By Achim Mohssen-Beyk, Reachview Farm

Food is one of the most important human needs - farming produces food, and without farming we would not live.

As the population has grown, civilization has developed and people's expectations have risen. Demanding bigger, better-looking produce in ever-increasing quantities has put enormous pressure on the farming industry. Although this pressure has caused increasing yields, there is a downside to this development.

Cheap produce and meat can be produced only through high volume production systems. The results are inhumane and unnatural mass production. We are even importing locally available products from outside Canada to be able to offer food at the lowest price possible.

The use of chemical fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides, hormones, antibiotics, de-wormers and synthetic medication, which originally were meant to make increasing yields possible are harming our environment, our livestock, the producer and the consumer. The result is that our children don't know how a chicken or potato tastes the way nature made it originally. Many suffer from allergies and deadly diseases like cancer.

We pay the price of our search for the cheapest price with decreasing quality, less nutritional value and loss of our family farms . Our water is no longer safe and the soil is no longer alive.

Externalisation of production and transportation costs make cheap products possible. In reality we pay more, because our health care system and all our tax money pay for these externalised costs. In addition we pay with the loss of environment and resources.

Here is why the organic movement shows us the right direction. We have to find our way back to healthy and drug free food. Organic agriculture enhances the quality of the soil with composts, green manure and crop rotations instead of chemicals. Disease, weeds and pests are controlled by herbal pesticides, crop rotation, timed intervention, homeopathics and the support of natural preventitive mechanisms.

Livestock can grow in natural living environments, without inhumane treatment, chemical drugs and antibiotics.
With organic agriculture we achieve higher nutritional levels in our food, a cleaner environment and better health. We also support our family farms, especially when we buy local organic products.
Organic Agriculture is the only way we can survive the 21th century.

Let us make a difference and give our children and ourselves a chance to live in a healthy environment.