The Many Benefits of Organic Farming for Health and Prosperity
Based on a Report from the Organic Farming Research Foundation
with additional research from Organic Processing Magazine
What if there were one solution that could help solve many of America’s most pressing problems?
A program that could cut down soaring medical costs by improving the health of our citizens and reducing the risk factors for disease?
An approach that could boost the economy by creating jobs and a healthier, more productive workforce?
A solution that would combat climate change, improve the soil and protect America’s watersheds? A method that could also protect the birds and bees, and all living things?
There is. It’s called organic farming.
Imagine a world where organic farming is the leading form of agriculture. A world where everyone—from all income levels and geographic locations—has access to food grown without chemical pesticides and fertilizers that have been linked to myriad diseases and disorders. A world where instead of just a few agribusinesses getting rich off selling chemicals and chemically grown food, farmers thrive economically while they also help improve the health of our fragile ecosystem. Where the need for millions of pounds of toxins is eliminated…keeping them from entering our water, air and soil. A world where agriculture and nature exist in harmony providing healthier food for everyone.
We believe this dream can come true.
The Organic Farming Research Foundation’s (OFRF) report Organic Farming
for Health and Prosperity illustrates how science is proving that a better world through organic farming is not just a dream, but the beginning of a much more sustainable reality.
Organic Science
This comprehensive report is a review of the scientific literature on organic farming in America from 2000 through 2011. Research papers published in peer-reviewed academic journals composed the primary sources of information. Where peer-reviewed literature on a given topic is nonexistent or difficult to find, the authors cite additional sources, including the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), organizations associated with the United Nations, the Rodale Institute, the Organic Trade Association and the Organic Center.
The report was designed to examine the multitude of benefits that organic agriculture can provide as well as identify the key ways in which U.S. agricultural policies could support organic farmers and make organic foods more accessible to all.
When the existing scientific literature is reviewed as a whole, it’s clear that organic farming practices are good for human health, economic prosperity and the health of the environment. However, several key challenges have prevented the organic farming industry from growing as rapidly as it could, including lack of public awareness of the value of organic farming; public policy that creates an uneven playing (or growing) field between organic and nonorganic growers and a lack of research needed to advance the organic industry. Each person that reads this report has an important role in helping overcome these challenges.
For those in the organic industry… This report will provide information you can use to educate consumers and retailers, offering additional scientifically proven reasons to support the organic movement and engaging information they can share with others.
For business leaders… This report will provide compelling reasons why investing in
organic is not only good for the world, but good for growing a healthy business that appeals to today’s educated consumers.
For governmental leaders and community activists… It’s time that the benefits of organic agriculture are acknowledged by policymakers and the public at large. Governmental leaders need to enact a unified federal policy to support organic and community activists need to push for policies that support organic on a local and federal level. Over the past decade, a small amount of public resources has been directed toward organic farming, but this is disproportionate to the investment needed to realize the great potential of organic farming. This report recommends elements of an integrated, unified policy that will further organic agriculture and support the multiple advantages it can provide society.
Here are some of the key highlights of the report:
Organic Farming Is Good for Human Health
Organic farming is essential to promoting human health because it’s designed to grow food without the use of toxic substances that are strongly linked to disease and interfere with healthy development.
Today, the increasing use of pesticides in the U.S., and around the world, is a matter of serious concern. According to a report released in 2011 from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), pesticide sales in the United States were approximately $12.5 billion, over one-third of the $40 billion world market in 2007.[1]
While the official position of government regulatory agencies is that there are acceptable levels of pesticide exposure below which there is “a reasonable certainty of no harm,” many people choose to try to reduce dietary exposure to pesticides by selecting organic foods and beverages. Studies show that they are making the right choice: assessments of pesticide residue data on organic and nonorganic fresh fruits and vegetables, researchers found that organic produce has a small fraction of the pesticide residues compared to nonorganic produce. Much of the residues found on organic produce were “consistent with unavoidable contamination because of drift, persistent residues in the soil, or contaminated irrigation water supplies.”[2]
Less Pesticides in Food Means Less
in Your Body. The average child in America is exposed to 10 to 13 pesticides daily through food and beverages, based on an analysis of food consumption and pesticide residue data collected by the USDA.[3] However, scientific evidence shows that eating organic foods can decrease the levels of pesticide metabolites detected in children. A 2003 study found that “children fed predominantly organic produce and juice had one-sixth the level of pesticide byproducts in their urine compared with children who ate nonorganic foods.”[4] A follow-up study in 2006 found that metabolites in children’s urine indicating exposure to malathion and chlorpyrifos decreased from detectable to non-detectable levels “immediately after the introduction of organic diets.”[5]
Based on cumulative data from USDA and peer-reviewed studies, a 2008 report, Simplifying the Pesticide Risk Equation, from Organic Center projected that an industry-wide conversion to organic produce would eliminate more than 95 percent of pesticide dietary risk.[6]
Pesticides Increase Risk of Cancer. According to the American Institute for Cancer Research, there are an estimated 12.7 million cancer cases around the world every year, with this number expected to increase to 26 million by 2030.[7]
A strong and undeniable link between cancer and environmental and dietary exposure to pesticides was confirmed in a 2010 report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service’s President’s Cancer Panel. In this report, the Cancer Panel, made up of some of the nation’s most respected oncologists, shows that exposure to chemicals commonly used in nonorganic agriculture have been linked to almost every type of cancer, including brain, breast, colon, lung, ovarian, pancreatic, kidney, testicular and stomach, as well as cancer of the central nervous system.[8] Written in conjunction with the National Institutes of Health and the National Cancer Institute, the report, Reducing Environmental Cancer Risk: What We can Do Now, examined the impact of environmental factors and the use of synthetic chemicals in regard to cancer risk. After reviewing extensive data and science on the issue, the report recommends, “to reduce risk of cancer, American consumers should eat food grown without pesticides and synthetic fertilizers.”
Reducing Risk to Rural Families. While the President’s Cancer Panel’s report points out that pesticide exposure can increase risk of cancer in all populations, those with the highest risk of environmental exposure are farmers and those working and living in agricultural areas. The report summarizes numerous studies documenting the negative impacts of synthetic chemicals used in nonorganic farming, including an increased incidence of several types of cancers in farmworkers and their spouses and an increased incidence of leukemia for children living in agricultural areas.
Pesticides Affect Neurodevelopment. In addition to cancer, there is compelling evidence that exposure to chemicals can lead to neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative issues, and even cause epigenetic (DNA-level) changes that are passed on to future generations.
In a recent report published in the April 2011 issue of Environmental Health Perspectives, which was not included in the OFRF report, academic teams from three different areas of the United States used a variety of methods to measure the impacts of prenatal exposures to organophosphate (OP) insecticides on the neurological development and IQ of children. All three studies reported decrements in full-scale IQ, working memory and perceptual reasoning. Researchers from Université de Montréal in Quebec, University of California–Berkeley and Emory University in Georgia found that children born to mothers with the highest urinary levels of OP metabolites showed a 7-point decrease in IQ compared with children of mothers with the lowest OP levels. One of the researchers told CNN.com that impacts on intelligence found in the study were similar in magnitude to the adverse impacts associated with high lead exposures, and were comparable to a child performing six months behind average in a school population.*[9]
In another study published in 2010 in Pediatrics, researchers at Harvard University analyzed of over 1,000 children exposed to levels of pesticides common among U.S. children. Based on reports from parents, the study found that children with higher urinary levels of OPs are at least two times as likely to have symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) than children with levels below the mean.*[10]
Furthermore, a study that followed more than 300 children in Salinas Valley, California, from in utero to 5 years of age found that a child’s prenatal exposures to OP had even a greater association with ADHD than exposures after birth. A tenfold increase in levels of urinary OP metabolites in the mother’s urine during pregnancy was associated with a 500 percent increase in the diagnosis of attention disorders in 5-year-olds, according to the study published in Environmental Health Perspectives in 2010.[11]
Organic Can Provide More Key Nutrients
Besides reducing exposure to toxins, a number of respected studies have shown that organic foods can also contain higher amounts of key nutrients. Scientists have suggested that the challenges organic plants face, such as fighting off pests without the help of pesticides and scavenging the soil to access nutrients rather than having synthetic nutrients instantly available, lead organic plants to build up antioxidant and nutrient stores to protect and strengthen themselves.
The answer may also reside in the typically higher soil quality found on organic farms. The linkage between improved soil quality/stronger plants and more nutrient-dense food supports a basic principle of organic farming—feed the soil to better feed the plant.
Several studies have shown that many crops when grown organically—such as apples, tomatoes, strawberries and blueberries—have significantly higher levels of certain minerals and phytonutrients than their nonorganic counterparts.[12,13] Studies also show that cows grazed on pasture, which is required in organic farming, produce milk with markedly higher conjugated linoleic acid content.[14]
One of the groundbreaking U.S. studies on nutrient density was on tomatoes. After over a decade of farm trials comparing nonorganic and organic tomatoes, in 2007 University of California–Davis scientists reported in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry that organic tomatoes contained much higher levels of health-promoting flavonoids, with quercetin and kaempferol found to be on average 79 and 97 percent higher, respectively. The gap between flavonoid levels in organic versus nonorganic tomatoes increased over time—the longer the fields were managed organically, the more flavonoids.[15]
Most recently, a report in September 2011 in Critical Reviews in Plant Sciences analyzed the findings of the majority of U.S. and European studies on nutrient content and found that the level of secondary metabolites such as vitamins, antioxidants and minerals in organic produce is on average 12 percent higher than in nonorganic samples.*[16]
While many studies show organic foods are richer in nutrients, researchers generally agree there is a need for more studies, especially regarding the specific factors that influence the uptake of nutrients.
Organic Farming Is Good for the Economy
The organic farming industry has been the one bright light during the current recession. While many industries have shed employees, organic farming has been hiring workers, adding farmers and increasing revenue. The organic industry has grown from $3.6 billion in 1997 to $29 billion in 2010, according to the Organic Trade Association’s 2011 industry survey. The association also reported that the organic agriculture sector enjoyed an annual growth rate of 19 percent from 1997 to 2008.
Even in 2010, during the height of the greatest economic downturn in the United States since the Great Depression, the organic farming industry increased by 8 percent. This same year, during a time other businesses were laying off employees, 40 percent of organic companies reported hiring full-time staff, according to OTA’s survey.
Organic Farms Have Stronger Bottom Lines. According to USDA’s 2008 census, organic farms are more profitable than other farms, reporting, on average, approximately $20,249 more in net income than nonorganic farms.
Data from a number of field studies also show that organic farming can be more profitable. A recently released report on an 18-year study conducted at the University of Minnesota found that organic rotational systems were more profitable than nonorganic systems, with price premiums playing a large role in this difference. However, even without the premiums, organic was still slightly more profitable.[17] Additionally, nine years of data from Wisconsin show that intensive rotational grazing and organic grain and forage systems were the most profitable on highly productive land.[18] Data from Minnesota showed that net returns to the four-year organic rotation were significantly higher than returns to the nonorganic systems when a price premium was included; when the premium was not included, net returns were statistically equal to nonorganic.[19]
Organic Farms Provide More Jobs. Organic growers employ an average of 61 year-round employees, while nonorganic growers hire only an average of 28 year-round employees, according to a 2010 survey of organic and nonorganic farmers in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina and South Carolina. The survey results, which were published in a University of Georgia Outreach Bulletin, found that organic farms also hire more seasonal workers than nonorganic farms.[20]
The labor share of production costs is higher on organic farms because they rely on labor-intensive practices ranging from weeding and tilling to planting cover crops and flowering hedgerows to attract beneficial insects and birds. Many organic farms grow fruits and vegetables, which typically require more hand labor than field crops.
Organic Farming Is Good for Soil
Soil scientists and cultural historians have made a convincing case that civilizations rise or fall based on how they manage their soil resources, as reported by Jared M. Diamond in his book Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed.[21] Unfortunately, history is marked by human failure to properly manage soil. Organic farming has heralded a new renaissance of soil stewardship that offers numerous benefits to the planet and humanity.
Crucial soil functions such as water-holding capacity, soil microbial activity and nutrient cycling are strongly influenced by the structure of the soil, particularly the degree to which it forms soil aggregates. Without soil aggregate formation, soil erodes easily via wind or rain, as happened in the Great Plains during the Dust Bowl of the 1930s.
Soil microorganisms, found in abundance in organically managed soils, secrete glue-like substances that help hold soil particles together. Organic methods—such as crop rotation, cover crops, green manures and use of composted and raw animal manures—help enhance microbial activity and improve soil quality. Conversely, inputs used in nonorganic farming—including synthetic fertilizers, pesticides and fumigants—destroy many of these microorganisms, resulting in lower concentrations of soil aggregates.
Organic Methods Build Better Soil. Many scientific studies have confirmed that organic farming methods result in higher quality soil. A large body of soil quality data comes from long-term systems comparison trials across the United States, including studies in Pennsylvania, Michigan, California, Iowa, North Carolina, Maryland, Wisconsin, Washington and Minnesota. These trials found that, in comparison to nonorganic management, organic farming increases soil organic matter, enhancing the soil’s ability to sequester carbon, cycle nutrients and absorb water. Futhermore, the study found increased levels of soil organic matter and microbial activity even when the organic plots were subjected to routine tillage.[22]
Healthy Soils Resist Disease. A small but telling body of research suggests that improved soil quality can increase crop resistance to disease. In a study from North Carolina State University, published in Applied Soil Ecology in 2007, researchers found that Southern blight disease, a common soil-borne fungus that affects hundreds of plants, was three to five times less prevalent on farms where synthetic pesticides were not used than on conventional farms.[23] While the mechanisms for this are still unknown, scientist speculate that it may involve signaling between plants and soil, perhaps mediated by soil organic matter. This is an area where soil scientists and plant pathologists could collaborate on research and generate extremely useful information for all farmers.
Organic Farming Is Good for Water Quality and Aquatic Life
Water may well become the largest problem facing global agricultural production in the very near future. Not surprisingly, food production practices can have a strong impact on water quality.
Fewer Toxins in Water Supply. Ground and surface water can be contaminated by the pesticides, fertilizers and animal wastes that are not absorbed by plants or soil. In the United States, 64 percent of measured lake acres and 44 percent of stream miles are impaired; they no longer support one or more of their designated uses such as swimming or fishing, according to the EPA. The synthetic herbicides, pesticides and fungicides used in nonorganic farming also enter drinking water supplies, posing a variety of threats to human health.
Unlike nonorganic farmers, who contribute to this disturbing issue, organic farmers, under federal law, must utilize production practices that “maintain or improve the natural resources of the operation, including soil and water quality.” No other farmers in the U.S. are held to this standard.
Less Nitrogen Leaching. One of the most widely known impacts of agriculture on water quality occurs when fertilizer leaches into groundwater and runoff, polluting water supplies and causing the well-known “dead zone” that forms each year in the Gulf of Mexico. Runoff causes algae to grow uncontrollably, which depletes oxygen from the water and literally suffocates marine life. Excess nitrogen fertilizer also causes weeds to take over ponds, reservoirs and lakes as well.
In organic systems, biological fertilizer sources release nutrients slowly over time, providing more opportunity for nutrients to be digested by soil organisms and held in the soil instead of leaching below the root zone. Because of this, a growing coalition of hydrologists, water quality experts and conservation leaders is advocating for organic and sustainable farming.
In a 12-year study published in 2010 in Agriculture, Ecosystems and the Environment, researchers at Michigan State University found that organic fields had half the annual nitrate losses of nonorganic fields.[24] Additionally, researchers at Washington State University studying apple production found that, after nine years of organic management, annual nitrate leaching was four to six times higher in nonorganic than in organic orchards.[25]
Organic Farming Is Good for Biodiversity
“If honeybees become extinct, human society will follow in four years.”
–Albert Einstein
Organic farming supports diverse populations of pollinators—a very important part of agriculture.
The Latest Buzz. In 2006, for unknown reasons, honeybee colonies suddenly began to die across the U.S. In recent years, this phenomenon—called colony collapse disorder (CCD)—has been linked to pesticide exposure. On January 28, 2012, The Economist reported on a study from the USDA’s Bee Research Laboratory in Beltsville, Maryland, which found that bee larvae that were exposed to a common pesticide called imidacloprid were much more susceptible to disease than those that were not exposed. When bees were exposed to a parasite, the bees that were given pollen with pesticide residue had an average of 700,000 parasite spores in their bodies, while other bees harbored fewer than 200,000. Previous reports found that pesticides in this same category have caused bees to act confused, which may also be linked to bee decline.*[26]
Organic farms, however, are shown to provide a natural habitat for these essential insects. According to a study published in a 2002 issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers found that native bee populations supported 50-100 percent of the pollination needs for watermelon on organic farms in California and none on nonorganic farms.[27] Additionally, organic canola fields in northern Alberta, Canada, were found to have greater abundance of native bee communities than nonorganic fields, which in turn had more native bees than fields planted to genetically modified canola, reported Ecological Applications in 2005.[28]
Birds Migrate to Organic. Organic practices also support diversity in bird populations. In five recent studies, almost all bird species, including locally declining species, increased in both population and variation on organic farmland. In a two-year study published in Conservation Biology in 2002, researchers from the University of Nebraska found that on average, bird abundance on organic sites was 2.6 times higher than on nonorganic sites, and the average number of bird species was 2.0 times greater.[29]
Organic Farming Is Good for Combating Climate Change
Because organic farming practices help improve soil structure, water-holding capacity and nutrient cycling, these farms are more resilient in the face of climatic extremes. Researchers at the Rodale Farming Systems Trial found that organic corn yields were 31 percent higher than nonorganic in years of drought. These drought yields are remarkable when compared with genetically engineered “drought-tolerant” varieties, which saw increases of only 6.7 to 13.3 percent over nonorganic (non-drought-resistant) varieties.[30]
In regards to slowing down climate change, in agriculture there are two primary strategies: sequestering carbon in agricultural soils and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Carbon Sequestration. World soils hold more carbon than the amounts in the atmosphere and all vegetation combined. Because organic management increases soil organic matter, it directly results in higher carbon sequestration.
Although the amount of carbon sequestered varies depending on the climate and the types of organic methods used, even at the most conservative end, researchers say the world’s soils, if managed carefully, could capture an estimated 1.2 billion tons of carbon per year.[31]
Reducing GHG Production. Agricultural production releases 13.5 percent of human greenhouse gas emissions globally and 6 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions in the United States, according to the EPA and the 2007 Climate Change Report presented in Geneva, Switzerland.[32]
Calculating meaningful estimates of greenhouse gas emissions from agricultural systems is a technical and mathematical challenge. An accurate accounting of emissions must consider both direct and indirect sources of emissions in the entire farming system. (Direct emissions arise from the farming practices themselves while indirect sources are the amount of greenhouse gases generated in manufacture of inputs, such as fertilizers and pesticides, used on the farm.) Recent studies are documenting that organic farming results in an overall negative balance of greenhouse gases; in other words, organic farms absorb more greenhouse gases than they release.
A Canadian life-cycle study of all the inputs required to produce organic and nonorganic canola, corn, soy and wheat showed that organic farming generates almost 25 percent less greenhouse gas emissions than nonorganic agriculture and 80 percent less ozone-depleting emissions. Much of these energy savings were from not using synthetic fertilizers.[33]
Charles Benbrook, chief scientist at the Organic Center, has developed a comprehensive carbon calculator that takes all factors of dairy production into consideration when calculating a carbon footprint. Depending on cow breed and numerous management details, the data shows that, per unit of production, organic pasture-based dairies emit 20–23 percent less methane than nonorganic dairies.[34]
Organic Farming Saves Energy. One way to reduce greenhouse gases is to decrease overall energy use. Studies are revealing that organic agriculture has lower net energy use and increased energy efficiency compared with nonorganic. The Canadian life-cycle study mentioned previously found that, due to the high energy costs associated with synthetic fertilizers, organic crop production consumed only about 40 percent of the energy utilized by nonorganic production.
An analysis of 17 years of field crop data from Michigan published in the journal Environmental Science and Technology in 2011 found that the organic system had lower fossil fuel inputs than the nonorganic system. In this study, cultivation for weed management was the largest source of fossil fuel consumption for organic management, while the nonorganic, no-till systems relied on energy-intensive inputs for fertilization and pest control.[35]
The Evidence for Organic Is Compelling—Now It’s Time That Policies Start Supporting It
The clear scientific evidence of the benefits of organic farming in terms of human health, economic health and the environment must guide the development and implementation of 21st-century policies. Reforming agriculture policies toward investment in organic systems is a necessary evolution. The Farm Bill is an important vehicle for investment in organic agriculture, and all agricultural advocates must push for more support for organic in this policy. A number of other policy arenas could be created or modified to either reward organic farming or break down barriers for organic farmers. A summary of key priorities includes:
1.
Significantly Increase Funding for Organic Research, Education and Extension Activities at the USDA. The funding should at the very least parallel the sector’s growth and presence in the food economy. This means increasing funding for programs such as the Organic Agriculture Research and Extension Initiative and updating/implementing the Agricultural Research Service’s organic research agenda and others.
It would also include making the Organic Production Survey a regular follow-up to the U.S. Census of Agriculture, continued economic analysis of issues and trends in the organic sector and setting aside funds for organic in competitive grants programs such as the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative. Research is also needed for the development of publicly available seeds, varieties and livestock breeds appropriate for organic farming systems. Lastly, an interdepartmental task force to integrate organic research into departments outside the USDA is also key.
2.
Ensure Fair and Appropriate Risk Management Tools. Ensure fair and appropriate crop insurance, such as eliminating the organic premium surcharge, making sure that insurance payouts are based on organic prices for organic products (not on lower nonorganic prices), extending coverage to grazed forage, double crops and cover crops, and covering genetically modified organism (GMO) and pesticide drift damage to organic farms.
Pesticide and GMO Policy. Pesticides and GMOs need to be more strictly regulated to reduce risk of drift on organic farms. Users of pesticides and GMOs should be required to plant buffer zones to contain drift. Liability for pollen drift should be put on GMO manufacturers and patent holders when farmers lose sales due to genetic contamination of their crops.
3.
Meet Market Demand. Lift prohibitions on the purchase of organic food in the Woman, Infants and Children (WIC) program and enable Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients to buy organic at farmers markets and all retail outlets. In addition, organic food should be included in military, school and Indian foodservice and assistance programs.
To ensure consumer confidence in organic, funding should be increased for the National Organic Program (NOP) to perform oversight, enforcement and regulatory functions.
4.
Create a Robust Organic Transition Assistance and Certification Support Program. Provide technical, educational and financial assistance to new and transitioning growers, including trainings on transitioning and NOP regulations, as well as business and marketing guidance. Research is also needed to address challenges in transitioning. Annual payments during the three-year transition period for income lost would help many farmers make the change to organic.
Additionally, federal funding should continue to be provided to support organic certification for producers, such as through the National Organic Certification Cost Share Program, whereby producers can be reimbursed for a portion of their cost of certification.
5.
Reward Environmental Stewardship. Ensure that organic farmers are rewarded and can participate in market-based systems of payments to farmers who provide ecosystem services to the wider society. This includes making use of the USDA Environmental Markets infrastructure as a clearinghouse for agriculture environmental credits, including nutrients, wetlands and carbon. More funding should also be given to conservation programs, such as the Conservation Stewardship Program and the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, so that they more appropriately serve and reward the environmental benefits of organic systems.
The Organic Farming Path Forward
Organic offers a multitude of benefits for the health and prosperity of America. Now it is time to take a stand. To make our voices heard. Each of us needs to build support in our communities, among our family, friends and farmers and our local and federal policymakers. The findings in this report resonate across all sectors and among all people, and the benefits of organic farming to our economy, environment and public health need to spread across all mediums of communication. Become informed about calls to action through OFRF’s advocacy network and get your online communities to join the network. Share the findings of this report on Facebook, tweet about them and post them on your websites. Attend rallies, gatherings and meetings with your legislators. It’s time to mobilize farmers and supporters of organic farming around the country, and the voice is growing louder by the day.
Organic Farming Research Foundation is the national non-profit champion of the American organic family farmer. Founded in 1990, OFRF promotes organic interests in Congress, integrates organic farming in agricultural universities, provides research that is responsive to the organic farmers’ needs and partners with organizations to secure the connection between organic farming and a healthy planet. Headquartered in Santa Cruz, California, with offices in Washington, D.C., OFRF knows that when an organic farmer succeeds, we all thrive.
References
1. 2006–2007 Pesticide Market Estimates Report; http://epa.gov/oppfead1/cb/csb_page/updates/2011/sales-usage06-07.html.
2. Baker, Brian P., Charles M. Benbrook, Edward Groth III and Karen Lutz Benbrook. 2002. Food Additives and Contaminants 19(5): 427–446.
3. C. Benbrook. 2008. Simplifying the Pesticide Risk Equation: The Organic Option. The Organic Center.
4. Curl C.L., R.A. Fenske, K. Elgethun. 2003. Organophosphorous pesticide exposure of urban and suburban preschool children with organic and conventional diets. Environ Health Perspect 111:377–382.
5. Lu, Chensheng, Kathryn Toepel, Rene Irish, Richard A. Fenske, Dana B. Barr and Roberto Bravo. 2006. Environ Health Perspect 114(2): 260–263. Published online 2005 September 1. doi: 10.1289/ehp.8418.
6. C. Benbrook. 2008. Simplifying the Pesticide Risk Equation: The Organic Option. The Organic Center.
7. http://preventcancer.aicr.org/site/PageServer?pagename=cancer_stats.
8. U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services. National Institutes of Health. National Cancer Institute. 2010. Reducing Environmental Cancer Risk. What We Can Do Now. Available online at http://deainfo.nci.nih.gov/advisory/pcp/annualReports/index.htm.
9. Gray K., C.P. Lawler, 2011. Strength in Numbers:
Three Separate Studies Link in Utero Organophosphate Pesticide Exposure and Cognitive Development. Environ Health Perspect 119(8): doi:10.1289/ehp.1104137.
10. Bouchard, M. F., D. C. Bellinger, R. O. Wright and M. G. Weisskopf. 2010. Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder and Urinary Metabolites of Organophosphate Pesticides. Pediatrics 125.6: E1270-1277.
11. Marks A.R., Harley K., Bradman A., Kogut K., Barr D.B., et al. 2010 Organophosphate Pesticide Exposure and Attention in Young Mexican-American Children: The CHAMACOS Study. Environ Health Perspect 118(12): doi:10.1289/ehp.1002056.
12. Reganold, J.P., P.K. Andrews, J.R. Reeve, L. Carpenter-Boggs, C.W. Schadt, J.R. Alldredge, C.F. Ross, N.M. Davies and J. Zhou. 2010. Fruit and soil quality of organic and conventional strawberry agroecosystems. PloS ONE 5(9): e12346. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0012346.
13. Asami, D. K., Y.-J. Hong, D. M. Barrett, and A. E. Mitchell. 2003. Comparison of the Total Phenolic and Ascorbic Content of Freeze-Dried and Air-Dried Marionberry, Strawberry, and Corn Grown Using Nonorganic, Organic, and Sustainable Agricultural Practices, Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry 51(5): 1237–1241.
14. Ellis, K. A. et al. 2006. Comparing the fatty acid composition of organic and conventional milk. Journal of Dairy Science 89.6:1938-1950.
15. Mitchell, Alyson E., Yun-Jeong Hong, Eunmi Koh, Diane M. Barrett, D. E. Bryant, R. Ford Denison and Stephen Kaffka. 2007. Ten-Year Comparison of the Influence of Organic and Nonorganic Crop Management Practices on the Content of Flavonoids in Tomatoes. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry 55(15): 6154–6159.
16. Brandt, K. C. Leifert, R. Sanderson and C. J. Seal. 2011. Agroecosystem Management and Nutritional Quality of Plant Foods: The Case of Organic Fruits and Vegetables, Critical Reviews in Plant Sciences, 30:1–2, 177–197.
17. Delbridge, Timothy A., Jeffrey A. Coulter, Robert P. King, Craig C. Sheaffer and Donald L. Wyse. 2011. Economic Performance of Long-Term Organic and Nonorganic Cropping Systems in Minnesota. Agronomy Journal 103.5: 1372–1382.
18. Chavas et al. 2009. Organic and Conventional Production Systems
in Wisconsin Integrated Cropping Systems Trial: II. Economic and Risk Analysis 1993–2006. Agronomy Journal doi:10.2134/agronj2008.0055x.
19. Mahoney et al. 2007. Organic Food: Profitability of Organic Cropping Systems in Southwestern Minnesota. 65–81.
20. Santos, F. I., and C. L. Escalante. 2010. Farm Labor Management Decisions of Organic and Nonorganic Farms: A Survey of Southeastern Farm Businesses. Univ. Georgia Outreach Bulletin AGECON-10-001.
21. Diamond, J. M. 2005. Collapse: how societies choose to fail or succeed. New York: Viking Press.
22. Snapp et al. 2010; Hepperly et al. 2009; Teasdale et al. 2007; Kong et al. 2007; Glover et al. 2000; Clark et al. 1998; Drinkwater et al., 1998.
23. Liu Bo, Cong Tu, Shujin Hu, Marcia Gumpertz and Jean Beagle Ristaino, North Carolina State University. 2007. Effect of Organic, Sustainable, and Nonorganic Management Strategies in Grower Fields on Soil Physical, Chemical, and Biological Factors and the Incidence of Southern Blight., Applied Soil Ecology 37:202–214.
24. Snapp, S. S. L E. Gentry and R. Harwood. 2010. Management intensity—not biodiversity—the driver of ecosystem services in a long-term row crop experiment. Agriculture, Ecosystems, and the Environment 15(August): 242–248.
25. Kramer, S. B., J. P. Reganold, J. D. Glover, B.J.M. Bohannan and H. A. Mooney. 2006. Reduced nitrate leaching and enhanced denitrifier activity and efficiency in organically fertilized soils. Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci 103:4522–4527.
26. www.economist.com/node/21543469.
27. Kremen, C., N. M. Williams and R. W. Thorp. 2002. Crop pollination from native bees at risk from agricultural intensification. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 99:16812–16816.
28. Morandin, L. A. and M. L. Winston. 2005. Wild bee abundance and seed production in nonorganic, organic and genetically modified canola. Ecological Applications 15(3): 87181.
29. Beecher, N. A., R. J. Johnson, J. R. Brandle, R. M. Case and L. J.Young. 2002. Agroecology of birds in organic and nonorganic farmland. Conservation Biology 16(6): 1620631.
30. www.rodaleinstitute.org/fst30years.
31. Lal, R. 2004. Soil carbon sequestration impacts on global climate change and food security. Science 304:1623–1627.
32. IPCC. 2007: Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Core writing team, Pachauri, R. K and A. Reisinger (eds.)]. Geneva, Switzerland: IPCC and EPA. 2011. U.S. Greenhouse Gas Inventory Report: inventory of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and sinks: 1990–2009. USEPA #430-R-11-005. Accessed online at http://epa.gov/climatechange/emissions/usinventoryreport.html.
33. Pelletier, N., N. Arsenault and P. Tyedmers. 2008. Scenario modeling potential eco-efficiency gains from a transition to organic agriculture: life cycle perspectives on Canadian canola, corn, soy and wheat production. Environ Manage 42:989–1001.
34. Benbrook, C. 2009. Shades of Green: Quantifying the benefits of organic dairy production. The Organic Center. www.organic-center.org/reportfiles/Shades_of_Green_03302009_final.pdf.
35. Gelfand, I., S. S. Snapp and G. P. Robertson. 2010. Energy efficiency of nonorganic, organic, and alternative cropping systems for food and fuel at a site in the U.S. Midwest. Environ. Sci. Tech 44:4006–4011.
*These studies were from additional research done by Organic Processing Magazine and were not in OFRF’s report.
