Why aren’t Veggies as Nutritious Anymore? This headline in a recent USA Today Article grabbed my attention for a bunch of reasons.
- How did we arrive here? Not thinking through long term consequences for decisions made in the moment?
- There are many articles that suggest that a balanced diet is all we need to be healthy and that we do not need to supplement. I beg to differ. We need to fill in the gaps as our foods are deficient in many nutrients.
- I love love love that one farmer Richard Stewart is doing what he can to change the way foods are farmed and encouraging other famers to join him . He is also thinking about how he can create a GENETIC TRUST FUND for his kids and their kids..
- Makes the case that we should include a Green Smoothie in our daily routines so we can easily absorb more nutrients.
Here are some of the main points of the article
There it sits — in all its green glory — in the produce section of your local grocery store. ❚ Broccoli. One of the most nutritious vegetables on the planet. ❚ But 70 years ago, it contained twice the calcium, on average, and more than five times the amount of vitamin A. The same could be said for a lot of our fruits and vegetables. ❚ Why? How? ❚ The answers lie in the soil and how Americans farm it.
Over the past two centuries, U.S. population growth and food production methods have stressed and degraded our dirt. Our farming soil is not as alive as it once was, and experts say that’s a problem.
It’s a complex issue, and there are various factors at play, but studies through the years draw a direct line back to American farms.
More and more farmers are recognizing they are part of the problem – one that extends beyond their farms, affecting the water quality in our lakes, rivers and oceans downstream.
Changing how we farm our Veggies
Richard Stewart manages Carriage House Farm in southwestern Ohio, and he’ll tell you what’s happening on the 163-year-old farm, owned by his family now for five generations.
His goal one day is to stop conventional farming — growing corn and soybeans for animal feed and export — and instead only grow and raise things people eat. His family converted about 60 acres from its 300-acre farm to produce fruits, vegetables, honey and, recently, a line of vinegar.
Stewart is paying close attention to the soil. And he’s learned, for example, to plant a cover crop of mustard before he grows a crop of potatoes. The mustard keeps away the Colorado potato beetles, which, you probably guessed, love potatoes but not mustard.
He makes sure there is a good strip of trees and native plants between his fields and the Great Miami River, because he wants to keep his soil in place and avoid any runoff that might hurt water quality.
“I’ve got kids. My child may be the seventh generation that farms this property, but that is not even a blink in the eye of the history of this planet,” Stewart said. For More on this story
Bottom Line: More than ever to get our daily requirement of nutrients to be healthy and live a high quality of life we need to eat our Veggies and as a minimum we also should take a high quality Multi Vitamin and Mineral supplement. Many of you know I am partial to and carry products from Standard Process because of their commitment to the soil and to high quality farming practices.
If you want to pick up a high quality multi or mineral supplement for your family let me know and I will have them available at the front desk for pick up.
