Thursday, June 14, 2012

The Supercroppers on nutrition

Food...nutrition...health...

Hard to deny the link between those elements..
But in our society, these elements are weirdly aligned.

We eat food for the nutrition. The very nutrition that feeds us. That fuels the different parts of the human machine. The macro and micro nutrients that oil the wheels of life.

Funny that, given the importance of this, we do not pay more attention to what it is we really eat.

Let me explain...
In a previous post, I referred to "cancer in a berry"...You might have thought I was exagerating. I wish I was.

That strawberry starts it's life in a field somewhere in California. The land is tilled, then fumigated. WIth methyl bromide.
Methyl bromide is a fumigant that was banned by the Montreal convention years ago. The US still uses it but will be phasing it out shortly. With reason...

Methyl bromide kills and sterilizes everything. 2 meters deep. Rodents, insects, weeds. It kills anything alive. As you have guessed, it's extremely potent.

...and toxic....for humans. It's a known carcinogenic chemical. For the ozone. It's known to severely attack the natural protective layers of our planet. But they use it anyway.

The berries are then planted through a black plastic tarp and grown that way. They are then picked way before they are ripe. That's in order to ship them firm. They are often picked white and then turned red with ethylene gas.

They are not bred, cultivated and picked for flavor. They are grown in a way that suits the industry. Not the consumer.

Back to nutrition...
Strawberries, like all fruits and vegetables, develop flavor and nutrition in the last 10% of their growth cycle. When they ripen. When they reach their real color. Naturally. That's also when they get their flavor.
That berry that gets picked the way we currently grow contains about 60% of the nutritious elements it would if it were ripened on the plant. It will lose 20% of this during transport. It will lose another 20 or so percent on the grocery shelf waiting for someone to buy it.

By the time you use it after it has sat in your fridge, it pretty much contains 0% nutritious elements.

But the chemicals do not dissolve or dissipate. Since they are not organic elements, they do not break down. At least not before a long long long time.

Cancer in a berry...

Khaled

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