but what about humus, the organic material created by the dead as equally as the living that is in the healthiest of soil?) as well as pesticides) is the reason we have organic food today. They stated that we should once again reverse our way of thinking: from simple quantities back to complex qualities; from chemistry back to biology; from monoculture back to polyculture.
And yet, Cascadian Farms was eventually sold out to Welch's and General Mills. And Big Organic fought Little Organic. As the definition of organic was being questioned by the USDA, so was the prospect of a real organic industry. And so we get: "Supermarket Pastoral."

A farm stand turned
organic-industrial giant.

3. DOWN ON THE INDUSTRIAL ORGANIC FARM
...And yet for every organic acre is an acre free from pesticides and harsh chemicals.
The view Pollan took on an organic farm was a small, family farm. That is, until he visited California. In fact, except for the containers of chemicals, organic farms look exactly like any other conventional industrial farm (many conventional megafarms own these large organic farms). One of these farms was Greenways Organic; then Earthbound followed. "Inputs and outputs: a much greener machine, but a machine nevertheless." Crop rotation and diversification take the place of chemical fertilizers and pest controls--the way nature (sort of) intended. This is still a problem in large organic companies: and let's face it, supermarkets want to buy from large farms that can steadily produce a lot. And that's why small farm stand businesses like Earthbound turned into hundred acres of organic lettuce selling to chains such as Costco and Wal-Mart. And that is how organic turned into food grown on large farms and factories minus the chemicals. I wonder if the small organic farm will ever come back into existence. Or if organic will one day mean what I used to think it meant.
4. MEET ROSIE, THE ORGANIC FREE-RANGE CHICKEN

No, sadly Petaluma farms don't
actually look like this.

Pollan stopped at Petaluma in California to visit the Petaluma Poultry headquarters, where he hoped to find Rosie, the free-range chicken Pollan had bought at Whole Foods. What made this chicken any different from other industrial chickens? Pollan sure didn't find any farmhouses, red barns or pastures of roaming chickens. Actually, he found a building that looked more like a huge warehouse. And in here the chickens roamed. Actually, they never actually went outside. They had to stay inside until they were old enough, and by the time the small door to the outside world was opened, the chickens had no desire to go outside (they are killed two weeks later). The only thing that made them organic was that they were fed certified organic feed (corn and soy grown without pesticides and chemical fertilizer), didn't have antibiotics, and were killed younger (to make up for the expensive price, and to guard against diseases they had the possibility of getting). The processing facility was fully automated, and, as if a joke, the empty chicken-house lawn is maintained. But does the organic chicken taste any different?
5. MY ORGANIC INDUSTRIAL MEAL
After shopping at Whole Foods, Pollan decided on Rosie the chicken roast, Cal-Organic roasted vegetables (yellow potatoes, purple kale, and red winter squash), steamed asparagus (from Argentina) and an Earthbound Farm spring salad mix. To top it off, Stonyfield Farm organic ice cream and Mexican organic blackberries would be the desert. But is all the gas (money, environmental damage) needed to ship out of season asparagus all the way from Argentina or blackberries from Mexico? As good as a food tastes out of season, Pollan decides it's not worth it. Especially when he could be supporting local farms that sell vegetables that don't taste like wet cardboard. And as good as the chicken and vegetables were (not to mention the added benefits of chemical-free food), they still lost some of their appeal after a cross-country truck ride. So although organic industrial is better than an industrial meal, it is much more expensive, and there are still two more meals to outshine it. "And so, today, the organic food industry finds itself in a most unexpected, uncomfortable, and, yes, unsustainable position: floating on a sinking sea of petroleum.