No. It's the chemicals that I'm worried about.

I would always choose organic over non-organic. The chemicals and pesticides in conventional foods has been proven time and again to be toxic and unhealthy. I have seen plenty of studies saying organic produce has more antioxidants and vitamins.

I will continue to spend the majority of my income (sigh!) on organic produce and healthy foods!

I do not choose organic bc I think it's better nutritionally anyway. If it is, great, if not, that's ok. I choose it to support the farmers..to get produce and meat the way it is supposed to be in my opinion, from farmers, not giant corporations mass producing and keeping their animals in awful conditions.

No; I don't usually shop organic because I can't afford it. I wash my produce with baking soda and water to get the pesticides off, so I'm not too worried about it. I think organic produce, eggs, milk, etc. are great if you can afford them, but I have issues with organic frozen dinners and mac and cheese...junk food is junk food, whether it's organic or not.

Good point, Spectra! I think buying organic produce and dairy is great if you can afford it, but if you're buying organic potato chips, cookies and tv dinners, you're wasting your money. If you are interested in this topic and haven't read the Omnivore's Dilemma, I suggest you do because he goes into great detail how many "organic" companies (think Cascadian Farms, which is really General Mills) are hurting your local farmers just as much as non-organic farms. If you have the money to buy organic in your grocery store, use it to buy local at your farmer's market (if your city/town has them).

see i don't necessarily lean towards organic in the hopes that it has more nutrition - but i think that it's just better for you in general. in an age where we depend on chemicals and all sorts of thing to make produce grow faster and bigger, knowing that someone's doing it the 'clean' way makes it more enticing for me

Meh. ... I think so much of it is a marketing scam. I'm healthier than most people I know, despite all the "icky chemicals" I'm putting into my body.

For years, people didn't know that smoking was bad for you, because there were no scientific studies released. In hindsight, it seems odd that people couldn't figure it out using common sense. I feel the same way about pesticides - maybe there hasn't been a study yet definitively saying they're bad for you, but using common sense, I don't see how they can possibly be good for you. I buy organic when I can and will continue to do so.

I usually only buy organic or hormone free dairy and that's just because the milk squicks me out.

Most people don't buy organic because they think it's healthier, but because of the impact of pesticides, not only on our health, but also on our environment. Also worth noting is that this study is actually only a survey of all current studies and makes no novel findings.

The counterargument by Paula Crossfield on Civil Eats is well worth the read: http://civileats.com/2009/07/30/organic-versus-conventional-food-uk-repo...

I've always purchased organic because of the chemicals and to support local farmers. It didnt really matter much whether or not they were "healthier". Eating fruits and veggies to begin with is healthy right?!? I'll definitely continue to buy organic whenever possible.

Avoiding pesticides is not a good reason to choose organic, either. The plants themselves produce chemicals that act as pesticides and herbicides, and that makes up over 99% of pesticides that are found in the food by the time you eat it. Don't be fooled that you're supporting local farmers just because it's organic, either. Organic is big business and the exact same companies that make non-organic produce control most of the organic market. You need to actually track down where your food is coming from if you want to support small farms. I no longer buy organic (I did for years) for these reasons, and also because it's less efficient, which means there's less food to go around, and that more land needs to be cleared to keep everybody fed. When you take all of this into account, it's not very people-friendly or environmentally-friendly.

I can't afford organic food so it doesn't really matter in my case.

I choose not organic because I can't afford organic.

I don't buy things labeled organic in the store. I think it's a load of hooey. Unless you're getting it from a trusted vendor at a farmer's market, you can't trust it to really be "organic."

I should qualify my post by saying that I'm vegetarian. If I bought meat products, I would buy something hormone-free. Still, not necessarily "organic."

My diet is 90% plant based ... so about all of my produce is in fact organic. I don't dispute the nutritional facts - although I do not rely on these "studies" to base my diet - but organic produce *tastes* better. Also I feel healthier knowing there's less chemical pesticides on my food.

Organic is only better for the environment if you're getting it from a closer source than the regular version. It doesn't take that many extra miles of trucking to expand a carbon footprint. If you're going green, go local.

Okay, who funded these studies? Nestle? Kraft?

I buy organic whenever I can to avoid chemicals and GMOs, but I place higher preference on local foods. Produce loses nutritional value when it's being trucked across continents.

I don't see why the big issue is always whether or not an organic tomato has more lycopene or not, as if some compounds are worth the other risks of conventional farming, such as pesticides, the financial burden on farmers, and pollution. Many organic growers (though not all -- see Cascadian Farms and Horizon Organics, which are both pretty terrible companies when it comes to environmentalism or happy animals) are simply the ones who are embracing locavority and ways to improve the entire system. Support them in your own community!

Organic foods do, in fact, have little or no chemicals on them and are healthier for your body at least in this regard--its not just BS. My mother has a severe sulfite allergy, and has to eat organic foods because they have not been treated with preservatives. She has allergic reactions when she eats conventional food, and feels great when she eats organic...seems pretty cut and dry to me. I dont have this allergy, but I try to eat organic most of the time.

I've always known that. Organic also doesn't mean great farming practices either, the label organic is still pretty loosely regulated so you have to be careful of which places your organic foods are coming from, especially when it comes to meat and dairy.

ive done a lot of research on the matter, and have a best friend who actually just got her PhD in nutrition from Columbia. we've had a lot of eye-opening talks. and to dispel some of people's reasons for not eating organic.

1) spectra - baking soda does nothing if its say, a peach, or a tomato, or an apple. the fruit has absorbed the pesticide through the thin skin. and even for the veggies/fruits that have thicker skin that you would eat, they actually recommend a mild bleach (YES BLEACH!) solution to get the pesticides off - obviously followed by a really good washing.

2) for everyone who says its too expensive - food inc. did a good job of hammering this home, but it's a matter of perception. organic food isn't too expensive; conventional food just takes crappy shortcuts and uses government subsidies to make it unnaturally cheap.

anyway, it annoys me to hear that argument by people who own nice cellphones and wear brand names and drive nice cars. when you bought those jeans, did you just look for the cheapest jeans you could find? bc, hey, they're $8 at kmart.

3) JenniferN - organic produce does not produce unnatural pesticides that our body can't handle -- this is where baking soda might come in handy for a wash. i use a vinegar solution.

4) runningesq - your post makes me sad. so you think buying organic is a marketing scam, but you don't see the blatant marketing scams in every grocery store you go to? placing pricier brands in the middle shelves, blasting labels like "TRANS FAT FREE" on something that never had trans fat to begin with, putting nice pictures of farms and pastures on products that aren't grown on farms and whose animals have never even seen a pasture? or how companies won't allow pictures of slaughterhouses to be published? or how they block legislation that simply wants to inform the consumer? those aren't marketing scams?!

5) the final refutation i have to these studies is that they don't measure nutritional or calorie density. i can taste the difference between non-free range organic eggs and regular eggs. regular eggs taste like foam to me now. i'd have to eat 4 regular eggs to feel as full or satisfied as i would with 2 organic free range eggs.

i'm by no means a health nut. ive just noticed time and time again, how organic foods leave me feeling healthier, more satisfied and full than non-organic foods (meats, fruits and veggies).

do your research, please! from reputable sources!

I eat organic because it TASTES BETTER. I don't care if it's "healthier" or not. I would have said that was pretty obvious.

I never thought organic was nutritionally better. An apples and apple, yea? I'm kind of sick of everyone assuming that as consumers we're idiots.