nutritional value of food at risk: fruits and vegetables now less nutritious

[xchrom]

http://www.nationofchange.org/nutritional-value-food-risk-fruits-and-vegetables-now-less-nutritious-1355070081



The nutritional value of foods is at risk, with the amount of nutrients found in fruits and vegetables having diminished greatly over the years. One apple today may carry half the amount of nutrients as an apple produced 50 years ago. Although it is still very true that everybody should be consuming many fruits and vegetables on a daily basis (preferably organic), the sad truth is that we would need to consume many times more of them in order to get the nutrients we need.

One University of Texas in Austin study has gained particular attention in the media. According to Donald R. Davis’s findings published in HortScience, crops grown in limited space almost always contain lower levels of minerals, vitamins, and protein—by up to 40%. High yield crops may be receiving less sunlight or moisture in addition to nutrition from soil, which is often depleted with aggressive farming techniques that may disregard natural rotation methods.

“Our poor farming practices are leading to sick plants, depleted soil, and a need to use higher and higher doses of pesticides and herbicides to ward off what healthy plants would naturally ward off,” says author of The Juice Lady’s Living Foods Revolution, Cherie Calbom, MS. “We are heading toward a dust bowl in many parts of the country if nothing changes.”

[Viva_La_Revolution]

1. you have to feed your soil if you want good vegies

I have clay soil, which most gardeners hate. I LOVE it because I know it's so rich in micronutrients and minerals. It's taken a few years of adding lots of compost and such to make the ground more workable, but it's worth the extra sweat.

big ag only replaces the Nitrogen, Potassium and Phosphorus, none of the trace elements that were stripped out of most fields years ago.