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Rodale Institute’s Fundraiser: Nutrient Density Research

Help us conduct important research to determine the nutrient value in organic and conventional foods. Make a donation today.

Rodale Institute (Kutztown, PA, USA) is looking for your support! This campaign will fund research comparing the nutrient density of organically and conventionally grown produce. But, we can’t do it without the backing of our friends and supporters!

Last year’s report out of Stanford University called into question the health benefits associated with organic and conventional foods. While this study revealed health benefits associated with eating organic foods we believe that more research needs to be completed to truly see how organic and conventional foods stack up.

The Institute’s Farming Systems Trial (FST) has side-by-side research fields that have been managed organically and conventionally for more than 30 years — the perfect location for a sound nutritional study. FST provides an excellent field laboratory to address the impact of growing methods on nutrient density because the crops are all grown in the same soil, processed in the same manner, and can be tested the same number of days after harvest. Utilizing this unique field “laboratory” resource, Rodale Institute believes that we can put skeptics to rest once and for all.

Please make a gift of $10, $15, $25 – as much as you can afford. We promise you that your contribution will help to help to improve the health and well being of people and the planet.

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7 Comments

  1. I have a very hard time trusting Rodale anymore since they are championing GMOs in some of the magazine articles they publish within the last 5 years, specifically, bananas.

    1. Seriously? If I can see some evidence for this, I would consider pulling this down…

      1. It was a 2010 Organic Gardening Magazine article, small. It complained how we need gmo’s because of how bananas multiply in nature. I’m looking in my archives for it, but it may take me some time.

  2. That surprises me to hear. I just did a search of the Rodale Institute’s website and all the articles I found seemed, at a quick glance at least, to be against gm. This is a list of them here… https://rodaleinstitute.org/tag/gmo/

    Including this one by their farm director Jeff Moyer… https://rodaleinstitute.org/gmos-and-sustainable-agriculture/ which seems like the closest thing I can find to an actual stance on gm.

    Although the Rodale Institute (who do organic research) and Rodale Inc (who are a publishing company) are linked they may have difference stances. So please, please can we hear a stated stance from the actual Rodale Institute before we potentially put out misinformation and discredit an institute who do some amazing work.

  3. In this research does The Rodale Institute make a distinction between varieties? Vegetables issued from seed bred for a uniformity of taste, a predicable color, the same shape (to fit in boxes i guess), right down to their estimated response to fertilisers, or a predictable time to harvest so farmers can deliver in time (to name just a very few criteria of selection), well, these uniform well behaved varieties cannot compare with hand-raised varieties or land races that gardeners and peasant breed in their own gardens or village commons. They select not just the best plants most productive but more importantly for a wider genepool, gene rich, colourful/pigmented= antioxidants, rich in complex flavours. These are truly what is needed to keep our vitality without so called health supplements. The peasants and tribals of today still know that to have food on the family table, you need a huge diversity of varieties and species.(ask Andean indians how var of potatoes do they have and how many species of carbohydrate crops they grow. Ask peasants from the Balkans, Portugal Papua, Vietnam, Togo, Ecuador how (some) still save their seeds? They select their seeds for next planting with wisdom, forsight, anticipation, taking care not to be too harsh or greedy when selecting plants for seeds, keeping some unproductive individual plants (but resistant to drought or pest or diseases) so they are able to cross breed with more productive individual plants and widen the gene pool of, maize, wheat, kale etc. Why not continue our ancestors heritage in our gardens instead of purchasing uniform corporate seeds grown by the the square mile. Let diversity grow in peasant Permaculture small fields, Permaculture gardens, urban community gardens, and join in the complex Permaculture peasant food web. Thanks Rodale all the same for the study.

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