Mini Jumbo, on Ground

Description

Why should we grow food for our loved ones?

Lindsay Sheehan brings it down to the point:
“Store-bought produce isn’t as nutritious as it used to be. Showing a steady decline since the 1950s, modern farming practices have valued the size, yield, growth rate, and pest resistance of fruits and vegetables over and above essential nutrition. You would need to eat eight oranges today to obtain the same amount of vitamin A as a single orange would have provided just two generations ago.

The leading causes of nutrient loss are growing foods in soil that is depleted in nutrients, cultivating fast-growing varieties that are harvested before maturity, as well as the “dilution effect” – a phenomenon where the larger the fruit and the more produce the plant itself yields, the less protein, amino acids, minerals, and vitamins are available in the harvested food. Sadly, today’s average vegetable purchased in the supermarket contains anywhere from 5% to 40% less nutrition.

However, we have much more control over growing our food. We can enrich the soil with organic matter, harvest food when it reaches peak maturity, and choose to grow cultivars that give us the most nutritional bang for our buck.”