Posted on 08/26/2012 4:29:58 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Ever get the sneaking suspicion that corporations -- or hell, even the mango vendor at the local farmers' market -- are conspiring to use your fear of ingesting chemicals to get you to spend more money on food? Those who worry that they're being misled about the veracity of certain "organic" claims will soon have a pricy tool to protect themselves; at least in theory.
Lapka has created a personal environmental monitor via a sleek iPhone accessory and app that claims to be able to test for radiation, electromagnetic fields, humidity, and organicity by way of four separate plug-ins. The product should debut in late 2012 and according to the maker, the device "is designed to look for significant quantities of nitrates in raw foods and drinking water caused by residues of synthetic fertilizers." Notice the word raw: This won't be able to tell you whether those Newman-O's live up to their label.
The device tests for organicity by way of a tiny stainless steel probe -- designed "for medical accuracy and enhanced durability" -- that is inserted into the food. So, yeah: You'll have to stab the food in order to evaluate it. Not sure how Whole Foods or Publix will take to shoppers poking holes in their apples and kale before purchase, so good luck with that one. But that's not the only reason to pause before plunking down $220 for the innovative device.
Because the product description only mentions nitrates (certainly not the only issue at hand with organics), Clean Plate Charlie reached out to resident organic farming expert and "hot farmer" Jason McCobb (aka. Farmer Jay) for his take on the device. Bear in mind that neither McCobb nor Clean Plate Charlie have used or interacted with Lapka, so all comments are based only on press materials available at this time.
"The concept is interesting, but I am more worried about pesticide and fungicide residues," said McCobb via email. "Doesn't sound like it will detect those. I like some of the other features better, like EMF and radiation (detection). It will probably be like the mosquito repellent app or the metal detector app; good in theory, but not functional."
McCobb also made an interesting point about what the market for such a device says about some people's inclinations to exploit the organic food movement: "It really sucks that we need to spend so much money and time to protect ourselves from liars and people that are trying to scavenge on our movement."
If going organic is important to you, make friends with local growers and give your business to people you feel you can trust. Otherwise, for now -- as always -- the only way to know what you're getting, with 100-percent certainty, is to grow it yourself. Good thing Florida's hell summer is just about coming to a close.
Cue the Gallagher geico commercial
So, non-organic food is inorganic?
I always thought the way to tell if produce is organic was to be sure it is small, pest damaged, and swarming with e-coli from all the s*** they dump on the fields. It should also cost 2 to 3 times more than the nicer looking and nutritionally identical produce grown with modern agricultural practices.
I recently went to a lecture on grape/vineyard production and someone asked a question about organic.
The guy giving the lecture said “organic” is just a label to make the consumer feel good, and that’s it.
He went on to say that food production in the US is so tightly control there is nothing that is not technically organic but most people don’t want to go through the process of applying for the certificate because it cost so much.
So that’s one/his opinion, I am not a farmer so I can’t say for sure but it sounded reasonable.
Well, most regular supermarket vegetables are subsidized by illegal immigrant labor. People are angry about paying a tiny bit more for vegetables, but then they don’t like illegal immigrants, which they are causing.
Fools eat organic. And free range and whatever else. Fools.
You support completely unfettered illegal immigration?
Getting fleeced by the faux ‘Organic Grocer’?...Yeah, there’s an app for that..
Uh, unless you eat rocks, your food is organic.
I agree. Raise anything you want and when you take it to market, put an “organic” sign on it, and up the price.
Yes, I said so for years.
I ALWAYS choose inorganic foods, only eat organic when the real stuff isn't available.
Most all food is organic. Besides sodium chloride and water, what common food substance is not organic?
Organic means “wormy”
Have you ever had a supermarket tomato? They were picked green three months before, gassed to make them red, and bred for transportation. Why would pay any money for something that tastes awful? I wouldn’t.
Someone gave me a couple of home-grown tomatoes recently. I made them into sauce. Boy was that sauce good! So sweet!
LOL!!!
I remember reading these usenet sites years ago where the liberals were discussing ways to take the wind out of America's sails. They agreed that our food is too inexpensive and that if we were made to spend more on food we'd have less left over to destroy the Earth (or whatever). I have a real problem with that notion. I don't want to go back to the days where food was so damned scarce that oranges were given away as Christmas gifts. I think it's great that a much smaller percentage of our population is needed to grow our food. Just my take.
All food is organic; the stuff fertilized with shit is just more expensive and more likely to kill you.
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