Photo copyright Stacey Newman via canva.com.
Up until around 70 years ago, Australians went to a grocer who selected produce for them. Then around the 1950s, Coles and Woolies converted their stores to self-service and shopping habits were changed forever.
People reached for the prettiest produce, resulting in mass wastage of food.
Soon the supermarkets began rejecting anything that didn't look perfect, forcing farmers to come up with a solution.
This "solution" was the extensive use of fungicides, pesticides and herbicides, resulting in pretty but toxic, nutrient dead produce, yet sadly still resulting in wastage, which is devastating especially when there are people going hungry in our world.
Thankfully, organic production steers away from these methods and can often result in what I like to call ugly duckling produce - it might be a bit wonky, a bit smaller or a bit bigger, but looking beyond the outer appearance it is actually the best and healthiest choice for your family.
I happily embrace a few spots or a bug here or there, as it is proof that what I am eating won't cause me harm.
1. Natural Variability
Nature doesn’t produce identical fruits and vegetables. Variations in size, shape, and colour are normal and do not affect the taste or nutritional value of produce. Embracing these differences allows us to appreciate the natural diversity of food.
2. Nutritional Value
The appearance of produce has little correlation with its nutritional content. Even slightly misshapen or blemished fruits and vegetables can be just as nutritious—or even more so—than their visually flawless counterparts. It's what's inside that counts!
3. Minimizing Food Waste
The obsession with perfect produce contributes to massive food waste. Fruits and vegetables that don’t meet cosmetic standards often go unsold or unused, leading to unnecessary disposal of perfectly edible food. By accepting imperfections, we can help reduce this waste.
4. Supporting Sustainable Practices
Focusing on perfect-looking produce promotes unsustainable agricultural practices. Farmers may resort to excessive pesticide use and genetic modification to achieve uniformity, compromising environmental health and biodiversity. Supporting sustainable farming methods means valuing quality over appearance.
5. Rediscovering Flavour
Often, the most flavourful fruits and vegetables are those that are ripe and locally grown, regardless of their appearance. Imperfect produce can surprise you with its taste and texture, offering a richer culinary experience.
6. Economic Accessibility
Perfect produce tends to come with a higher price tag, making it less accessible to everyone. Embracing imperfect produce can make healthy eating more affordable and inclusive for all income levels.
7. Changing Perceptions
As consumers, we have the power to reshape perceptions of what constitutes "good" produce. By choosing to purchase and celebrate imperfect fruits and vegetables, we can encourage retailers and producers to reduce waste and promote more sustainable farming practices.
Please read on for five terrifying facts about pesticide use in Australia.
5 Scary Facts about Pesticides in Australia
- Over 80 pesticides used here in Australia are banned in other countries.
17 of these are carcinogenic, 48 are hormone disrupters, 30 are classified as extremely hazardous or dangerous by WHO and 3 are currently subject to international legal actions. You can find information on these chemicals here. - Our regulations in Australia are very relaxed in comparison to most other countries.
Most countries require a pesticide is proven safe before use. In Australia anything can be used until proven unsafe by conclusive scientific evidence that a pesticide is unsafe for humans before it can be banned.
Let’s take a moment to consider what this means. Years and years of exposure to toxic chemicals before a link is eventually considered, tested and a conclusive outcome is made.
- Washing or peeling your produce won't work.
Attempting to peel produce such as grapes (which have over 30 chemicals applied) with thin skin or strawberry (over 20 chemicals) and celery (on average over 60 chemicals applied) with no skin will not remove all of the chemical residue, which is absorbed into the flesh.
In Australia, we also use "systemic" chemicals. These are particularly scary as they are absorbed in to the entire fruit, making it impossible to wash or peel away. - Pesticides are destroying our environment.
Pesticides aren't selective. They don't just harm fruit flies or slugs. They kill important pollinators such as bees, natural predators such as ladybugs and work their way up the food chain to harm animals necessary for a healthy and diverse ecosystem.
What's worse is that detrimental insects (and weeds and fungi for that matter) are becoming resistant to these toxic chemicals due to overuse, requiring them to be used in larger concentrations, leading to further harm to beneficial species. - The world's go-to herbicide is developed by American and German operations that produced chemical weapons during World War II
The devastating Agent Orange that killed and caused ongoing health problems to the Vietnamese people and Vietnamese War Veterans was developed by Monsanto with the help of Nazi-sympathisers, Bayer.
Their most famous collaboration, the agricultural and home herbicide Roundup (active ingredient Glyphosate), shares many similarities. Despite all the evidence of harm out there, farmers are still determined and happy to use Roundup because it is a cheap and quick option for weed control. We often comment that farmers who say "we use organic practises but won't get certified" would definitely be using these chemicals because for all the hard work, and expense it takes to hand weed you simply wouldn't do it without the organic certification, it’s too hard (see a picture of our Tuscan Kale beforehand weeding, then after). It takes 4-6 hours to weed just one 50 metre row of produce, and we have 8 rows to one bed, with a total 9 beds in total. By the time you finish all the beds, you have to go back and start again... but I digress.
If your organic produce doesn’t look as “perfect” as what you find in Coles and Woolies, rejoice, as it is simply a reflection of how perfectly free from GMO and chemicals it is.
