It looks good . . . should taste good . . . but are you prepared to pay over the odds for food labelled 'organic', in the hope of better health and a good conscience? And do you really know what you are buying, asks Kathy Sheridan.
You amble happily into the shop and gaze at the vegetables. Research tells us that 80 per cent of decisions are made subconsciously as we patrol the aisles, so you hover over the handy little bags of salad leaves. Hang on . . . Wasn't there something about them being washed in chlorine to facilitate that generous use-by date? Pass.
You reach for a pack of "fresh" green beans. The label says "Kenya". That's about 5,000 miles away, with oil prices in the stratosphere and a gazillion tonnes of carbon dioxide emitted to fly them here. Are people nuts? Pass.
And those shiny, perfectly shaped peppers? Are they saturated with pesticides and chemicals to make them look like that? Is that farmed salmon the stuff they were saying nasty things about somewhere? That happiness is turning into a low niggle.
You pick up a pack of chicken nuggets. Are they the ones made entirely or partly of cow lips and chicken bums? And all those neatly trussed rows of plump, cheap chicken - what did you read about them? Enough to make you wince as you reach for one, remembering the reports about cow and pig "protein" being found in fillets (to help retain the water pumped in to swell the meat), swatting away images in your mind of birds cramped in cages, crippled by their own weight.
Then you recall what Michelin Star chef Richard Corrigan said about Irish chicken. We were committing a "great offence" by buying it, "full of antibiotics" and "poorly exercised" as the animals were, said Corrigan. "They're producing muck, crap, and people are buying it, and I think it's absolutely appalling."
Still want to drop that chicken into the trolley? Umm, maybe not. That low niggle has become high anxiety. After all, as legendary TV chef Julia Child put it: "When you're afraid of your food, you don't digest it well."
You turn to the organic birds and whistle at the prices: more than twice as high as Corrigan's miserable targets. But hey, they had happy lives roaming free and weren't ingesting antibiotics in the water from birth. And someone says there's nothing to beat the flavour. So you stump up. And it hurts.
A 2001 European survey showed that the average consumer price premium for organic food varied from 36 per cent in the case of baby food to a high of 113 per cent for chicken. On individual items, premiums went from zero for organic muesli in Austria to more than 270 per cent for potatoes in the Netherlands.
Why so much? Organic chickens require expensive organic feed and far greater quantities of it; and they are given nearly twice as long to mature naturally before slaughter. They get strictly prescribed, generous housing space and outdoor runs and the kind of labour-intensive husbandry required when routine antibiotics are not an option. Higher prices also compensate for the lower yields resulting from longer production times and lower stocking rates.
For organic crops, the regulations on pesticides, chemicals and fertilisers make the business vastly more labour-intensive and low-yielding. Typically, the yield is only 50 to 80 per cent of conventionally grown crops.
So is your short-sighted penny-pinching poisoning your children, wrecking their palates, destroying Mother Earth with carbon dioxide-emitting imports and intensive farming, and depriving hard-working, local, ideologically pure organic farmers of their livelihoods?
Maybe. Maybe not. The trouble is that no one can say for sure whether any of this is true.
Dr Patrick O'Mahony, chief biotechnology specialist at the Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI), says: "I'm not convinced of the health and nutrition claims of the organic groups. There is not enough evidence to sway me. I think a lot of the pro-organic claims are fairly hairy. If you have a mixed and varied diet, you're okay."
His "pure science" approach has many supporters. Sir John Krebs, former chairman of the UK Food Standards Agency, has said baldly that there is no evidence that organic produce is safer or more nutritious than conventional foods.
Also, EU regulations permit the use of such toxins and likely carcinogens as pyrethrins, Bacillus thuringiensis and copper sulphate preparations in organic farming - because they come from natural sources. Does this undermine one of the organic movement's unique selling points, its claim that its produce is chemical-free? Many scientists say yes.
Does it matter? The same scientists say our food - conventional and otherwise - has never been safer. So it only matters because it highlights an aspect of the organic movement's philosophy which attracts scientific scorn: that synthetic/man-made is always bad and that "natural" is always good.
Our dietary intake of nature's pesticides is about 10,000 times higher than our intake of synthetic pesticides. And although only about 60 of those natural pesticides have been tested on rats, about half of these have been shown to cause cancer in rats and are present in many common foods. In other words, say the scientists, natural and synthetic chemicals are equally likely to show up positive in animal cancer tests. Anyway, given the low doses to which humans are usually exposed, the comparative hazards of synthetic pesticide residues are insignificant.
However, no one can dispute that much smaller amounts of pesticides, additives and antibiotics are used in organic food. Should we care?
Janie Axelrad, a research fellow at Liverpool University, told the Guardian that combinations of pesticides - the so-called cocktail effect - may harm babies' development. But the UK Pesticide Residues Committee (PRC), which looked at hundreds of studies, said the levels of residue were so tiny that there was no interaction unless the same class of pesticides was involved. ("Then it became more worrying," said the chairman, Dr Ian Brown.)
The cumulative effects are precisely what the organic movement has said we should be worrying about.
Now consider the other major reason why people buy organic produce: flavour. Research by nutritionists at UCC found that organic chicken breast tasted no better than conventional meat - a judgment which, as the report noted, "may be of interest to consumers who pay a higher premium of 120-180 per cent for organic chicken meat". Nor did consumers notice any difference in taste after a beef-steak comparison.
The UCC report concludes: "The claims that organic farming has certain benefits are likely to be true for soil, water and animal welfare. However, claims that organic foods are healthier cannot be sustained given the present state of knowledge."
Yet a 1999 study sponsored by the US Department of Agriculture found that pastured (free range) chicken had significantly lower levels of fat, far less cholesterol and far higher levels of fatty acids and vitamins.
But beware. This is not a given across the food ranges. Fat and sugar content can be just as high - or higher - in organic products, so the label is crucial.
Confused? Josef Finke, a long-standing pioneer of organic farming in Ireland and a spokesman for the Organic Trust, sighs wearily and points to the "science" that came out of the tobacco industry before it was rumbled. In his view, it is for science to catch up with the organic movement.
"It's only now that the money is available for proper research," he says. "But it is obvious that we [human beings] are the last in the food chain, and pesticides are accumulating there in our fat tissue and, at some stage, will affect your health. I do accept that there is no cut-and-dried rule on when this or that will happen, but, for example, people are only now coming to terms with chronic fatigue syndrome."
Meanwhile, his organic food shop in Cahir, Co Tipperary, has plenty of adherents who travel for hours to get there.
"They are delighted they don't have to read any labels," he says.
The problem for Finke et al is that much of the negligible science available tends to work against them. A quick trawl reveals increased instances of bugs of all kinds in organic produce, such as the Campylobacter bug in free-range poultry or a higher E.coli presence in organic lettuce. To be fair, the FSAI's Dr O'Mahony notes that the use of farmyard manure as a fertiliser has not been shown to result in a corresponding increase in food-borne health problems but he recommends that any fresh produce should be washed with large volumes of clean water.
One thing that almost everyone agrees on is that organic farming must somehow be better for the environment. But if the inference is that organic produce always conserves food miles, energy and nutrition, the facts are not so clear-cut.
At least 70 per cent of the organic food on the Irish market is imported. It may come from the EU or from countries as far afield as Argentina or Zimbabwe. In a typical organic basket in recent weeks, the potatoes were Italian, the carrots Spanish and Italian, the garlic French, the celery Spanish and the onions and mushrooms Dutch. Up to a few weeks ago, the broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage were also imported. Organic Irish carrots are currently available, but catch them while you can.
"There is no huge variety here and never will be, not for what people expect nowadays," says Michael Connolly, a Co Kildare organic producer and processor. People no longer seem to know when a vegetable is in season, he says, which tends to negate the "organic is local" argument.
This niche was spotted by a few organic producers, such as Denis Healy, from Co Wicklow, who also became importers.
"I don't want my food to be lathered with chemicals, but I also want it to be gorgeous. Just because Ireland is on the fringe, does that mean we never look to our neighbours?" says Healy, rhapsodising about Mirabelle plums and Exalta grapes from France and - for a "Christmas treat" - beautiful cherries from Argentina.
Three years ago, Healy had stalls at two markets; now he does up to 15 a week. Although he continues to cultivate more than 14 acres, he admits that most of his living now comes from imports.
"My big saviour is the markets and home deliveries," he says.
The markets are booming. Ten years ago, according to Paschal Gillard, certification officer with the Irish Organic Farmers' and Growers' Association (IOFGA) - the first organic growers' group - there were 10 farmers' markets around the country; now there are almost 100, usually with a few organic stalls. The organic box delivery market is also thriving.
But part of the fall-out from this rapid growth is the fragmentation of the industry and an element of scepticism among consumers. How can we be sure that the loose apples or carrots on a stall are what the sellers say they are? We can't. Appearance is no guide and there is no recognised scientific test to differentiate between organic and conventional produce. The only telltale signs - if you're prepared to have the food tested - might be the presence of certain pesticide residues, growth promoters or genetically modified materials which are prohibited in organic production.
Despite the rigorous certification process, the annual licensing requirement, the annual inspections and the on-the-spot checks, it's a case of "buyer beware", according to Jeff Moon, the FSAI's specialist in environmental health.
"There can be a problem with loose products sold door to door," he says. "Consumers really have to start asking the questions. There is a degree of complacency. They need to read the labels and start asking to see the certificates."
Ken O'Toole, a third-generation organic butcher in Terenure, Dublin, licensed through IOFGA and the Demeter organisation, remarks that he has had several spot-checks and inspections "but they're not inspecting where they should be inspecting. What about the places I'm supplying, like the restaurants etc? And the markets are allowed away with a hell of a lot more than we would be".
One licensed processor says he has not been inspected in more than two years.
Joseph Finke is realistic.
"If you want to betray the system, there are always ways you can do it," he says. "If you have cash reserves and can bypass the official bookkeeping system, of course you can buy conventional produce and pass if off . . ."
He mentions an occasion when an unlicensed retailer, who had managed to obtain a supply of organic labels from a producer, was seen packing produce.
"Generally, I am happy enough with the inspection levels now," Finke says. "There are a few cases pending and the Department [of Agriculture and Food] is tightening the screw - but that is what we have been asking for all the years."
Michael O'Donovan, of the department's structures division, confirms that it is "close to prosecuting" a retailer alleged to have been passing off non-organic food as organic. It will be the first such prosecution under powers granted to the division a couple of years ago. It is currently investigating 10 complaints received this year, the majority relating to markets, but O'Donovan admits that resources and monitoring are limited.
"We have to depend on what people are telling us," he says.
Meanwhile, IOFGA - with 720 registered members out of around 1,000 Irish producers - is kicking out an average of four members a year for breaches of the rules. These include: a processor who had "problems" with record-keeping and was buying in non-organic stock; a farmer who treated cows with antibiotics without informing IOFGA; another who was feeding conventional compound to poultry; and one who used the wrong fertiliser.
"These were all established guys who should have known better," says Paschal Gillard.
Apart from the withdrawal of licences, several of them would also have suffered substantial penalties - up to €30,000 in one case - in the form of grant clawbacks by the department.
"Possibly one of the reasons why there are not more farmers in the sector is what they see as excessive regulation," says Michael O'Donovan. "But I honestly don't see any other way."
Although Superquinn told The Irish Times that it is seeing a 15 per cent year-on-year growth in organic fruit and vegetables, the big picture in Ireland is hardly encouraging. Production here is going down rather than up. This is the only EU state to have reduced its organic farming land in the last five years. Less than 1 per cent of Irish land is farmed organically, compared to 12 per cent in Austria and more than 6 per cent in many EU states. Organic food sales represent less than 0.05 per cent of the total food market. In 2003, the sector's performance was less than half as strong as that of its British counterpart.
According to a Bord Bia survey, nearly 60 per cent of Irish consumers have never bought organic food, while committed organic devotees comprise only 8 per cent of all consumers.
Two-thirds of non-buyers cite price as their reason. The number of people willing to pay an extra 10 per cent for organic produce has dropped from 57 per cent to 44 per cent in two years.
"But it's also quite clear," says Bord Bia's Julian Smith, "that consumers are utterly confused. They have no idea what standards are applied or by whom."
There is no single national organic logo or certification body. Currently, shoppers have to deal with no fewer than three Irish labels, plus an optional EU label, and other countries' certification labels. It seems self-defeating at least. Meanwhile, the consumer who merely wants to eat with a clear conscience is left hanging.