Scientist says report downplayed positive findings

By COOKSON BEECHER
Capital Press

Advocates of organic food are downplaying the impact and results of a study commissioned by the British government that concluded that there is no nutritional difference between organic and conventionally produced foodstuffs.

Eastern Washington farmer Wayne Inaba said he doesn't expect to see much of an effect on consumer demand for his farm's organically produced food as a result the study.

"I think the majority of our customers buy organic food because of the way it's produced, not just because of its nutritional content," he said. "We don't plan to make any changes on our farm because of the report."

About 20 percent of Inaba Produce Farms' 1,500 acres are in organic production, while the rest are in conventional production.

In California, Peggy Miars, executive director and CEO of CCOF, an organic certification and trade association, said that although there's been "a lot of buzz" about the report, she doesn't think it's had much of a negative impact on organic sales.

"I haven't heard of CCOF-certified members being affected by this," she said. "The bottomline is that consumers need to do their own careful research and not be swayed by sensationalism, which can be rampant on the Internet."

Jay Nitikman, an organic consumer from Santa Cruz, said that buying organically produced food is about more than nutrition.

"It's about the environment -- wildlife, clean air, clean water," he said. "I'm going to keep buying from my local organic farmers. The report isn't going to change that."

Charles Benbrook, chief scientist for The Organic Center in Troy, Ore., said he's particularly troubled by the "overzealous statements" about the report in some of the media accounts and blogs.

"Certainly, some damage has been done," he said. "Some articles make the case that there's nothing about organic farming that leads to nutritional benefits. It's a condemnation of everything organic farming stands for."

Tim Smith, chief executive of Britain's Food Standards Agency, told "The Grocer" that the report's important message is not that people should avoid organic food but they should eat a healthy balanced diet and that, in terms of nutrition, it doesn't matter if the food is grown organically or conventionally.

The FSA is the agency that commissioned the study.

But Benbrook said the London research team downplayed positive findings in favor of organic food and used data from very old studies that assessed nutrient levels in plant varieties that are no longer on the market.

He also pointed out that the London team found higher levels of nitrogen in conventional crops.

According to the center's response to the FSA report, elevated levels of nitrogen in food are regarded by most scientists as a public health hazard because of the potential for cancer-causing nitrosamine compounds to form in the human gastrointestinal tract.

Benbrook faults the FSA study for failing to factor total polyphenols and total antioxidant capacity into the nutrient equation. These substances that have been found to help fight cancer and other diseases.

"If they had done that, the report would have concluded that there are significant nutritional differences in organic and conventionally produced food,"he said.

In contrast, the center's study, "New Evidence Confirms the Nutritional Superiority of Plant-based Organic Foods," which was released last March, focused on 236 matched pairs of foods -- organic and conventional -- produced on nearby farms using similar agricultural practices.

That study showed that bite for bite, organic fruit and vegetables -- on the average -- pack more nutritional value than fruit and vegetables raised using pesticides and synthetic fertilizers.

Benbrook said that what's exciting about findings like that is not so much the nutritional content of the food but that nutrition correlates with changes in the soil.

Staff writer Cookson Beecher is based in Sedro-Woolley, Wash. E-mail: cbeecher@capitalpress.com.

The report

Commissioned by the United Kingdom's Food Standards Agency, the report, "Comparison of composition (nutrients and other substances) of organically and conventionally produced foodstuffs: a systematic review of the available literature," examined 162 relevant articles published in peer-reviewed journals from Jan. 1, 1958 to Feb. 29, 2008. As part of the study, the researchers analyzed 3,558 comparisons of nutrients and other substances in organically and conventionally produced food. It did not take the use of pesticides into account.

To read the report, go to www.food.gov.uk/multimedia/pdfs/organicreviewappendices.pdf.

To read The Organic Center's response to the FSA report, go to www.organic-center.org.