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Marketing genius of organic foods unwrapped [Star, The (South Africa)](Star, The (South Africa) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) If marketing is the art of persuading consumers to buy things, then the initial promoters of "organic" foods - all amateurs with little or no marketing experience - have taught advertising and sales promotion experts a thing or three. Now ingrained in middle class culture, organic is superior, and free range is a moral choice. Everybody knows it. It no longer needs advertising. Labelling alone does the trick. Organic foods are "in". And business has cashed in on it. In the US, Stanford University estimated that the organic foods market leapt to $26.7 billion (R294bn) in 2010 from $3.7bn in 1997. How did the perception that it is better to buy "organic" food happen? Hippies did it. The flower-power people of the 1960s, dropping out and turning on, living off-grid, were responsible. Their food had to be organic and free range; they could not afford pest sprays or chemical fertilisers. Their sandals were homemade; they wove their own cloth, and so on. Their seemingly free lifestyle looked glamorous to middle class students later to be mums and dads in the suburbs. Those who joined the media carried the torch further. So the indoctrination began. It soon became a fashionable bandwagon begging for passengers, whom it duly got in the form of people selling anything organic - even bicycles with bamboo frames. But, but, but. How much better is organic and free range food? Does it really justify the extra expense? It is worth looking closely at the claims. Organic or free range food is supposed to taste better; be healthier for you; have no pesticide residuals; and have nothing in it but what Mother Nature intended. Well, yes and no, according to some researchers who do not take assertions at face value, however loudly they are proclaimed. Is organic food safer? Logic says yes. Research says perhaps and not by much - and not always. Small amounts of pesticides are found in both organic and ordinary food. It is marginally lower in organic foods but nothing to prove that ordinary food is bad for humans. On the pesticide front it seems there is not much benefit in eating organic. When it comes to contamination, E coli, the bacteria that can have awful results in humans (and did so in Germany not so long ago)*, can be in both organic and commercial food. The jury is out on which is worse and by what degree. Organic products win in some comparisons. Toxic metal contamination of organic produce has been found to be similar to that of non-organic produce, and most research has found negligible differences. Food additives are obviously not present in organic food, but there is no proof that approved additives are harmful. Another bad one - nitrates - are lower in non-organic products. No doubt about that. When it comes to the esoteric stuff - secondary metabolites, polyphenolic compounds, antioxidants and so on - the scientists are still arguing. In short, it boils down to ambiguity - six of one, half a dozen of the other. There is a darker side to organically grown produce, both animal and vegetable. In one year in Canada 50 organic products were pulled from shelves on health grounds. They were contaminated by salmonella, E coli and cadmium - among other nasties. This not to say that all organic produce is likely to be contaminated. The risk is there, but it is not usually much higher than for other products. It has long been known that meat products carry the biggest risk. The question is: are organic meat products safer? Almost 70 percent of organic chicken was contaminated compared with 64 percent of battery-fed birds in one survey. With pork samples, 65 percent were contaminated with E coli versus 49 percent of the ordinary samples. Organic farming enthusiasts naturally reject findings like this, as true believers must. Do more experimentation, they say (presumably, until they get the "right" answers). But it is a personal choice. Pay more if you must - and can afford it. But a cheaper way of maintaining food safety is simple. Always wash your hands in warm water and soap before and after handling food. Keep raw meat, poultry and fish away from other food. Wash cutting boards, utensils and countertops with hot, soapy water. Keep marinated meat in the refrigerator, and do not use a knife to cut meat and then use it on other foods without cleaning it. Those are the basic common sense rules, known for more than a century. Obey them and it is cheaper than paying over the odds. But then again, organic foods often do taste better. *In Germany 44 people died after 3 700 people ate E coli-contaminated organic bean sprouts in June 2011. Keith Bryer is a retired communications consultant. The Star (c) 2014 Independent Newspapers (Pty) Limited. All rights strictly reserved. Provided by SyndiGate Media Inc. (Syndigate.info). |