Organic tomatoes

Dear Andrew,

Thank you for your response to my comments.

You agreed with Chris that there are many reasons for farming organically, one of which is the environmental benefits. But you said that this is beyond the FSA's remit. Of course, it's not the FSA's job to give advice on which forms of farming and food production are most environmentally sustainable, but it certainly is part of the FSA's duty to take those issues into account in the work that you do. This is because all government agencies and publicly funded bodies are required by law to take into account the needs of sustainable development in the work that they do.

Turning to my comments, I'm still not really sure how quoting an anonymous spokesperson for a commercial interest helps an organisation guided by scientific evidence better to understand the complexity of interpreting recent research. I think you just quoted it because you like that opinion, and it was the most convenient anti-organic statement you came across about the research in question.

Despite what you say about salt, I'm still convinced that the agency is taking a peculiar, and discriminatory approach to judging the nutritional benefits of organic food as against other incremental nutritional benefits. The agency supports a number of initiatives designed to marginally increase the uptake of fresh fruit and vegetables, for example, the School Fruit and Vegetable Scheme (SFVS). The SFVS does not guarantee that children eat sufficient fruit and vegetables, indeed the same may be true of '5-a-day', given that I understand most nutritionists would say it should be at least '7-a-day', and some other European Governments have higher targets than 5 portions of fruit and vegetables a day.

But in both these cases, you are encouraging people to improve their diet, maybe only marginally, rather than insisting they move from an unhealthy diet to a completely healthy, 100% nutritionally approved diet overnight.

You were not, I note, able to give me a single example of the FSA dismissing marginal nutritional benefits on the grounds that they do not solve the whole problem, or that there are alternatives that would take people further.

But in the face of evidence that organic food delivers some nutritional advantages, you do simply dismiss it because it doesn't solve all the problems immediately. Unless you can provide examples to show that this is a consistent approach by the FSA, I remain of the view that this is pure and simple bias against organic. As you know, the independent review of the FSA that you commissioned a few years back found that there was a very widespread perception that the FSA had departed from science in its approach to organic food, so I am not alone in my views.

Finally, there have been several scientific reviews which show that, in general, organic foods have higher levels of vitamin C, less nitrate, less total protein, higher levels of plant secondary metabolites, and a higher proportion of essential amino acids in the protein (1). In addition, organic foods are found to contain significantly higher concentrations of secondary metabolites compared to non-organic foods. There have been 18 comparative studies looking at this area published since 2001, confirming a 2001 review of the data available then (2). I'm afraid you are simply wrong about the science when you say that the available evidence does not show that organic food has more nutrients.

Incidentally, I note that you suggest the accepted nutritional differences between organic and non-organic milk are only "possible", when numerous published studies have shown that these nutritional differences are real, and recent research has given us a clear idea of why they occur. It is even possible to achieve the same or similar nutritional differences on non-organic farms working to similar feeding regimes as certified organic farms (research paper about to be published), but of course consumers will only know if the milk has these nutritional differences if it is certified organic.

I know that the old Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food was full of people who'd spent their careers opposing organic farming. But the formation of the FSA was meant to remove you from those prejudiced attitudes. If a system of food production shows real promise in delivering more nutrients or vitamins, and given that you don't have anything invested in the pesticide industry or non-organic farming, it really does seem to me that you could be a little bit more cheerful about the prospect of more and more people eating healthier food!

Best wishes.

Peter Melchett

Peter Melchett
Policy Director, Soil Association
South Plaza, Marlborough Street, Bristol BS1 3NX
T:  0117 987 4561    Switchboard: 0117 314 5000
email:  pmelchett@soilassociation.org

1 Magkos F, Arvaniti F & Zampelas A (2003). Organic food: nutritious food or food for thought? A review of the evidence. International Journal of Food Sciences and Nutrition 54: 357 /371.
2 Brandt K.& Mølgaard JP (2001) Organic agriculture: Does it enhance or reduce the nutritional value of plant foods? Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture 81, 924-931.

I read the blog with interest, and in general I thought you were fairer in your comments than has been the case with some FSA spokespeople in the past, so thanks for that.

However, I have one serious complaint, and one much more general query about the FSA's approach to nutritional differences between organic and non-organic food.

First, the complaint.  You are writing about a bit of peer-reviewed, published research from one of the leading US agricultural universities.  Part of your response is to quote, with apparent approval, a newspaper report of an unnamed source from an industry body with a very strong vested interest in rubbishing this research ("In today’s papers, the British Tomato Growers’ Association technical expert is reported as saying that there is little difference between traditionally and organically grown tomatoes in Britain so he couldn’t see the opportunity for much difference in their nutritional value.")  Of course, I have no objection to you quoting vested interests, as long as, first, you make clear that's what they are.  Why didn't you?

Second, if the FSA is, as you claim, 'neutral',and you really felt that the FSA's position is enhanced by quoting a newspaper report of an anonymous industry spokesperson, why didn't you at least quote a view, say from the Soil Association, to balance the one-sided view of the British Tomato Growers' Association?

Third, I do wonder why you quoted this anecdotal (and incidentally clearly nonsensical) remark at all - why not quote something about European tomatoes that is supported by peer-reviewed research? Is it because you know that the European literature already contains research that supports the UC Davis findings?  So much for being guided by science!

It is things like this obvious example of bias that, I am afraid, do still make parts of the FSA sound like anti-organic campaigners.

The general issue.  This concerns your (and many others in the FSA's) view that "Simply getting us all to eat more fruit and vegetables should be the main message".  Of course, the Soil Association agrees that generally people should eat more fruit and vegetables.  But this argument is regularly wheeled out to dismiss the growing evidence of nutritional differences between organic and non-organic food, while exactly the opposite argument (that incremental improvements in nutrition are worthwhile) is regularly used in many other areas of the FSA's work.  Why is this?

I suppose you might argue that buying organic will somehow stop those consumers eating more fruit and veg - but as you know all the evidence from the supermarkets tells us that organic consumers generally eat more fruit and veg than non-organic shoppers, so that can't be it.

Are there any areas of FSA policy or advice on nutrition where the FSA is not supporting small improvements in the nutritional quality of our diets, on the grounds that what is really need is much more dramatic change?  My impression is that over the whole range of your work you do (sensibly) support moves designed to achieve modest gains in nutrition, rather than dismissing these because they do not deliver the ideal diet in one step.  Indeed, apart from your standard 'anti' line on organic food, I would be surprised if you could give me many examples of modest nutritional gains which the FSA says officially are not worth bothering about, as the "main message" should be to achieve much more radical change.

I realise that when it comes to excluding negatives, like illegal additives, you simply want them out.  But even on things like salt, you aim for reductions in salt consumption, for example by labelling, rather than saying 'simply avoiding all high salt foods should be the main message'.  And I don't hear the FSA say that we 'worry too much' about labelling designed merely to achieve incremental reductions in salt consumption.

There must be a minimum daily requirement of all foodstuffs in order to maintain a healthly lifetsyle. If non-organically grown tomatoes, or any fruit or vegetable for that matter, contain an excess of the minimum daily requirement of any nutrient then it is unlikely that the higher content of nutrients in organically grown fruits and vegetables will make a difference. It's about pharmaokinetics!