Todays Vegetables - Where are the Nutrients Going?

Today’s vegetables are nothing like those that Grandpa had as a child. There are a number of reasons. The produce going to market today comes from soil that is rich from chemical fertilizer but lacking many of the trace minerals that it used to contain.

Farmers want to produce the largest crop possible so they use the means that they have available. Often they overwork the soil, spray it with toxins, put just enough chemical fertilizer on it to grow the produce and use genetically altered breeds to appear that the vegetables and fruit are superior to those of earlier times.

While they might be disease resistant and often larger, studies show that the nutritional elements are dropping rapidly.

The Kushi Institute located in Becket, Massachusetts followed the nutritional components of vegetables and fruits for 22 years, from 1975 to 1997. They found that many of the trace element levels and vitamin levels dropped dramatically over that period. Iron levels dropped almost 40 per cent, vitamin A went down 21 percent, calcium dropped just 12 per cent but vitamin C had a whopping 30 percent drop in that time.

The reason sited was changes in farming practices. No longer is there crop rotation and allowances for the soil to remain fallow and build the nutrients. Organic matter no longer feeds the soil; instead, most farmers used liquid fertilizer that contains just the bare necessities to keep the plant growing well, but not pack it with nutrition for the consumer.

The chemicals may contain nitrogen but there’s no natural material replaced in the soil. Rich fertile loam that comes from years of organic material decomposing in the soil, no longer exists on many truck farms. Instead, there is compacted soil, void of the microbes and their organic food, which feed the soil the necessary material to transfer to the vegetables and fruit.

There are farmers that realize that if they care for the soil, the soil repays them with a high yield and nutritional food. These are the organic farmers. Organic farming works with the land instead of working the land. They don’t use the chemicals to create larger produce but find environmentally friendly methods to create bumper crops and control pests.

Besides crop rotation, there are other methods, such as composting, that bring the higher levels of nutrition into the soil. These also encourage friendly bacteria and microbes in the soil with the replacement of organic matter.

The most minute soil creatures play an important part in the food chain. These tiny creatures break down the organic material, just as earthworms do, and provide usable nutrients that are readily absorbed by the crops. Obviously, the more nutrients the crops absorb, the more they contain and the less people have to eat to maintain their nutritional levels necessary for a healthy life.

If you’re worried that your food doesn’t satisfy your nutritional requirements, you can do several things. The first is growing your own food. Growing your own food guarantees that you have a say in the manner that you work the soil to produce the food.

While it’s not always an option for many people, the second method is to choose food labeled “organically grown”. In order to wear the label organic, the farmers must use the earth friendly methods to raise them.

You may not know the exact content of nutrients in each fruit or vegetable, but you know it’s probably higher than those not grown organically.

Of course, you could eat more. However, from the numbers you already read, you know that you’d have to increase food intake dramatically.

Your last option is to increase your nutritional intake by adding food supplements to your daily routine. Herbal supplements and vitamin supplements replace the minerals and vitamins lost through years of depletion through farming practices.