Good for Our Environment – Good for Our Health
The Harris Family of White Oak Pastures in Bluffton, Georgia has raised
cattle on the same land for the last 142 years. During this time, they
have come full circle in their production practices. For the first 80
years of beef production, nature was fully in charge on this Georgia
farm. The Harris’s cooperated with nature to produce beef that was
healthy and safe in a manner that was humane to the herd. Their system
was completely sustainable from an environmental prospective.
After
World War II, the beef business industrialized and competing became a
matter of producing pounds of commodity beef at the cheapest price.
Science made this possible by providing tools like hormone implants,
antibiotics as growth promoters and the confinement feeding of
non-natural feedstuffs.
Thankfully, White Oak Pastures has now
returned to the old way of working with nature. They have built the
only on-farm, USDA-Inspected, farmer owned beef processing plant in the
South. They raise cattle using grassfed practices, which provide a
tremendous benefit to the environment and our health.
A high
percentage of grain fed to feedlot cattle and other animals raised in a
Confined Animal Feeding Operation is from genetically modified crops,
typically shipped from distant fields. Grazing animals on their natural
diet of grasses requires much less fossil fuel than a feedlot diet of
dried corn and soy.
Cattle are herbivores and were created with
four stomachs that allow them to consume and process grass into high
quality protein. As the animals graze, they are busy harvesting and
fertilizing. These chemical-free fields are inhabited by beetles,
earthworms and other beneficial insects that distribute cow manure
underground, thus returning minerals to the soil and building healthy,
sustainable soil within the soil food web.
Compared to grain-fed
beef, grass-fed beef is lower in calories and fat, yet much higher in
omega fatty acids with a healthy ratio of omega 3 to omega 6 fatty
acids. It is also much higher in conjugated linoleic acid, proven to
build muscle, reduce body fat and induce an optimum cellular
environment for improved health. Grass-fed beef provides more vitamins,
especially Vitamin E, lutein, zeaxanthin and beta-carotein.
In
this 21st century, where speed and convenience are often valued above
all else, it is crucial to become an informed consumer and know where
your food comes from and how it is raised. Having a connection to our
food, the land, and the farmers who grow our food is one of the most
basic and rewarding experiences in life. If we are going to affect
change in the arena of the ecologically unfriendly practices of big
agri-business, we must vote with our food dollars and support
sustainable farming practices.
White Oak steaks and roasts are
available at Whole Foods Markets, White Oak ground beef is available at
Publix Supermarkets. Fine Restaurants can get White Oak Pastures
Grassfed Beef from Buckhead Beef. Source: http://www.atlanta.naturalawakeningsmag.com/resources/news/news_item.2008-12-22.7733337243
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