There’s an important factor that determines the quality of foods we eat, and that’s how it’s grown, harvested and/or raised.
The highest quality produce (fruits and vegetables) is local and organic;
the highest quality meat, dairy products, and eggs come from pasture-raised animals;
and the highest quality fish is wild-caught.
Organic and local produce: more nutrients, fewer chemicals
Organic plant foods contain, on average, 25 percent higher concentrations of 11 nutrients than their conventional counterparts.
In particular, they tend to be higher in important polyphenols and antioxidants like vitamin C, vitamin E, and quercetin.
Even more relevant in determining nutrient content is where your produce comes from, and in particular, how long it’s been out of the ground before you eat it. Most of the produce sold at large supermarket chains is grown hundreds – if not thousands – of miles away, in places like California, Florida, and Mexico. This is especially true when you’re eating foods that are out of season in your local area (like a banana in mid-winter).
A typical carrot, for example, may have travelled miles to reach your dinner table. Days—maybe more than a week—have passed since it was picked, packaged and trucked to the store, where it can sit on the shelves even longer.
The problem with this is that food starts to change as soon as it’s harvested and its nutrient content begins to deteriorate. Total vitamin C content of red peppers, tomatoes, apricots, peaches and papayas has been shown to be higher when these crops are picked ripe from the plant.
A study compared the Vitamin C content of supermarket broccoli in season and supermarket broccoli out of season (shipped from another country). The out-of-season broccoli had only half the vitamin C of the seasonal broccoli.
Without exposure to light (photosynthesis), many vegetables lose their nutrient value.
If you buy vegetables from the supermarket that were picked a week ago, transported to the store in a dark truck, and then stored in the middle of a pile in the produce section, and then you put them in your dark refrigerator for several more days before eating them, chances are they’ve lost much of their nutrient value. A study found that spinach lost 47 percent of its folate after 8 days.
This is why buying your produce at local farmer’s markets, or even better, picking it from your backyard garden, are better options than buying conventional produce shipped from hundreds or thousands of miles away. Fruits and vegetables from local farms are usually stored within one or two days of picking, which means their nutrient content will be higher. And as anyone who’s eaten a fresh tomato right off the vine will tell you, local produce tastes so much better than conventional produce it might as well be considered a completely different food.
Another important benefit of organic produce, of course, is that it’s grown without pesticides, herbicides and other harmful chemicals that have been shown to cause health problems – especially in vulnerable populations like children. A study published in the journal Pediatrics concluded that children exposed to organophosphate pesticides at levels typically found in conventional produce and are more likely to develop attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
A panel of scientists convened to study the effect of environmental toxins on cancer released a report in 2010 urging Americans to eat organic produce grown without pesticides, fertilizers or other chemicals. The report states that the government has grossly underestimated the number of cancers caused by environmental toxins. Furthermore, the report especially highlights the risk of toxins in conventionally grown foods to unborn children. Exposure to harmful chemicals during this critical period can set a child up for lifelong endocrine disruption, hormone imbalances, and other problems.