Environmental Working Group on Organic Impacts

The Environmental Working Group (EWG)​ lists on their web site a ranking of the relative environmental impact (measured in terms of greenhouse gas emissions) of different foods.  The table is based on life-cycle analysis (LCA) conducted by a company called Clean Metrics.

I'm not ​an expert on LCA and I haven't dug into the detail on how Clean Metrics conducted the analysis.  Thus, I won't comment for now on the relative ranking of the different foods and commodities.  

However, I find the labeling on the EWG's prominent graph highly misleading.  The reason is that the chart repeatedly says things like:​

choose organic; ​buy organic; avoid growth hormones

Here is the problem. The research doesn't actually support the claim that these urgings would actually lower greenhouse gas emissions.  In fact, by their own admission, the EWG reveals that:

The lifecycle assessments are based on conventional rather than pasture-based or organic systems of food production. . . we were unable to identify definitive studies and widely accepted methodologies assessing greenhouse gas emissions from pasture-raised, organic or other meat production systems. 

So, the analysis didn't actually study the greenhouse gas emissions of organics or pasture-raised!​

​Moreover, when we look at the words of the company (Clean Metrics) that conducted the study that forms the basis of the EWG chart, we see things like:

There is not a strong correlation between organic food production methods and lower carbon footprints.

and

On balance, grass-fed animal products from ruminants are likely to have higher carbon footprints compared to products from conventionally housed/fed animals.

​Also, when we look at the research on growth hormones, like in this Journal of Animal Science article, we find

Manure output increased by 1,799 × 10^3 t as a result of [growth -enhancing technologies - primarily growth hormones] withdrawal, with an increase in carbon emissions of 714,515 t/454 × 10^6 kg beef

and this article in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science shows that the use of the growth hormone rBST in milk could reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Now, the EWG may have other reasons for advising against consuming foods with growth hormones or advising to eat organic over conventional, but I find it misleading to make these claims in a prominent graph ranking foods by greenhouse gas emissions.

Food Fear Mongering

A colleague forwarded me this story from NBC news.​  It's really hard to know where to start in on all the misleading claims and innuendos.  There first couple paragraphs will give you a sense of the tone:

American eaters, let’s talk about the birds and the bees: The U.S. food supply – from chickens injected with arsenic to dying bee colonies – is under unprecedented siege from a blitz of man-made hazards, meaning some of your favorite treats someday may vanish from your plate, experts say.

Warmer and moister air ringing much of the planet – punctuated by droughts in other locales – is threatening the prime ingredients in many daily meals, including the maple syrup on your morning pancakes and the salmon on your evening grill as well as the wine in your glass and the chocolate on your dessert tray, according to four recent studies.

At the same time, an unappetizing bacterial outbreak in Florida citrus droves, largely affecting orange trees, is causing fruit to turn bitter. Elsewhere, unappealing fungi strains are curtailing certain coffee yields and devastating some banana plantations, researchers report.

​Strictly speaking, each of the above examples does indeed correspond to a real challenge faced in each of the above industries.  But, does it represent a "food supply under assault" as the title of the article suggests?  Are each of these the cause of global warming?  The author later blames problems on "mono-culture" agriculture but that doesn't fit well any of the commodities described above. 

Much of the paranoia seems to stem from an interview with one professor of public health at Johns Hopkins who is quoted as saying things like:​

We need to regard all of these (examples) as a very powerful motivator to try to work on the carbon emissions, to start pushing that parts per million of carbon dioxide back down

​and

“Maybe seeing this impact all this has on our ability to raise the food we depend on will get us to the tipping point of real policy change and real action,” Lawrence said. “I hope so.”

Another professor of environmental science is quoted as saying:

We’re in a situation where the food supply is more vulnerable than it has ever been

​Providing a few anecdotal stories does not constitute scientific evidence.  If we are indeed so vulnerable, why is it that crop prices in the US have come down off their highs a year or so ago.  If late corn planting were really a sign of disaster (as this article suggests), it would be reflected in high corn prices but that's not what we're seeing.    

Moreover, why didn't the author actually go to the data and look at per-capita food availability (which can be found here)​, which doesn't reveal any general lack of scarcity. Or, why didn't they turn to the research on the projected impacts of climate change on agricultural production, which suggests it may be beneficial for agriculture (for some counter evidence, see here).  Either way, yes climate change will likely hurt some regions and some commodities, but it will also help other regions and commodities.  Growing corn and melons in Canada will become much easier (and less costly) if it gets warmer there.  

Its this sort of fear mongering based on anecdotal evidence, rejection of modern technology, ​followed up by ill-advised (and under-researched) policy recommendations that largely motivated me to write the Food Police.

The Cost of Environmentalism

What is the impact of a ban on plastic bags used by grocery stores?  Unexpectedly, it is higher chances of foodborne illness.  Apparently carting around that same old bag back-and-forth to the grocery story also means carting around bacteria to-and-from the grocery store.  

Peak Farmland

There was an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal last week describing some research on land use and agricultural productivity ( the original research is posted here).  

Here are some snippets from the WSJ article:

Globally, the production of a given quantity of crop requires 65% less land than it did in 1961, thanks to fertilizers, tractors, pesticides, better varieties and other factors. Even corrected for different kinds of crops, the acreage required is falling at 2% a year.

and

Yet the amount of farmland in the world was still rising until recently. The reason is that increased farm productivity has been matched by rising demand for food, driven by population growth and swelling affluence. But the effects of these trends are waning.

and

Even with these cautious assumptions, the researchers find that over the next 50 years people are likely to release from farming a land area "1½ times the size of Egypt, 2½ times the size of France, or 10 Iowas, and possibly multiples of this amount."

in conclusion:

Predictions of peak oil have repeatedly proved wrong. But the factors that made them wrong—productivity and technology—are essentially the ones that make a prediction of peak farmland likely to be right.

I agree - so long as we don't demonize or overly regulate the use of technologies that lead to increased productivity in food.  I have faith in our innovative abilities, but I worry about the messages being sent by the foodie cultural elites.   

What are the Environmental Costs of Moving Toward Lower Yielding Cropping Systems?

Here are the conclusions from an article just published online in the American Journal of Agricultural Economics

Crop yield development will play a critical role in future land use dynamics. Indeed, it will determine the requirements for additional cropland, and also have a strong impact on grassland expansion. We have illustrated that compared with yield stagnation, maintaining past trends in crop yield growth would save 290 Mha of cropland and avoid additional expansion of about 120 Mha of grassland by 2030. Our results suggest that failing to take into account the effects of livestock sector dynamics and the corresponding grassland requirements when assessing the effect on land sparing of increasing crop yield may lead to significant inaccuracy–a difference of 17% in our example.

With respect to GHG emissions, we show that by 2030 these would be lower by more than 2 GtCO2-eq per year if crop yields grew according to the past trends as compared to yield stagnation. Crop yield growth also seems to be a cost efficient way of abating GHGs, as the estimated R&D cost involved would be about U.S. $25 per tCO2-eq, while the marginal cost of reaching this target with stagnating yields would be U.S. $75 per tCO2-eq. However, to be effective as a mitigation option, crop yield increases need to be accompanied by policies that prevent further expansion of consumption in rich countries in order to avoid the potential rebound effects illustrated by Choi et al. (2011).

Overall, policies and investments targeting crop yield enhancement should be an important priority for the future of agricultural development (Herrero et al. 2010). Such measures could help to fight food insecurity, while at the same time contributing to climate change mitigation at a cost that is competitive with other mitigation strategies.