With The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Michael Pollan has become the evangelist for the ‘beyond organic’ movement. Although not preachy or pedagogic, this book is now a bible for people seeking to improve their health through the improvement of the health of our soils, animals, plants and of the planet as a whole. The ‘Beyond Organic’ movement not only questions industrial food productions systems, it also takes a hard look at what has become of the organic movement. And it is clear after reading Pollan’s brilliant, incredibly well-researched and so eloquently written book, that the essence of what made organic organic in the 70s has pretty much fully disappeared in today’s society. Instead, organic has become a marketing device, a method ignorant of its own carbon footprint that has succeeded (at least in the US) in applying many traditional industrial production techniques to a variety of new foods, under a new name, ideology and, of course, under a new price range. While still a better alternative than its traditional industrial counterpart (and Pollan has enough stories to tell about the rise and deceit of the industrial food production system to make one never want to eat industrial food again), organic today has little left of the ideals that once brought farmers and consumers together in an effort to return to a healthier and simpler way of obtaining and eating food.

However, this does not necessarily imply that a dismissal of all things organic is in order. There continues to be clear benefits to eating organic and to reject most so-called foods that are issued from the big industrial food machine: anything that comes in a shape or form that clearly can not be found in nature as well as anything that comes in a container or package as this is an indication of a highly processed food. Eating organic ensures with a relatively high degree of certainty that no chemical fertilizer and pesticides were used and that no hormones were injected into the meat you buy. Finally, it means probably more vitamins and minerals than the average non-organic food. But even more importantly than all of this, buying organic also means a commitment to a lifestyle and to a way of approaching the world that is badly needed today. And if organic is not the final destination, at least it is a step in the right direction.

This destination is the beyond organic movement with its slow food, permacultures, sustainable agriculture, farmers’s markets, and community supported agriculture. It is a return to the eating of whole foods and to a renewed kinship with our planet. Pollan demonstrates clearly the link that exists between the various elements of a food chain, from the soils from which we grow our food to the insects that play a role in the growth (or not) of a plant which will be eaten by an animal which we will in turn eat (for those who still believe in the eating of animals). Humans are active at every level of this food chain, and whatever decisions we decide to make can have a negative or positive impact on this chain, and thus, on our own health. It is a symbiotic loop that is reminiscent of James Lovelock’s Gaia theory, showing once again that human beings can not take the liberty of assuming that they are independent of the world they inhabit. Everything we do, the many ways we impact our planet and our ecological systems, the decisions we make regarding the plants and animals that surround us, all impact us and our health (mental and physical) directly.

While Pollan has become a bit of an activist, speaking against Monsanto and genetically modified foods, The Omnivore’s Dilemma set out initially to simply show a history of food and of our relationship to it. By placing the rise of industrial production firmly into the greater context of our evolution and of our historical relationship to food, Pollan is able to show how we have become deceived and brainwashed by the promises and cheap and instantaneous rewards of industrial food, a food that unfortunately has little left in common with the food that we human beings evolved to eat and assimilate.

As I have posted several times before, I believe in the benefits of technology in the long run. I believe that we will, at some point in the future, master enough knowledge to create artificial foods that taste good, that are beneficial to us and that are manufactured in a way which is at peace with the environment. However, we have not reached that stage. We are still living in a world in which corporations are pushing sugar and unhealthy processed foods down our throats, making false claims about the health benefits of their products, bribing government officials to get clearance for substances that are clearly toxic, abusing our environment in dangerous ways, using unimaginable cruelty towards the animals that are part of our food chain, and all in the name of profit. While the long term future of food lies clearly with the scientists and the nutritionists (hopefully without the pressure of corporations), the immediate and short term future on the other hand must imply a return to a more natural way of eating, one which is at peace with the planet and in harmony with the way evolution transformed us over millions of years.