Organic Farming in China

Americans are not the only ones willing to pay more for organic food, apparently the Chinese care about eating food that is free of chemicals and antibotics as much as we do. In fact they are doing a better job at producing it than we are. According to Corby Kummer, food editor for The Atlantic magazine, Chinese chickens have it better than most chickens in the U.S. because they are allowed to go outside instead of being kept in a chicken house until they are five years old, so I guess they are truly free range chickens. Another difference is that at this particular chicken farm that Krummer visited outside of Beijing they repurpose the chicken manure. Some is used for fertilizer; while the rest is put in a methane digester, which creates enough cooking gas for 1,700 households in seven villages. The biggest problem of recent times in the Chinese food industry is their approach to producing food, which has become more industrial as of late, which means more pesticides, more chemical fertilizers, and genetically modified crops. Meanwhile, the middle-class in China like that in America has increasingly embraced the habit of grabbing fast food and soft drinks, so therefore obesity and diabetes in China are on the rise. A makes sense that the Chinese are turning to eating organic food, which is seen as healthier and a better quality than processed food. The challenge is still the price, which is higher than processed food. If most of the Chinese population embraces organic food, then there is a chance that the price will come down, but for now organic is just for the few that are willing to pay for it. For more information check out the following link. http://www.theworld.org/2011/11/organic-farming-china/