Calling all Organic Moms (and Dads)... looking for info

[jyllebean]

I've been thinking a lot lately about the whole trend towards organic foods and environmentally friendly cleaners. Of course I want to "do good" for the environment, but I am very price sensitive. I have a hard time justifying spending more money on these products if I don't believe in it 100%. Rather than just go along with the "trend" I'm looking for some hard evidence as to why this is more beneficial to me and my family. I've heard some of the arguments but I haven't seen much evidence. I'm looking for something to read to teach me more about the "sustainable living" practice and why spending more money is worth it. Can anyone recommend books or literature that will help me in my research?

Thanks!

Jill

[kcandz]

As far as cleaning products go, a thread just got started in the Lounge with some articles about that issue linked in.

As far as books, are you looking for an objective piece of scientific journalism? Because most books will be pro-organic, might be viewed as propaganda. And maybe they are. :)

For me, I don't need a book or a study to tell me that I don't want chemicals created in a lab with unknown or untested effects on people to be ingested by me or my family. I don't want soil treated with pesticides creating vegetables that I eat.

As far as sustainable for the environment, we all have children on this board, we all need to think of the world they grow into as adults. If we poison the soil cumulatively, adding more and more junk into it to get the best crops year after year, at some point the soil will be ruined. What will our children do for food? Now substitute the word "water" or "air" or any other natural resource with that same thought. We have a finite amount of supply of just about anything here on earth. Once it hits a tipping point, we can't go back. Already our waste water is treated with who knows what and sent back to us to ingest again.

As far as money, these reasons about aren't the sole reason I vote with my dollars by spending more on organic and sustainable items. If I continue to buy the cheaper chemical stuff, it will continue to be made. If I say I only want organic and sustainable, hopefully eventually that is all that will be offered.

[octmom]

Re: the high cost of "safe" cleaning supplies: Lots of folks around here recommend a book called _Clean House, Clean Planet_. It includes recipes for homemade cleaners that are quite inexpensive to make. I understand that white vinegar and baking soda are common ingredients. HTH!

Jerilyn
DS, 10/03
DD, 3/06

[kijip]

I just wanted to take a second to say that living in more sustainable fashion does not have to cost more money in everything-

for example:

-A hybrid costs more money than a regular car, but walking to work or walking to the store when you might otherwise drive costs less than either car based option.

-An organic frozen pizza costs more than a conventional frozen pizza but flour, yeast, oil and salt and a little toppings are more affordable. Rather than buy say organic convenience foods I try to think about how I can plan ahead and cook more from scratch. We get a lot of our food bulk from the co-op and it is a cheaper grocery bill than one might expect for mostly organic items.

-Organic meat and cheeses are pricey. But eating less meat is not only better for the environment, it is better for your heath. Nothing is cheaper than rice, legumes, homemade soups etc.

-Turning down the heat and wearing a sweater is cheaper and better for the environment. Hanging laundry to dry (which I do for most things on inside racks in what is a wet and rainy city unsuited to an out doors clothes line most of the year) is a huge money saver and is an energy saver.

-Seventh Generation spray cleanser is more expensive than 401 or whatever but vinegar, water and elbow grease are cheaper than either. There are a lot of cheaper, natural ways to clean house that don't involve spending money but instead save money.

-Having a compact trash can is cheaper than a big one and I have to recycle and compost more to get down to that size.

At it's core, conservation has a strong frugal streak with reducing and reusing stuff.

We can not buy our way into sustainability. Yes, there are products that are a better deal for the environment that cost more money, especially in things like building materials and home furnishings. But moving towards a cleaner way of living does not have to cost tons of extra money, especially the first steps. While my spouse and I do pay more for some things, we save money in many areas that often offset the other higher costs. The most expensive thing that is green is choosing to live in the city, walking distance to a number of things and work, biking distance to my husband's work etc. We could have had a bigger yard, a bigger house and a slightly lower mortgage if we picked a spot that essentially locked us in to 2 car commutes that could eat up hours each day.

Here is a list of produce that exposes you to the most pesticides:

http://www.foodnews.org/walletguide.php

There are a number of books, including classics like Silent Spring, to more recent things like Inconvenient Truth that highlight various reasons to make the environment a priority. Fast Food Nation and other books like the Omnivores Dilemma cover food issues. Clean House Clean Planet covers home cleaning. I can't offer much up in the way of hard evidence (I know those sources are not considered unbiased but they do contain springboards to sources for further research) but I know what feels right for me and my family and I know what I see empirically and read about in the news. It is counter intuitive to me that it is not worth it to feed my kid cleaner food or generate less garbage. High rates of cancers, asthma, heart disease from a meat dependent diet. I can only give a highlight here of my reasons without writing my own book!

Some of the things I listed above do take more time but I have found that slowing down a little and doing things to be more frugal and green has improved the overall quality of my life.



****Rocking out while parenting my smart little 4 year old munchkin Toby.
The butter melts out of habit, you know the toast isn't even warm. -Ani DiFranco

[brittone2]

nak, and baby has a cold, but this was one article that was widely circulated in the media lately:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6272634.stm\
eta: see right margin at that site as well

I think local and organic is the most ideal situation. Ditto a lot of Katie's comments. Organic convenience foods make eating organic very expensive, whereas if you focus on whole foods and cooking from scratch, it becomes much more affordable.

Meat and dairy have the largest concentrations of nastiness, so those would be my primary focus even before veggies in most cases. Sometimes you can find pastured, local, grass fed meat that isn't necessarily certified organic, but depending on the farmer's practices, it might be even better (IMO) than certified organic (grass fed beef has been shown to have much, much less e. coli contamination, and more beneficial compounds like CLA vs. conventional meat). Reducing overall meat consumption makes it more affordable in general.

For fruit and veggies, as Katie and others have said, look at the dirty dozen.

Another thing to consider is like lots of compounds that have been in the news lately (phthalates, bisphenol A, etc.), pesticides are often estrogen mimicking, and therefore endocrine disruptors.

www.ewg.org is a great resource. You can also find quite a few studies on pubmed in environmental health/toxicology journals about organic vs. non organic foods. They've differentiated the levels of pesticides in kids that eat organic vs. those that don't. I don't have the study handy, but I know it exists and was published.
ETA:
here's one quick summary:
http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/news/20050930/organic-diet-cuts-kids-food-pesticide-levels

http://www.ehponline.org/docs/2003/5754/abstract.html

[bubbaray]

I highly recommend the Clean House Clean Planet book. I bought it and was trying the club soda for windows/mirror thing. I gave a bottle of it to my cleaning lady and asked her to try it, but I didn't tell her what it was. That day, she asked me what it was and told me it did a better job than Windex. So, I told her it was club soda and lent her my copy of the book. Well, being the industrious sort that she is, she made up ALL the solutions in the book and did a trial of her own with her clients for a couple of months. She liked the cleaners so much better than the commercial ones that she made up individual batches for each client and "sold" them too us (basically, her cost of the bottles and ingredients).

I'm pretty happy with the quality of cleaning she is able to achieve with them. Recently, I asked her to switch back to Vim cream cleaner every other visit (she comes every 2 weeks) in the bathrooms b/c I wasn't too sure how clean the baking soda was getting the toilets. But, other than that, I'm happy with the products and how they clean.

On the rare occasion that I clean instead of her, I tend to use Simple Green (diluted 30:1) for most things and the club soda for mirrors. I get Simple Green at Costco -- a large bottle lasts forever!

HTH

Melissa

DD#1: 04/2004

DD#2: 01/2007