The heirloom tomatoes in your garden may not just be tastier than commercially grown vegetables, but healthier too, according to a study from the American College of Nutrition.

The study looked for 13 nutrients in 43 crops grown from 1950 to 1999 and discovered that the vegetables enjoyed by our grandparents were significantly more nutritious than the veggies found on supermarket shelves today.

After rigorous statistical analysis, the researchers found that, on average, all three minerals evaluated have declined; two of five vitamins have declined; and protein content has dropped by 6 percent.

The decline is attributed to the relentless pursuit of crop strains that produce high yields, but few nutrients. One solution, short of agribusiness embracing lower-yielding crop strains or starting a vegetable garden, is to patronize farm stands and farmer’s markets where you can buy from smaller, multi-crop farmers that value quality above quantity.

Changes in USDA Food Composition Data for 43 Garden Crops, 1950 to 1999 [Journal of the American College of Nutrition]

According to Ecorazzi [yes, there is a web site devoted to green gossip]:

An advert has been placed looking for someone to “help phase out the use of pesticides from the Palace’s gardens, improving ‘environmental and conservation practices’ as well as maintaining a new organic vegetable garden at Clarence House.”

The position pays £13,500 and will no doubt potentially include some tea-time with the green prince himself.

Charles has been an avid organic gardener for the past 25 years and, as the article points out, his garden at Highgrove House is considered one of the jewels of the organic movement.

His latest book, The Elements Of Organic Gardening, offers advice on converting to organic and reveals the methods used at some of the palace gardens like Clarence House and Birkhall in Scotland.

That tub of fruit yoghurt on the supermarket shelf has been advertised as healthy, fresh – and probably organic into the bargain.

But it also probably represents as much as 9000 kilometres of road and air transport to get it to the shelf. The yoghurt base, the fruit, the jar or tub, the lid, the label and even the bulk carton it came in have all come from widely scattered places. Germans consume 3 billion serves of processed yoghurt every year.

Modern industrial food production looks efficient: the products are always there, always fresh and always consistent. But underlying that seeming efficiency is a prodigal expenditure of energy, mostly as fossil fuels; often, the energy used to get the food to you outweighs the energy value of the food itself.

It takes 1000 kilojoules of energy to ship 170 kilojoules worth of out-of-season strawberries from Chile to the USA.

The answer, if you’re really serious about reducing your ecological footprint, is to unmodernise in the kitchen. Buy less processed food, cut down on out-of-season produce and scout around for a farmers’ market – they’re springing up everywhere and you’ll know the food has travelled tens rather than thousands of kilometres.

By doing that, you’ll also cut down on food additives, save money, rediscover the true pleasures of cooking and help farming folk to stay on the land.

The organic food movement’s adherents have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams, but success has imperiled their ideals. It simply isn’t clear that organic food production can be replicated on a mass scale.

And it looks like big business is going to do it their way …

Just as mainstream consumers are growing hungry for untainted food that also nourishes their social conscience, it is getting harder and harder to find organic ingredients.

There simply aren’t enough organic cows in the US, never mind the organic grain to feed them, to go around. Nor are there sufficient organic strawberries, sugar, or apple pulp — some of the other ingredients that go into the world’s best-selling organic yogurt.

So what are we eating?

Drinking green tea can substantially cut the risk of dying from a range of illnesses, a Japanese study has found.

The research, which looked at over 40,000 people, found the risk of fatal cardiovascular disease was cut by more than a quarter.

But British heart experts said the benefits may be linked to the whole Japanese diet, which is healthier than that eaten in the west.

In this study, which began in 1994, researchers from Tohoku University looked at how humans could benefit.

They examined data on 40,530 healthy adults aged 40 to 79 in north-eastern Japan, where green tea is widely consumed.

Around 80% of people in the region drink green tea, with more than half consuming three or more cups each day.

Tamsyn Jones has written an evocative cover story for the latest issue of E/The Environmental Magazin which succinctly argues that our future depends on our looking after it. [The photograph is an outtake from the cover photoshoot by Jon Moe.]

“It’s one of nature’s most perfect contradictions”, says Tamsyn, “a substance that is ubiquitous but unseen; humble but essential; surprisingly strong but profoundly fragile. It nurtures life and death; undergirds cities, forests and oceans; and feeds all terrestrial life on Earth.”

“It is a substance few people understand and most take for granted. Yet, it is arguably one of Earth’s most critical natural resources—and humans, quite literally, owe to it their very existence.From the food we eat to the clothes we wear to the air we breathe, humanity depends upon the dirt beneath our feet.

“Gardeners understand this intuitively; to them, the saying “cherish the soil” is gospel. But for the better part of society, dirt barely gets a sideways glance.

“To most, it’s just part of the background, something so obvious it’s ignored.

“Even among the environmentally minded, soil sags well below the radar of important causes. But the relationship between soil quality and other aspects of environmental health is intricately entwined.

“What’s more, it’s a relationship that encompasses a vast swath of territory, from agricultural practices to global climate change, and from the well being of oceans to that of people.

“Despite humankind’s long relationship with soil, the stuff remains a mystery.
Even our language manages to maligns it. Somehow, “dirt” has acquired a bad reputation. And it’s been codified in some of our most common idioms, with people described as “dirty rotten scoundrels,” “poor as dirt” or “dirtbags.”

“The modern word “dirt” itself descends from the less than complimentary Old English word “drit,” meaning “excrement.” Instead of marveling at the mystery of soil, we have mocked it, by dredging and paving; desiccating and polluting; and working it to exhaustion.

“Now our poor husbandry of this essential resource is catching up with us, in the form of disconcertingly rapid erosion and loss of farmland, widespread agricultural pollution, damage to fisheries, and alarming levels of pesticides and other chemicals building up in our bodies.

“The subject of soil is rarely billed as glamorous or sexy, but it should be. From its remarkable properties to its critical ecological importance, the dirt under our feet is a goldmine of scientific wonderment, and it’s about time people got excited about soil.”

Dig deeper into her fascinating story about soil at E/The Environmental Magazine

TAMSYN JONES is a recent graduate of the University of Missouri at Columbia, currently pursuing further study in Tasmania.

As organic food becomes a bigger presence on the shelves of major grocery stores, the University of Florida is following suit by expanding the study and research of organic farming. The photograph shows a field technician at the university using a propane burner as a weed killer.

UF officials recently announced the university will be one of the first in the U.S. to offer an organic farming major. A class in organic crop production is being offered for the first time this fall semester as part of the program.

“The organic food industry is maturing and I think you see that in lot of ways,” said Mickie Swisher, co-director of UF’s Center for Organic Agriculture.

The development of national organic standards in 2002 made the UF major possible, said Danielle Treadwell, an assistant horticulture professor teaching the crop production course. Now students can be taught standards that can be applied anywhere in the country, she said.

A good cobber, Peter Adams of Windgrove, has a fascinating blog — Life on the Edge — that often challenges his readers.

Today’s entry was typical. He asks: How much of the earth’s land is available to grow food?

Imagine, says Peter, that the earth is the apple above.

Take this apple and cut it into four quarters. One part is covered by land. The others are covered by water. Discard these three pieces.

Cut this land section in half. One of these halves is covered with mountains, desert or ice. Discard this piece.

Cut the remaining piece into fourths. Three of these are rocky, too wet, too hot, too infertile, or covered with roads or cities. Discard these.

Only 1/32 of the apple remains.

The thin layer of red of this section, shown left, represents the topsoil that must feed the world.

We had better look after it.