Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

livelovefruit.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 61 posts

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#51

Post by zaarn »

eth0up wrote: post #33
torgoguys wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The not drinking glyphosate thing is way overblown. The best data we have says that eating Crayolas is safe. Young children do it all the time. They're non-toxic by design. That doesn't mean that I'm going to munch down a boxful if asked to. It isn't food. OF COURSE he didn't drink it. Again, it isn't food.

Then consider allowing your children to merely gargle with glyphosate, and remove their crayon-eating privileges if they insist on persevering to digestive phases.

The considered safe exposure is about one milligram per kilogram bodyweight, so your children should be fine gargling on about 20 to 50 milligrams of the stuff without issue (somewhere after that you reach norminal toxicity where it'll just kill you normally like 99.999% of the pesticides out there).

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#52

Post by Nicksil »

refurb wrote: post #46
dragonwriter wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Growing things without herbicides and pesticides is very difficult. And not what organic aspires to, anyway, it just involves a fairly arbitrary set of exclusions as to which pesticides are used, which exclusions have no particular correspondence to either human health or environmental sustainability. “Organic” is largely marketing, but what the marketing appeals to is woo to start with.

It’s more than marketing in the sense that certain pesticides are excluded for their toxicity. That said, the list of allowable, synthetic organic pesticides is pretty damn long.[1] [1] http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?c=ecfr&SID=9874504b6f10...

>certain pesticides are excluded for their toxicity.

They're not excluded for their toxicity. The exclusions come as a result of a limited list of chemicals used in organic agriculture.

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#53

Post by Nicksil »

dx87 wrote: post #38
jbay808 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of us who purchase organic foods don't care about the impact on the food, but rather on the farm ecosystem. Pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers impact insect popuations, wash into rivers, and so on. It's nice to have an option to vote with our dollars in favour of more sustainable practices, even if the food isn't any healthier or tastier to eat.

Organic foods are normally grown with organic pesticides that still harm the environment, but since the pesticides aren't synthetic, the food still keeps the organic label.

Organic herbicides and pesticides tend to be less effective, as well, thus requiring more frequent application using large farm equipment, belching exhaust and compacting the soil.

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#54

Post by jsilence »

xref wrote: post #23

The specific bit where it is allowed on hydroponic farms: > glyphosate (an incredibly toxic herbicide that is absolutely prohibited on organic farms) is being sprayed on fields prior to constructing hydroponic greenhouses awaiting organic certification. This is done to remove weeds from the greenhouses.

By the way, glyphosate is not at all "incredibly toxic". Its toxicity, the debatable claim about causing cancer set aside since that is not about toxicity, is well below that of coffee. It would be safe to ingest larger amounts of glyphosate, and people actually have done that.

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#55

Post by zaarn »

jedimastert wrote: post #22
designium wrote: post #4

At least, when I am purchasing "Organic" products, I would expect to use the least or zero amount of pesticide/herbicide/etc. in the growth of the "organic" plants and animals. If the article is showing the truth, it feels like those companies are cheating the consumers who are paying for that premium product. It's also unfortunate that there are certifications companies that are either created or "cooped" by compani…

Kurzgesagt has a pretty great video[0] about organic food, and goes a little bit into what the definition of "organic" means. Digging through his citations[1] (which is awesome, btw), as far as American legal definitions and pesticides and the whatnot are concerned, the relevant law[2] says that pest and disease problems can be controlled using "non-synthetic controls, such as...repellents", meaning that pesticides c…

MaiLabs also made a video[1] specifically about glyphosate and why some bodies rule it as carcinogen and others don't, she's sponsored by Funk similar to Kurzgesagt and it's quite informative. She searched trhough quite a few sources [2] to evaluate the situation and it's really all about the IARC including a non-independent study vs all the other bodies not doing that (the IARC is literally the only body that said glyphosate is cancer).

1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2K0TAphTfaI, 2: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_CgI5-bYC6dNnUvAMQUHlHjp...

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#56

Post by zaarn »

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #30
cwojno wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Organic is a marketing term created by organic companies. Growing things without herbicides and pesticides is very difficult.

No, that's not true, it's the strongest USDA mandated and certified food standard available in the USA. The USA standard is far weaker than EU's organic standard, which is weaker than the UK's, but it is still the strongest defined standard in the US market. Not only do those standards limit pesticides, they restrict frequency and amount of what is permissible. The European standards have additional rules around anim…

The problem is that the term "organic" in the US includes pesticides that are... less healthy than normal ones.

They are organic pesticides, those are after all okay, but they are more generica than targeted pesticides and tend to be worse for the environment and the human body (Kurzgesagt has a very good video on that).

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#57

Post by cwojno »

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #30
cwojno wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Organic is a marketing term created by organic companies. Growing things without herbicides and pesticides is very difficult.

No, that's not true, it's the strongest USDA mandated and certified food standard available in the USA. The USA standard is far weaker than EU's organic standard, which is weaker than the UK's, but it is still the strongest defined standard in the US market. Not only do those standards limit pesticides, they restrict frequency and amount of what is permissible. The European standards have additional rules around anim…

I agree that the USDA created an official designation. As you said, "organics" still use pesticides, but the recommendations for limitations and selection are not all based on science.

If they were, then I would expect that GMO/GEO foods wouldn't be barred as they have the potential to not only help address malnutrition, but also reduce water usage and tillage.

http://www.goldenrice.org/ https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-03231-x

Sorry, I was speaking only of US standards as those are the only ones with which I'm even remotely familiar.

https://www.ams.usda.gov/grades-standards/organic-standards

Overall point: there is a strong naturalistic bias with the term organic. Natural = good, GMO = bad. This is unproven and in some cases counter to reality. This is why I refer to it as a marketing term.

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#58

Post by cwojno »

zaarn wrote: post #56
NeedMoreTea wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that's not true, it's the strongest USDA mandated and certified food standard available in the USA. The USA standard is far weaker than EU's organic standard, which is weaker than the UK's, but it is still the strongest defined standard in the US market. Not only do those standards limit pesticides, they restrict frequency and amount of what is permissible. The European standards have additional rules around anim…

The problem is that the term "organic" in the US includes pesticides that are... less healthy than normal ones. They are organic pesticides, those are after all okay, but they are more generica than targeted pesticides and tend to be worse for the environment and the human body (Kurzgesagt has a very good video on that).

Some pesticides that are banned by the organics label are actually pretty terrible for humans and the environment.

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#59

Post by zaarn »

cwojno wrote: post #58
zaarn wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that the term "organic" in the US includes pesticides that are... less healthy than normal ones. They are organic pesticides, those are after all okay, but they are more generica than targeted pesticides and tend to be worse for the environment and the human body (Kurzgesagt has a very good video on that).

Some pesticides that are banned by the organics label are actually pretty terrible for humans and the environment.

And some pesticides allowed by the organics label are actually pretty terrible for the huamns and the environment.

Re: Glyphosate in Organic Hydroponic Food Production

#60

Post by undersuit »

RachelF wrote: post #44

I don't understand this at all: Why would you need kill weeds (unwanted plants) if you are growing your plants hydrophonically? What am I missing?

Glyphosate disrupts a key biochemical pathway in most plants and bacteria and probably some other lifeforms I don't know about. Hydroponic grow-ops can still deal with weeds, one I know about is duckweed, an incredibly invasive water plant.
Post reply on HN