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Episode #58 Organic Label Just Lost Integrity...AGAIN · Beyond Labels Premium

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: It moves you into a place where every single thing you have to look out there in the horizon and think of how cleverly somebody could construe language and co-opt it, you know, from day one.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: I can guarantee you, back in the 80s, when all this organic uh standard stuff was was being developed, nobody was thinking that someday somebody would figure out that if they circumvented soil, they could circumvent the entire provisions because um because the provisions were based on soil.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's just it's it's beyond uh it's beyond comprehension.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: Hi everybody, welcome to Beyond Labels.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: I'm your co-host, Dr.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: Cena McCullough, along with Joel Salatin, my favorite farmer.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: Today we have a special show for you.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: This is um updating you on current events.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: And Joel's gonna lead off with a positive update that we have on the um the Pennsylvania Amish farmer uh situation that we brought to you just a couple weeks ago.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks, Zena.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, there is a positive update.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: We left you last time uh discussing his his plight.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: Amos Miller is his name, if you're following the story.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: He has a personal membership association club, services about 4,000 families, and uh was facing jail time and a$300,000 fine for um for not complying with a a judge's cease and desist order that he signed, unfortunately.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and we noted at the time that a lot of his problem has been simply because he hasn't had legal counsel.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: He's had a he's had a judge-appointed attorney, and of course, this judge-appointed attorney eats probably eats at McDonald's every day, has no clue about the you know, food, food choice, food freedom, any of these issues.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: And so he's gotten very, very bad legal counsel and signed some documents actually that have that have exacerbated his problem instead of helping him, his problem.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, we're really, really happy to announce that attorney Robert Barnes is going to has come aside and is going to represent him and um and it head up a legal team that's gonna have some real stars on it.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, Robert Barnes, if you'll uh click back in your memory, he is the uh he was the lead attorney for the Kyle Rittenhouse defense.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Kyle Rittenhouse was the young 18-year-old who went to Waukeshaw, Wisconsin, was attacked by the BLM uh folks there and shot and killed uh one of them, wounded another one.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and he and of course, you know, he's been vilified in the media and every place else.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and uh Robert Barnes uh was his defense attorney and was able to show that it was self-defense, that it was perfectly uh logical for this young man to defend himself with his Second Amendment rights, and um and so uh this guy is he's no slouch.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um he's he's been uh he was the uh counsel for Wesley Snipes.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: The uh you know, the guy who had a uh a tax problem.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm trying to think is and and so here's here's what he says about the Amos Miller case.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: He says this case is bigger and beyond one farmer in the Amish community.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's about what can you farm and what do we eat?
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: And do we can do we control that or is it the government?
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: He's already gotten uh so Miller was scheduled for a court hearing um when we left you last uh uh in in mid-September, and um and that's already been changed.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: You can just sense the tone of things are changing already with this aggressive defense attorney uh coming into the case.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: The the judge is starting to back up a little bit, and um and and and in fact Barnes has um uh oh uh another little development in the case is that the state is trying to also now bring in and indict Amos Miller's wife, Rebecca, because she co-owns the land uh that the that the Miller's farm.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: And um so here's what so there's another attorney that's joined, um, New Jersey-based lawyer Bradford Geyer.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, he's also been added to the uh to the defense team.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: And uh these are both very high-profile attorneys.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and Geyer said for much of the last year, Amos Miller has been without counsel, acting pro se and non-party.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: Unrepresented, Rebecca Miller has not been a party to the case.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: Defendants retained undersigned counsel recently for this matter, filing a motion to appear pro, well, these are legal terms, these all this Latin pro hoc vice in this matter, and needs time to effectively represent the defendants.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: In addition, it is counsel's understanding productive negotiations are underway that may fully resolve this matter.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: So it may be with this new kind of super team on his side that that that the whole court thing kind of dissolves.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: There's a negotiated settlement, and the whole thing uh goes away.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: So, anyway, um, not to belabor the point, but uh, but uh many of us have been really watching this case, and it's exciting to see uh some real, real positive movement and change for the Amos Miller case.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: He is right now, I think, in the nation, he is representative as the point man for this uh battle over personal membership author, uh personal membership associations, which are kind of the oh the the new darling right now of the circum of the food choice circumvention uh movement.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: And um, so this is going to test that and um and we'll see where it goes.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: So uh we'll keep you posted on the Amos Miller case as things progress.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: There is a uh a large uh kind of a fundraiser shindig uh being planned right now for him.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh they've asked me to come and and be the um you know kind of the lead off uh for that, and I have agreed to, of course, uh totally gratis pro bono for me.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: Uh this is an issue that needs our our attention.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: And um it looks like it's being planned right now for spring sometime.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: They just they they wanted to pull it off before this, but with this fast moving change now with legal counsel, it takes a little bit of pressure off.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so um, so they're hoping to do some sort of a shin dig sometime in the spring.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: We'll keep you posted.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for your interest, and uh believe me, this is this is just as the attorney said, this is the point issue right now for food freedom in the U.S.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, thank you, Joel.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's always great to have some positive news coming our way, you know.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: Such a critical case, like Joel said, we will keep you updated.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: This will affect all of us and how we can access our clean, nutrient-dense food supplies.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: So, another update we wanted to bring you today in the food space is on the hydroponic court case.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: So we've talked about hydroponics um briefly before, and we've talked about it in our book um in Beyond Labels.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: So we wanted to give you an update on that.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: So Cena, just to make sure everybody's with us, hydroponics is where you grow grow plants in no soil.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so it's a it's a soilless, it's a soilless plant growth system.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's essentially like growing plants on an on an IV tube.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, if you if you can imagine um, you know, uh living and existing whatever your whole life on an IV tube, um, this is what it is.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: And and it and and no country in the world will organic certify soilless plant systems because the whole I the whole goal here is the the soil, you know, the the the soil biology, the soil community.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and so the US is the only one who has been certifying uh organic certified hydroponics, uh soilless systems.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: If you're watching, for example, all these farms of the future, these vertical farms with LED lights and and all that stuff in the you know science uh in uh you know uh science magazines and and that sort of thing, that that's what all this is.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: This is all tied into that to that uh completely you know Star Trek uh Star Trek existence.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: Sorry, Cena, I just wanted to make sure everybody was with us on because sometimes, you know, hydroponics, you say hydroponics, we all know what it means, but it's a pretty big word, and sometimes people don't understand what what hydroponics is.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't want to lose anybody in the discussion.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: So sorry, go ahead.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: No, I think that's fantastic.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: And actually, um, and I don't want to belabor this point, this could be another conversation, but the Real Organic Project, um, who's kind of at the forefront of fighting this ability for hydroponics to be certified as organically grown, they would argue that even if the even if the plant, for instance, is grown in some type of soil medium, if it's been given liquid nutrients, it's technically hydroponic.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: So there's even some debate as to what the definition actually is, but clearly, if the plant has been grown without soil, then you know, our stance is that's hydroponic.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: So, based on that definition, the um the Real Organic Project and others are putting pressure or have been putting pressure on the government that they need to change the definition of organic so that it excludes the hydroponics or they need to at least um exclude the hydroponic based on the current definition.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so what's happened is the USDA has said we're not gonna do that.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, we're not gonna change our definition.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's fine the way it is.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we think that hydroponics should be able to be certified as organic.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: So the Center for Food Safety filed a lawsuit against um Tom Vilsack, the secretary of the USDA.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and there was a court that sided with the USDA.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_01: So then there was an appeal.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: And on September 22nd of this year, the U.S.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit sided again with the USDA.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: All right, so the question at hand that the court was trying to answer is do hydroponically grown crops meet the requirements to be certified as organic?
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: The Center for Food Safety argued that they wanted the USDA to issue new regulations that would prohibit organic certification of the hydroponically grown crops.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and because of their refusal, it led to this case.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: And basically, um, the court decided that the USDA is not required to issue the requested rule.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: And let me tell you why.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Joel, you'll you'll this will be par for the course for us, but basically what they are saying is that the USDA doesn't have to issue a new rule because this I'm reading this now from the courts document.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: The statute imposes, um, this is the organic statute, it imposes three requirements for organic crops: a restriction on synthetic chemicals, a prohibition on growing organic crops on land to which any prohibitive substances have been applied, and a requirement that organic products be produced and handled in compliance with an organic plan.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if you look at the organic plan, um, which I have pulled up here, and we'll put all these links in the podcast description.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: So this is in the um the US legal code.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's seven US code 6513 organic plan.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: If you look in the organic plan here in this code, it says under soil fertility, an organic plan shall contain provisions designed to foster soil fertility, primarily through the management of the organic content of the soil, right?
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: So the plan, the organic plan has to be designed to foster soil fertility.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: What they're saying though is that well, if this there is no soil, those farmers are not held to the same standard because there's no soil for them to tend to.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: So this is what it says.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: This is what the court case says.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_01: Because hydroponic operations do not use soil, hydroponic producers cannot comply with the you know the organic requirement.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: The crop production farm plans have to contain a provision designed to foster soil fertility.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, USDA's decision interpreted that provision to mean that if crops are grown in soil, their producers must take measures to preserve that soil's fertility and organic content.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: So now it's an it's an if.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's not, oh, you know, part of organic is you have to actually build the soil or maintain the fertility of the soil.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: It's if you're using it, which that word is not in the official rule.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_01: The word if, you know, it reminds me of what's the definition of is, you know, like right?
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's it's it's sound, it's it smacks uh very closely of uh I didn't inhale.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes, this is crazy.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: So obviously, obviously, to me, this speaks uh it reeks of the government and industry colluding together, right?
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you know, seeing it, Cena, uh I'm I'm sitting here scratching my head trying to think of uh of some sort of a of a parallel uh so that folks can understand.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: So let let's let's do, you know, education, education is a real hot topic right now.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: So let's assume let's assume, for example, that the goal of um of an English class is let's say that um let's see that that the the that the plan that the uh the plan of an English class would be to um to foster um uh uh a love of uh whatever the the a love of literature, for example.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_00: Okay well if the English teacher doesn't use any books, doesn't use any books, then she could do whatever she wanted to uh uh under under this kind of thinking, then there would be no um no literature requirement because there are no books in the classroom.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: You follow that?
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: I mean that's that that that's the same, it's the same kind of it's the same kind of argument.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: The the assumption clearly is well, you know, and you can go clear back to the organic uh or organic uh act that Pat that Senator Patrick Lee when he put in whatever it was back in the 80s, and and and the whole kind of the the overriding umbrella was soil.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: It mentioned soil, soil, soil over and over again.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: And and um I can assure you uh you know it's it's similar it's similar to um to saying uh Americans have no have no freedom of food choice because the Bill of Rights doesn't grant it to us.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the the found the founders didn't say you have a uh fundamental right to freedom of food.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: Uh they said you have a right to you know to worship and speak, but not a right to the choose the food of your choice.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh therefore, you know, uh it it doesn't even exist.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: And and and so as you start down this path, it moves you into a very um, you know, it it moves you into a place where every single thing you have to look out there in the horizon and think of how cleverly somebody could construe language and and co-opt it, you know, from from day one.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: I can guarantee you back in the 80s when all this organic uh standard stuff was was being developed, nobody was thinking that someday somebody would figure out that if they circumvented soil, they could circumvent the entire provisions because um because the provisions were based on soil.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's just it's it's beyond uh it's beyond comprehension.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and so for consumers, what this really means is that when you go into that grocery store and you're relying on the organic label, um, the organic label just lost a little more integrity, right?
• 17:42
  SPEAKER_01: It just lost a little more of our ability to trust in the values that we think that label stands for, right?
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: It is actually eroding its integrity.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: So, and you and I pointed out loopholes in the past uh with the organic label, and clearly there are many loopholes before even hydroponics came around.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: But it was still, when you walked into the grocery store, it was still a better option than can than conventional in terms of reducing your overall toxic burden.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so, what my point is to get across to all of our listeners is that all of us lost a little bit today.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: Because all of us at some point buy food that has a label.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: We all go into a grocery store or order from Thrive or something where we're trusting the label and we're we're going to organic because we don't want to eat conventional.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: And now that label has just gotten a little bit less trustworthy.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: It's weakened itself.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_01: And let me tell you why.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: Some people don't really understand the importance of why we're fighting to stop hydroponics from being in the organic label.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: So let's make it very clear.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_01: When you grow something hydroponically, so you grow it without the soil, you are devoid of all those healing microbes that exist in the soil.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_01: You're devoid of that complex interaction that occurs between all the numerous microbes in the soil that give the plant its health and vitality, and consequently give you your health and vitality.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: We know that every single chronic and autoimmune disease is in some way related to a decrease in the number of microbes in our gastrointestinal tracts and a decrease in the type or diversity of microbes in our gastrointestinal tract.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: Those two things go hand in hand.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: When you take the soil away from the growing medium of your food, you reduce the amount and the diversity of microbes that you are ingesting.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: And it's been estimated that the average person consuming a Western diet has lost roughly 35% of the diversity of the microbes in their gastrointestinal tract.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: That tracks with onset of diseases, breast cancer, for instance, Alzheimer's, all of these types of diseases have been tracked to decreased number and diversity of microbes in the grointestinal tract.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: Joel, our friend, Dr.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: Sabine Hazen, who was one of our speakers at our first summit, she's a leading expert in the microbiome.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: She has been able to reverse diseases such as alterative colitis, um, you know, um diabetes, even balding by doing fecal transplants, where she takes um, you know, the feces from healthy individuals after she's tested their microbiome and sees the diversity of it, and she transplants that into the sick person.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_01: It changes their microbiome by increasing diversity and quantity of microbes, and consequently the disease reverses.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_01: So we know that this is um, I would even say a causative relationship, like not just a correlation.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_01: And so what we're doing is we are weakening, when we weaken this label, we are weakening our overall health.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: We're weakening our immune systems, right?
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_01: We we are weakening every single system in your body because the microbes in your gastrointestinal tract, they regulate, they co-regulate every single system in your entire body.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_01: So you are now setting yourself up for the development of a chronic or autoimmune disease when you consume on a regular basis the hydroponically grown crops.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_01: So that's why I am so um adamant about educating people, about growing crops without soil, um, and about fighting this label.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I want to add in the in the court's document, um, because this is this goes to our point, Joel, that we can't.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: If we are gonna go through the system to try to change the food supply, we're gonna fail.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: And and and this this is another example of why.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so in the court's opinion, um, this is what they said.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um the the appellates um contend that the USDA's interpretation of the rule and of the department's own regulations conflict with its experts' opinions.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_01: So basically, Center for Food Safety was saying we have expert opinions.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, experts have given their opinion, they can be ready to testify, and our experts disagree with USDA's experts on you know the whole issue of whether hydroponics should be kept considered as organic.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: And this is what the court said.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_01: But expert opinion is not a reason for us to reverse the district court, much less second guess USDA.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_01: So basically what they're saying is that um the USDA is king, right?
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_01: You can't second guess them, you can't disagree with them or with their experts.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you're always gonna lose because what matters is how the USDA interprets its own regulations.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_01: So we all have to trust their experts.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_01: Meaning, some experts, I guess, are more expert than other, Joel.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: You know, we're we're back to this, uh, we're back to this uh, you know, um, I represent science.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, uh, Dr.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: Fauci.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_00: If if you argue with me, you're arguing with science.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: It this is essentially the same argument USDA says you're arguing with me, you're arguing with science.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, you've brought up the nutritional uh uh aspect of this hydroponics.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's important to realize I've been on uh I've been on these uh big uh tomato hydroponic farms in the Netherlands, and um, and it's important to realize that uh those hydroponic grown tomatoes, for example, have 30% more water than soil-grown tomatoes.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: So they have weight, but it's not nutrition.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_00: So when you buy them, you know, when we talk about the price of food, uh everybody's you know talking about the price of food today.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_00: And and you and I, you know, uh we concentrate on the quality of food, that's true, but at the same time, the the quality per dollar is a big deal as well.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so when we, for example, when beef cattle, farmers, which I'm I'm familiar with, uh use steroids that make the cells actually expand and take on water, you're going to the store, you're buying your meat, and you're actually paying a lot for water.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Tyson, they put their chickens in water vats, run agitators in there, and Tyson sells like two billion dollars worth of water a year uh through its chicken, uh, through through soak in soak in in a chill tank.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: Uh partly because the chickens are so um are so uh um sl uh what's the word?
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: They're that they're they're absorptive.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_00: Uh our our chickens at at that we grow on pasture, they are not absorptive because they have better muscle structure.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: So they don't absorb.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_00: We in fact we did a test several years ago where we left chickens in the chill tank for like 36 hours and used a real uh careful grammatic scram um gram scale to to measure, you know, a scientific scale that to measure the um the the uptake.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: And and we couldn't get them to soak in even one one ounce of water at all, even at 36 hours.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, the the the the the chickens in the in the supermarket are much more absorptive uh of water.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: But here in the in the hydroponic with vegetables, it's important to realize that that they they uptake way, way more water.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_00: Now, in the Netherlands, you know, they they've got way too much water.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so as the farmer said to me, well, it's it's it's one way for Netherlands to to take their excess water and export it.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, you know, I I I I get that.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: But but but uh but in in the pricing scheme, you know, when you've got when you've got that high a percentage of additional water in something, you're paying for that water at the at the counter.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_00: So then, so then when you go buy the real food from your, you know, from your from your uh authentic source, and it costs an extra, you know, 20% or whatever, um, you're actually paying for nutrition, not just water.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: And that I think that's a as this whole price war thing uh develops, I think that's an important thing to to bring into the the nutrient density.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: So you're you're consuming, but you're all you're not only you're not only paying for uh nutrient deficiency, but your microbiome is getting nutrient deficiency uh because it's not getting the soil microbes, as Cena pointed out.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: So you're you're losing two ways, and um, and that's a it's a big deal.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_01: That is a big deal.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: And the scary part, Joel, is that you will walk into the grocery store and you probably won't be able to tell which foods were hydroponically grown that have that organic label.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: So I've walked into the grocery store and sometimes um it's on the label where you know I see the organic seal and it says um hydroponically grown, but you often won't see that on, for instance, berries.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: Lots of berries now are hydroponically grown.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_01: You won't see it.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so it doesn't have to be, especially now, now that they won, now that the USDA won the court case, it's not gonna have to be labeled, right?
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: So you can't easily figure it out.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_01: So um on the so the positive news is, you know, if we want to take a positive out of this, the positive news is there is an alternative, which is the uh, well, this is just one solution, the real organic project, right?
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: And the real organic project was born out of the um a group of farmers, real farmers, um, who were trying to preserve the integrity of the organic label.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: And the hydroponics was a huge issue for them.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_01: So they got together and formed this group of farmers and created this um real organic label.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: And they're trying to get it into grocery stores and, you know, on all these products so that you, the consumer, know that the foods that have been labeled with that real real organic project label uh were not hydroponically grown, for instance, you know, didn't have um didn't have, for instance, the pigs grown on concrete slabs, um, things like that.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um in in his latest, um, you know, Dave is the um the founder of that group.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: And in his latest email that he sent out about losing this court case, um he he mentions this is what he says.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: Uh I just want to read the end of it.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, because there's a little bit of like they're not sitting there licking their their wounds, you know, they're moving forward.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um this is what it says.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: My own response to the failures of the USDA was to start the real organic project with a group of like-minded farmers.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: Is it possible for a plucky band of farmers to create a meeting place for the real organic movement?
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_01: Is it possible that millions of eaters actually want food grown in the soil and clean of pesticides?
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: Food coming from animals living outside, participating in the endless cycles of water, carbon, and nitrogen.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_01: We think this is possible.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_01: So let's gnash our teeth for a moment at the failures of the government.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: Let's cry over the staggering greed and power of the multinational corporations, and then let us move on and let us do it ourselves.
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_01: Please join us.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: Together, we can't be stopped.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: And Cena, I would just add to that, as a farmer who has not joined the Real Organic Project, that my my my single biggest beef with them is that first you have to join the government program and be certified organic through the government, and then they will look at you for their label.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_00: I wish they would just forget the government program, come out.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: This is a totally private uh and and I applaud every private thing.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_00: This is like a an underwriter's laboratory, if you will, or a triple A.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's a it's a totally private, non-governmental thing.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: But the problem is they're trying to keep that foot that they're they're trying to keep that foot in the government program, and and they're just getting ulcers and angst over that whole thing.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I would like to see them just go ahead and and bite the bullet and and do the private thing.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_00: I think they'd actually have a lot more momentum and uh a lot a lot more uh well what uh you know efficacy really um in their in in their objective, if they would just if they would just realize, you know, the government is whatever, the devil, and we're just not gonna play that game, and we're just gonna do our we're just gonna do our thing.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I I love those guys.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I'm friends with them and um and I appreciate what they're doing, but I'm just a little more um uh whatever, maverick.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_00: And and I well, we don't go into the government program because, for example, it says our compost has to be too hot.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so that's one reason why we don't do it in the government program because we can't we can't build our compost with pigs and do it and do it uh uh um uh low low temperature.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_00: It has to be a a thermophilic uh compost, and we think that kills half the microbes and the enzymes.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_00: And that's of course why the USDA demands it.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but it it it compromises the integrity of the fertility of the program.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: So uh I I just I just think and and and these guys would be able to not to not require their farmers to to go through the therm the the the hot compost that the USDA requires and um and have a you know have a more uh gentle approach.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: So anyway, um I think you have you have an excellent point, and I'm really glad you brought this up because that's my biggest issue with them as well.
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I wonder if at this point, you know, now that they've they've tried to walk the line, right?
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: Have one foot in each camp, and now they've realized that it's not gonna work, like they've come to our side, Joel.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_01: And so I wonder if now they might be willing to break free of that USDA organic label, because I agree with you, it's gonna weigh them down.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and their their label will erode in integrity as as the USDA label erodes in integrity.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm gonna email Dave and I'm gonna propose this to him and see if if he'd be willing to start breaking free from that organic label, you know, and let him know that, you know, like we support that, right?
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_01: Like a lot, there's a lot of us I think that will support, especially in this day and age, we'll support just break free, be totally third-party independent, you know, like the detox project or the non-GMO project.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_01: I think that's fantastic.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_01: I'll follow up with Dave.
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_01: I'll let everybody know what he says.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um, real quick, Joel.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, the first uh the best solution, in my opinion, would be to know your local farmer.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's the best solution.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_01: However, we're still gonna be getting like some produce and things like that in the grocery store.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_01: Most of us are.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so to know if it's hydrophobically grown in the grocery store.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um, my easiest solution is to look for that real organic um project label.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_01: You can also, if you're gonna spend more time um slushing out, you know, slewing through the information, you could contact each company.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like if you wanted to buy certain berries and it's the same company of berries that you're buying every week, you can call and find out how those berries were grown.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_01: It takes a little more effort, but you know, it's another option on the table for you.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_00: And because because uh it's very difficult to buy everything local.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: And so most of us do go beyond local.
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_00: But I'll tell you what, and maybe we ought to do a podcast on this sometime, Cena, is how how to use a website so that you actually you actually see through the the terminology and and just some things.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I'm I can certainly do that on livestock.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you could do it on on produce, but uh I I can t I can tell you there are definitely um you know buzzwords and red flags, things that in very in in just a couple of minutes on a website of any any producer at all, you can see uh what they're you know what they're doing.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_00: And and um, and so you know, websites are uh websites are the ultimate democratized information.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: I know that you're getting you know the the company's best foot forward, but at the same time, you know, when they when they say they're uh they're for um you know natural chicken and the picture behind the homepage is five Tyson chicken houses, you don't have to read much farther than that.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_00: You you know that's what I'm saying.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_00: And and and so um so that's where we are.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thanks, Zena, for bringing this to our attention.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna we're gonna wrap up here, drop this uh uh now.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um uh these are these are you know uh whatever these are these are moving current event targets in the in the food choice movement and in the in the whole labels movement.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so um so we're excited to keep you up to date.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_00: And uh thank you for listening today, and we look forward to seeing you next time.