Why don't we just call it what it really is?

Heritage Growing is a name that I can embrace. I am a permie, have my PDC & Advanced Practicum, have a Cert. Organic Farm, am Pending Biodynamic Certification but bottom line, there are too many labels for "clean" food. The USDA & the FSA are busy easing regs for their organic label allowing plenty of synthetic additives and washes. I'm going for Heritage Growing as a nod to the millennium of our forefathers that proved that outside additives are not necessary. There haven't been labs, brewing up test tubes of junk to dress our food for very long. Every human on the planet today, is a testament that we can survive just fine when we grow in a closed system. It's not new, it's our Heritage.

It gets my goat when chemical fertilizer, herbicide, fungicide, pesticide, computerized fossil fuel intensive produce is called "Conventional"

I started replacing "conventional" with "industrial" when I'm speaking. Sometimes it pisses people off, but those are the types of people I enjoy pissing off.

I do like the word "heritage" so I think I'll go with that. Now I have heritage farming vs. industrial farming. Heritage produce and livestock vs. industrial produce and industrial livestock.

Marianne Cicala wrote: The USDA & the FSA are busy easing regs for their organic label allowing plenty of synthetic additives and washes.

i think consumers need to know this sort of info.

from what i have seen, most people are looking for a few key words, most of which advertisers have already jumped onto.

pasture raised / free range / grass fed / humanely raised etc.

most consumers couldnt tell the different from a conventional farm and an industrial organic farm - its trying to show those consumers how you are different that is the challenge.


imo, a label wont do it, educating the customer on how they are being duped and how you are not using advertising tricks to get their business is the only way to go. the hard part is getting the time to educate those consumers....

fwiw - i have started referring to our food as "food with integrity" - that seems to be working so far.

On my invoices I put "beyond organic permaculture no spray"

The retailers put either "no spray" or "local no spray" and sometimes they put the name of my village. I don't make sales at retail right now.

I prefer natural farming or sustainable farming. Many practices that are quite old, are harmful to the land and food. Agriculture did plenty of harm to the natural world before the advent of chemical farming.

Dale Hodgins wrote:I prefer natural farming or sustainable farming. Many practices that are quite old, are harmful to the land and food. Agriculture did plenty of harm to the natural world before the advent of chemical farming.

A good point. We tend to put ourselves and our age down but the fact is that most farming/growing practices all around the world were based on mass ignorance. The only reason humanity hadn't turned the ENTIRE planet into a desert [which they succeeded in doing for most of north Africa as well as Iran/Iraq etc.] was because there weren't enough people to accomplish that and their resources were limited. Now, with unlimited resources, we've already managed to desertify 30% of the world's agricultural soils.

We have the potential to do much better than our ancestors ever could. Knowledge is power and with great power comes great responsibility... be a superhero!

Dale Hodgins wrote:I prefer natural farming or sustainable farming. Many practices that are quite old, are harmful to the land and food. Agriculture did plenty of harm to the natural world before the advent of chemical farming.

Masanobu Fukuoka has brought us Natural Farming.

Personally, I prefer "real food" That can encompass biodynamic, organic, or natural

Of course with organic standards collapsing and biodynamic so undefined still (with so many branches and means of teaching, demeter has already shown a significant fall from Stiener's original lectures. Dont get me wrong biodynamics was meant to grow and be innovated from, but not in the black and white demeter is doing. Balance is the key and I feel others are teaching biodynamics in a more wholesome manner.)

As for a universal title or label.. I use chemical or conventional for the poisonous foods and agriculture. While sticking to real food for other methods as mentioned. Eventually I wont be buying organic as the standards are already collapsing.

In 5 yrs organic will mean as much as the word natural does now.

John Master wrote:In 5 yrs organic will mean as much as the word natural does now.

I think this is a problem specific to certain countries, esp the US. I'm in New Zealand, and 'certified organic' still has meaning and is going from strength to strength.

In many ways organic still means something here, but there always seems to be someone trying to relax the standards. organic uht pasteurized milk is one example of organic meaning not very much. Organic grapes on the other hand means a heck of a lot more to me.