Beyond Organic

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The transition of "organic" from small farm to big time is now upon us. Although getting toxic chemicals out of agriculture is an improvement we can all applaud, it only removes the negatives. The positive focus, enhancing the biological quality of the food produced, is nowhere to be seen. The new standards are based on what not to do rather than what to do. They will be administered through the USDA, whose director said recently, "Organic food does not mean it is superior, safer or more healthy than conventional food." Well, I still agree with the old-time organic pioneers. I believe that properly grown food is superior, safer and healthier. I also believe national certification bureaucracies are only necessary when food is grown by strangers in far away places rather than by neighbors you know. I further believe good, fresh food, grown locally by committed growers, is the very best to be found.

In my opinion, "organic" is now dead as a meaningful synonym for the highest quality food. Responsible growers need to identify not only that our food is grown to higher, more considered standards, but also that it is much fresher because it is grown right where it is sold. Therefore, we have come up with a new term, one we define to mean locally grown and unprocessed, in addition to exceptional quality. ( See below .) It's a term we hope will be used, as "organic" was used when we began, by those local grow ers who accept that if you care first about the quality of what you produce, a market will always be there. We now sell our produce as "Authentic Food." We invite other serious growers to join us.

Interested growers can contact Eliot at Four Seasons Farm, 587 Weir Cove Road, Harborside, Maine 04642.-Mother

Authentic Food - Beyond Organic

A seal of quality from a farm near you

The label "organic" has lost the fluidity it used to hold for the growers more concerned with quality than the bottom line, and consumers more concerned with nutrition than a static set of standards for labeling. "Authentic" is meant to be the flexible term "organic" once was. It identifies fresh foods produced by local growers who want to focus on what they are doing, in stead of what they aren't doing. (The word authentic derives from the Greek authentes: one who does things for him or herself.) The standards for a term like this shouldn't be set in stone, but here is what I would like for growers to focus on:

• All foods are produced by the growers who sell them.
• Fresh fruits and vegetables, milk, eggs and meat products are produced within a 50-mile radius of their place of their final sale.
• The seed and storage crops (grains, beans, nuts, potatoes, etc.) are produced within a 300-mile radius of their final sale.
• Only traditional processed foods such as cheese, wine, bread and lactofermented products may claim, "Made with authentic ingredients."
• The growers' fields, barns and greenhouses are open for inspection at any time, so customers, themselves, can be the certifiers of their food.
• All agricultural practices used on farms selling under the "authentic" label are chosen to produce foods of the highest nutritional quality.
• Soils are nourished, as in the natural world, with farm-derived organic matter and mineral particles from ground rock.
• Green manures and cover crops are included within broadly based crop rotations to maintain biological diversity.
• A "plant positive" rather than "pest negative" philosophy is followed, focusing on correcting the cause of problems rather than treating symptoms.
• Livestock are raised outdoors on grass-based pasture systems to the fullest extent possible.
• The goal is vigorous, healthy crops and livestock endowed with their inherent powers of vitality and resistance.

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