Hi All,

I recently was sent the following link.  As a long-term organic gardener, I
now question whether I've been pulling the wool over my own eyes!
Waldemar is gonna hate this; Paul's gonna love it!  No telling where Bob is
going to weigh in  : )

http://www.gaiaresearch.co.za/organics.html
Excerpts follow:

Organically grown plants may each produce a minimum of 50 such natural
pesticides. Prof Bruce Ames is quoted as saying that the average person
consumes 1500mg of pesticides a day, of which 1499.91mg are endogenous
toxins, the remaining 0.09mg being synthetic pesticides applied to the
produce by the farmer.

“Anticarcinogenic phytochemicals in the diet protect humans equally well
against synthetic and natural carcinogens. Multiple hazard chemical
synergisms occur from both natural and synthetic sources. These
anticarcinogens do not distinguish whether carcinogens are synthetic or
natural in origin.”

Crop protection chemicals reduce plant stress, yet there is no pesticide
risk management program that evaluates the risk versus benefit equation to
balance the risk from crop protection chemicals (which are extensively
tested and heavily regulated) against the benefit of decreased risk from
natural plant and fungal toxicants (which are only sporadically tested and
regulated).

“The human diet has changed drastically in the last few thousand years, and
most humans are eating many recently introduced plants that their ancestors
did not. Natural selection works far too slowly for humans to have evolved
specific resistance to the food toxins in these newly introduced plants.”

“It is possible that every plant in the supermarket contains natural
carcinogens (legumes, cereals, fungi, herbs, spices and beverages included
with the fruits and vegetables) at levels commonly measured in the (highest)
parts per thousand ranges, ie. thousands of times higher than from man-made
pesticides.”

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