To Attract the Next Generation, the Message of Organic Needs to Change

(Photo courtesy of the Real Meals Campaign)

Thank You: This will be final piece of commentary for 2022, and I just wanted to say thank you for making Organic Insider a part of your world. There are very few things that are more important to me than organic, and the fact that you engage with this newsletter means you share a similar concern for it as well. So, for that, I am deeply grateful. Our regular coverage will return on January 4th, with a look at what’s ahead in 2023. Wishing you all a fantastic new year!

Despite the organic industry’s growing popularity, future consumers resonate with different messages.

And if we are serious about attracting young leaders who can continue organic’s development and protect what early pioneers have worked so hard to establish, we need to communicate and engage with this demographic in a much more effective manner.

Until this point, the evidence demonstrates that it is simply not happening.

We see it at the National Organic Standards Board meetings, where attendance is largely dominated by people in their 50s and 60s, with hardly any representation by those in their 20s and 30s.

It can also be seen at universities throughout the U.S.

According to Anim Steel, executive director of the Real Food Generation, an organization that fights for equity and sustainability in college cafeterias across the country, “I know of no young people fighting for organic.”

While cost remains a factor and there is no widespread aversion to organic food per se, the fact remains that it is simply not a priority for Gen Z.

WHAT NEEDS TO BE COMMUNICATED

Mackenzie Feldman may understand the challenge that organic faces among young people better than anyone.

As a student at the University of California at Berkeley, she became alarmed at the potential public and environmental health risks posed by the spraying of glyphosate-based products throughout her campus.

So, in 2017, Mackenzie co-founded Herbicide-Free Cal, a campaign that eventually led to 95% of the school switching to organic landscaping methods. Mackenzie and her partner decided to subsequently launch Herbicide-Free Campus, which has since re-branded to Re:wild Your Campus, to enact similar change throughout the entire UC system and on campuses across the nation.

While Re:wild Your Campus focuses exclusively on landscaping methods, instead of food, she knows how to galvanize young leaders and what is important to them.

“In regard to engaging college students, the organic food movement is facing an uphill battle. It has an elitist, expensive perception, and students don’t want to get involved in something when they do not see people who look like them represented,” she said.

To get college students to care more about organic food, the message has to be much more than just their personal health and the risks that consuming chemical-laden foods pose.

“The truth is that these students do unhealthy things all of the time, such as drinking, smoking or not sleeping,” acknowledged Mackenzie Feldman. “So, it’s important to emphasize that advocating for organic foods on their campus will mean that farmworkers will not be exposed to harmful pesticides. In order for the message to resonate, it needs to be framed through this lens of social and environmental justice.”

Building momentum for organic food on colleges throughout the country will require creating an organization similar to Re:wild Your Campus, and that will take time and money.

Until then, however, we can start changing the message of why organic is important in our daily online and offline conversations.

“Each year, pesticide exposure poisons as many as 20,000 farmworkers, yet regulations to protect these vital workers have not been updated to address this growing problem,” said Virginia Ruiz, director of occupational and environmental health at Farmworker Justice.

According to her organization, pesticide exposure causes farmworkers to suffer more chemical-related injuries and illnesses than any other workforce nationwide. Short-term effects include stinging eyes, rashes, blisters, blindness, nausea, dizziness, headache, coma and even death. Long-term impacts, such as infertility, neurological disorders and cancer, are also prevalent. Not only are farmworkers subjected to these risks, but their families who live in nearby communities and go to schools neighboring the fields face the same dangers.

Emphasizing the positive impact of organic on farmworkers is critical if we want to engage young people, whose hands will ultimately decide the fate of our industry.

And it all begins with re-framing the organic message from “me” to “we.”

With gratitude, Max Goldberg, Founder