The Organic Manifesto (Book)

by Maria; Scholosser Eric Rodale

Rodale was founded on the belief that organic gardening is the key to better health both for us and for the planet, and never has this message been more urgent. Now Maria Rodale, chairman of Rodale, sheds new light on the state of 21st century farming. She examines the unholy alliances that have formed between the chemical companies that produce fertilizer and genetically altered seeds, the agricultural educational system that is virtually subsidized by those same companies, and the government agencies in thrall to powerful lobbyists, all of which perpetuate dangerous farming practices and deliberate misconceptions about organic farming and foods. Interviews with government officials, doctors, scientists, and farmers from coast to coast bolster her position that chemical-free farming may be the single most effective tool we have to protect our environment and, even more important, our health.

Genres: Nonfiction, Food, Health, Gardening, Sustainability, Environment, Agriculture

Paperback

First published January 1, 2010

Reviews

[Jodi · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is essential reading for anyone sitting on the fence about whether or not to buy organic food.

It is very simple to read, well written and only 180 pages.

In this book the author explains:

- We must demand organic food now
- Buying organic is more important than buying local
- Organically farmed soil stores carbon
- The chemical system of agriculture is killing us
- Cheap food means high health costs
- Using antibacterial hand washes is like washing your hands in pesticides
- Whether or not organic foods have more nutrition is besides the point
- There have been significant declines in nutrients in food in the last 50 years
- The more we try to isolate ourselves and to defy nature, the more we make ourselves weaker
- Synthetic chemicals are destroying our health, and our ability to reproduce
- The idea that we can't feed the world without chemical farming is LIE
- Chemical farming is a better term than 'conventional farming' as there is nothing conventional or traditional about all the new toxic chemicals being used on farms
- Chemicals are not properly tested before being approved for use and are often not removed from use even when proven to be harmful or a cause of cancer
- Crop yields are similar between organic and chemical farming when rainfall is average, higher in organic farming when there are floods or drought
- Organic farming uses 30% less fossil fuels
- Organic farming requires 15% more human labour and so creates jobs
- Organic farming provides an economic return equal or higher than chemical farming, and without government subsidies

It is so easy to get overwhelmed with how much control large corporations have gotten over our lives and our health and our food supply. But we do have some power and what we buy changes the world - so buy organic!

You can also help further by buying Fair Trade organic products, plus switching to plant-based cleaning and personal care products and avoiding plastic water bottles.

Going 100% organic is very difficult at this point but going 80%, 90%, or 95% organic is still a worthy goal and every change we make helps.

This book is highly recommended. The author's passion for the subject is obvious and, I think, infectious.

To read about how you can work to undo the damage caused to your health already by pesticides and hormones in food, and the plastics we take in when we use plastic water bottles and other plastic products the book 'Detoxify or Die' by Dr Sherry Rogers is essential reading.

Using her daily 'detox cocktail' and an FIR sauna you can get some of this gunk out of your body and improve your health and reduce your risk of disease in the future. The book also explains how modern cutting-edge medical testing can be useful. This program is essential particularly if you are about to start a family or your health has already been affected by your toxic chemical levels.

Jodi Bassett, The Hummingbirds' Foundation for M.E.

[Britt · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author is biased, but she let's you know that up front. An interesting read for anyone wondering about the pros and cons of eating organic. I did skim over a couple of sections, but overall it's thought provoking.

[Jo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maria Rodale, CEO of Rodale, Inc. and 3rd generation organic advocate, shares convincing arguments (scientific, financial, political, ethical) for going totally organic. Chemical agriculture is poisoning us, our children, our air, our water-- so it's not too hard to convince me. Especially fascinating as we seek a solution for dealing with carbon emissions is that there already is one: organically farmed soil stores carbon, on the mycorrhizal fungi that grow on the roots of plants-- fungi that are killed by the fungicides typically used in chem ag. Bingo! A major piece of the global warming puzzle could be within our sphere of influence already. Rodale also shares some horrifying history about the introduction of chemicals into agriculture-- really, I knew it was bad, but not this bad. Bless her for taking up the standard, and let's join her in turning the tide towards healthy stewardship of our land and food.

[Marc Buckley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am Bias because Maria is a friend of mine who I have admired for years. She is honest and hard-hitting when it comes to calling bullshit on those who are destroying our food systems, environment, and taking farmers down the road to destruction. Her grandfather and father are the pioneers in the Organic movement in the USA and the Rodale Institute is the leading organization for long-term regenerative organic studies in the world. Besides her leadership role at Rodale Publishing which was later acquired by Hurst Media, she has tremendous experience in research, food, and agriculture. Her book Organic Manifesto is a tremendous read I recommend to anyone interested in the realities of ag and our food systems.

“There are two ways to look at food: there is what you ingest and how it is grown. And how it is grown is more important to everyone than what you actually eat,” Maria explains. “What you eat is personal, and that is about personal liberty and freedom. Some want vegan, and that’s great, others want meat, and that’s great. But how food is grown is collective, it is a communal thing. Chemicals affect all our health, whether you eat that food or not, chemicals disable the soil from storing carbon which impacts all of us. So as a movement we need to shift our paradigm to thinking who cares what you’re eating, let’s care about how we are growing and let’s care about the impact the way we grow things has on all of us.” Maria Rodale.

Maria believes that what we need is love, to move towards a future of love, where taking care of everyone is at the heart of what we do. And she talks more about this on on my podcast Inside Ideas episode 70: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJXpB...

Or check out the links below:
https://www.innovatorsmag.com/lets-ta...
https://www.innovatorsmag.com/inside-...
https://medium.com/inside-ideas/maria...

[Tom · Rating 2 out of 5]

Someone got me this book for Christmas, knowing that I tend to like good food and non-poisonous food, and so I approached it very much as a receptive, willing audience. The problem I ran into-- aside from the sometimes choppy prose and organization-- is the kind of Michael Moore problem that a lot of people face: fundamentally, I agree with this woman, and yet I find her argument to be riddled with flaws, at best, and totally disingenuous at worst.

What I mean is, this book-- even in its formatting -- is a polemic, particularly the first half, and is basically just shouting at the choir. Rodale is a zealot, and suffers from the delusion of a zealot (ie- she is so passionate about the topic that she has convinced herself that she has found the single unifying solution to EVERYTHING, from obesity to autism to ADHD to sexual dysfunction to global warming to political unrest and terrorism), which weakens the argument. Her passion is problematic too, in the grand sweeping suggestions she makes for change in the end, most of which boil down to: "Hey everyone, go organic NOW!"

it's not that it's a BAD book; it's just a flimsy argument in a lot of places, made worse by some obvious one-sidedness, selective use of statistics, and questionable logic. The pie-in-the-sky, everything-is-amazing section on a day in the life of an organic farmer is especially indicative of all of these problems.

Also, not her fault, but the foreword by Erich Schlosser is awful.

[Cammie · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was hard for me to chose a 'rating' for this book. Clearly, Maria Rodale had a mission. That being said, passionate arguments that go on for 187 pages don't necessarily make the most well-written books. However, despite knowing many of her points due to a environmental science major in college, it was interesting to see them all in one place. Her constant use of citations is also helpful in fact checking and understanding her message. I believe in her ideas whole-heartedly and I think reading the book will push me to make the decisions I should have been making a long time ago about my food. So, she realized her goal with me, a much stronger focus on my foods and the use of the only thing I have that matters to companies, purchasing power.

It's worth a read, no matter where you stand on the organic/conventional fence.

[Joe · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was a catalyst for me personally, a rallying cry to push my life to be more organic. It might be a little one sided and pretty biased towards the act of organic agriculture but thats only because for some unexplainable reason we have been conditioned to think that bias is wrong! Some where along the line doing things the right way has become taboo!! I found Maria Rodale's unrelenting push for sustainable organic agriculture to be refreshing and it may be just what the casual reader needs to motivate them as it motivated me! What have you got to lose? God forbid it pushed us to pick up the organic broccoli rather than the regular, what's the worst that could happen. Reading this book may give you the idea that organic food production is the cure for all that ales us. In the big scheme of things that may not be 100% the case but goddamn if it isn't a hell of a good start.

[Samantha Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book provides an in-depth look at this history of farming, the industry & government's role in chemical farming practices, and the impact of this on our health & climate. Although the material isn't 'page-turning', it's both fascinating and frightening. Rodale does a good job of inserting her wry tone of voice, worthy of a few chuckles. She didn't come off preachy at all, openly admitting that she doesn't go organic all the time and believes that people should be allowed to eat what they want - whether it be Pop Tarts or Doritos; these can still be produced organically. Rodale does her best to present "just the facts - and maybe a few opinions thrown in for good measure." It has inspired to be more stringent in my organic buying habits.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

I LOVED this book. I am very passionate about Organic living in all forms and saving our earth. I think the information was presented very well and opinions were placed tastefully.

One thing that I disliked though, was that towards the end(as with many books like this one) it was a little redundant. The ending message was that we should all rise up as one and fight the big companies and one day we will have apple trees lining the highways and everyone will have gardens. While I believe that is completely possible, to the people I am trying to convince, it sounds too "dreamy" and hippie. The book is still chock full of useful and wonderful information.

[Bleu Caldwell · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I agreed with the overall premise -- I love the organic industry and would like to see it continue to grow -- the science seemed a little too black and white. I'm not saying that it's wrong, because I don't know, but I doubt that organic farming is the solution to all the world's ills and conventional farming (and the chemical companies) are the root of all evil. I suspect the situation is a lot more complex than that and contains a lot more shades of gray. However, I'll continue to buy and support organic when I can, and hope that the food industry as a whole continues to move in a healthier direction.

[Kewannah "Health Kick Chick" · Rating 2 out of 5]

After listening to this woman on Jillian Michael's last podcast, I had to read her book. I was floored when she said that many of the same companies that made poison for the Nazis make pesticides for our food. So far, she's spelling out what the big damn deal is about organic food and why we should buy/support it.

The book serves an important function but felt repetitive after a while. It surely could've been cut down by 75% and been an amazingly informative booklet. Pages 181-183 answer the most important question: "why choose organic?". For that alone, this book is valuable.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outstanding! A very pleasant and informative read. While we try to eat organic, now we WILL eat organic as much as possible. I am somewhat disgusted by the American food industry and government controls. It is good to be an informed consumer. Highly recommend that ALL read this book.

[Tanwi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mild spoilers ahead!

Organic Manifesto is a short work of non-fiction that argues that organic farming is the best solution to the climate crisis. I read the entire book during a 4 hour retail shift which tells you all you need to know. It read like a highly watered down and somewhat more contemporary version of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. The writing style towards the beginning really put me off. It was super casual and informal. It felt like the author was trying to be youthful and relatable but it just came off as a bit try-hard and disingenuous. Rodale makes a lot of really broad sweeping claims about the virtues of organic farming (among other things) throughout the book. It’s painfully obvious that she’s trying to sound worldly and powerful, and most of these claims are wholly unsubstantiated by the information she presents. At best, this book is more about the terrors of conventional farming than it is about the wonders of organic farming. It’s like if Karl Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto entirely as a critique of capitalism and preached communism as the solution, without ever actually saying what communism is.

There were also some passages that I felt a little iffy about. The history of chemicals in agriculture is closely tied to the history of scientific advancement in warfare, and I felt like Rodale could have done more justice to the connections between modern agriculture and global histories of colonization and warfare, especially in the United States and Germany with regards to colonial expansion and World War II. Rodale also compared the cross pollination of genetically modified crops with normal crops to sexual assault, which I did not like. The way she did it sounded like she was trying to be feminist, and she began to allude to a few glaring injustices in the way society treats female victims of sexual assault, but it was honestly very poorly executed.

I definitely approached the book with a fair bit of skepticism and Rodale didn’t do much to absolve most of it. Rodale’s background is not entirely unbiased and this came through clearly in her writing. I went through the book hoping to see Rodale address issues with organic farming, or at least concede that it isn’t a perfect one-size-fits-all solution to the literal climate crisis, but she didn’t waver from this stance even once.

All of that being said, I think this was ultimately a good read for anyone who buys and eats groceries. It definitely became a lot more readable as the book went on, and the information was well organized and for the most part presented in an easily digestible way. There were some really interesting tidbits of information and it would definitely serve as a great wake-up call to anyone who doesn’t have previous knowledge about conventional large-scale farming practices. It was also really interesting to get a more recent view of some of the issues explored in Silent Spring, and above all, to hear from the farmers themselves. If Rodale did one thing really well in writing this book, it was her presentation of the farmer’s side of the issue of organic vs. conventional farming. Overall, it was a quick and easy read that covers a lot of essential US history that will probably never be covered in any school curriculum. I find the policy side of any issue particularly confusing, but Rodale’s presentation of modern (and historical) agricultural policy was factual, straightforward, and from what I can gather, quite accurate.

[Alex Siggers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Maria Rodale’s novel provides a broad, yet thorough look at the current, vulnerable state of our agriculture industry. She lays the foundation by providing a look at the importance of carbon, water, and our land, along with the detrimental impacts on each that our farming systems are causing. The entire book paints a stark picture of the unequivocal influence of the chemical industry on farming across the globe. From control of the seeds, to the fertilizers, to the fields themselves, chemical manufacturers serve as the main antagonist, and rightly so. Rodale argues that changing our view and treatment of the soil is the key to making progress in the climate crisis. Organic farming will act as the primary pathway of changing our global outlook on food production and security; she even goes as far as to say organic farming would reduce rates of ADHD, but there’s always a compelling, stacked argument behind her claims. Given this book was published by her own company, it is easy to say that there was an underlying bias throughout the book. However, her careful and convincing use of statistics, personal interactions, and ecological principles should be enough to change the minds of most reasonable people regarding corporate farming.
There is a section towards the beginning of this novel that I believe should be read by every person at some point: We Have Poisoned Ourselves and Our Children. It addresses the correlation between increasing disease prevalence and increasing use of agricultural chemicals. If that’s not convincing enough, she highlights the country’s backwards priorities when it comes to funding programs and testing. Our dependence upon cheap food is detrimental, not only to us, but the entire globe. This section made me really think about how many of us have any idea what’s going in our bodies, and if we can really do much about it. Is it too late? How many non-processable compounds have bioaccumulated in my body? What can I change? At the very least, this book should make you think about who’s really in charge of our farms and pay more attention to what we shove in our faces.
I would absolutely recommend this book to a friend; I actually have already. It sparked a desire to seek out so much more information and see how well her proposed changes might actually work. I can’t understand how a person could be exposed to the information in this book and not want to know more. There is a certain willful ignorance and complacency in thinking that there is nothing that can be changed to better our current food system.

[Megan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ok, so as a new farmer…yes, but also NO. Yes, there’s major complex issues in farming (worldwide) that trace right back to our lovely government. However NO, plants are not “raped”, farmers are not committing “suicide” by unknowingly ingesting chemicals, and I disagree completely with her statements relating to farmers’ relationships (“addictions”) to chemicals… how is this an addiction if there is no other choice in many instances? Do your research! In general she paints an incredibly gloom & doom picture of farming, and a very dumbed down one at that. Does this mean I don’t see problems? No I absolutely DO and will continue to learn quickly and work diligently to find better solutions for our area and environment! I encourage everyone reading this book to also check in with their local ag boards, government officials, read other sides to understand multiple viewpoints, & also trace the money to understand what is actually going on behind the scenes. Just please don’t take this book as the end-all-be-all of facts. One last thing…in my experience the land owners care VERY MUCH for the land which is being farmed, and take great responsibility for it, always wanting to do what’s best and are not just in it for the cash. The author apparently disagrees with this. People do have hearts.

[Lindsay Pittman · Rating 1 out of 5]

I agree with the overall message of the book, but i think it desperately needed an editor.
Much of the scientific reasoning i found poorly explained and confusing, and much of the literature is poorly cited. There are too many instances of a study result stated as a fact, rather than a supporting reference with an explanation of the study as rationale- science is not black and white. All results must be given with context, which tells me that the author doesn’t have a clear scientific understanding and is cherry picking. The many references to her grandfathers work to give the author credibility was weird.
A significant portion of the text is redundant, and the structure follows that of a rant without clear organization. I felt like the author was rambling at me with a raised voice. The text is published through her own institution, which explains things. Overall this left a bad taste in my mouth and wouldn’t recommend this over text over others in the pro-organic category (would rec “the soil will save us” or “the world according to Monsanto”)

[S · Rating 4 out of 5]

Given that this is non fiction and addresses some deeply serious issues, I assumed that it was going to be heavy and I wouldn't be able to get through a lot in one sitting. I was wrong. The Organic Manifesto is a fast paced read that strikes an impressive balance between grappling with the negative consequences of our global actions and presenting solutions. In what could have easily become an angry rant about how brutally we have damaged our planet, Rodale chooses to look toward the future with hope though she certainly doesn't pull any punches. It's clear that she's done the legwork in terms of research and that frankly she was the perfect person to write this book. I think what she has to say is important and worth your time.

[mary jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

the other side of this equation - and one equally explored and documented - is the damage done by the chemical companies, their insidious monetary presence in our legislation and in the way farms are ablet to function. the history is laid out and the current impact is made clear. just as derrick jensen's 'a language older than words' and frances moore lappe's 'diet for a small planet' provide documentation and research on the dangers posed by our current actions, so too do they all pose positive actions that can be taken - of varying size and impact - but, ultimately, ones that show we can effect change if we work together and focus upon the systems that have gotten us to this perilous place in the earth's history.

[Jacquie MacMullin · Rating 2 out of 5]

I knew it was going to be biased, and the author says she’s biased, but still... it’s so biased. I agree with every word she says but I shouldn’t be the intended audience. I already grow organically in my home garden and buy organic food when possible. The author should be aiming to convince people not like me. But I don’t see that happening when she is so blatantly biased while not using enough sources to support her supposed facts and assertions.

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Could the answer to all that ails us really be organic farming? Rodale makes a pretty good case for that with many references to research studies and statistics. Her arguments are logical and although her proposal is daunting, it gives me hope for the future.

[Matheus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mais que um manifesto, uma motivação para mudar o estilo de vida e abrir os olhos para o crime que estão fazendo com os alimentos e a terra.

Vale muito a pena ler! O histórico desde os anos 1800 ensina e nos faz entender como chegamos à situação atual.

[Ryan · Rating 3 out of 5]

It felt a little bit one-sided but lays out some good reasons why eating and using organic products is important.

[Andrea · Rating 4 out of 5]

a bit of a rant, but great information in an easily digestible format. go organic!

[Adrianna · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 - The book largely focused on things happening in the United States so it may not be relatable to some readers.

[Mari Turner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Surprisingly simple and interesting read for a more comprehensive understanding of agriculture and the food decisions we need to be making now.

[Beth · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5

[Rachel Herschberger · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Kevin Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm ready to go O. At least when it's not Whopper Wednesday.

[Karli · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book included good insight on how organic farming can have a positive impact on our world. Some chapters I felt the author put too much bias into her writing.

[Bean · Rating 3 out of 5]

6.5/10