Unclothed
About Nothing beats the feel of cotton. That’s what the commercials say, but what they don’t
tell you is that the feel or conventional cotton uses 25% of the world’s insecticides. Not just the US, but the world. Regular cotton also uses 10% of the world’s pesticides. In fact, regular cotton starts using pesticides on the seeds. The little babies haven’t even had time to say their first words, or sprout a twig, before they are brought down by the man. The man carrying the chemicals. From seeds onwards, chemicals are a continuous part of the growing process. Organic cotton not only doesn’t use pesticides, but it uses a lot less water. How? Because organic cotton is a rotation crop. When crops are rotated the soil maintains its nutrients and is better able to hold water in. Regular cotton is usually the sole crop planted. Cotton depletes the soil, and leaves the soil incapable of holding water. Mass irrigation happens on regular cotton and uses 3,000 cubic meters more of water per acre to grow than organic cotton. Most organic cotton is rain-fed and not irrigated, so helps to save water in these times where over one third of the world’s population does not have clean drinking water. Aren’t we lucky to be such an abundant nation that we can use our water resources for golf courses? Don’t answer that. Not that we have anything against golf courses, but it might be smart to only have golf courses where they can sustain themselves without sucking up water we may one day need for simple things like drinking and bathing. Call us crazy. Water will always be around, right? I hope you all caught the sarcasm inherent in that sentence. Water is a precious commodity and organic cotton farmers recognize the importance of this and we are proud to be able to bring you products that feel good and do a little good for the world. Organic cotton does not compromise the look or feel of regular cotton. You can still wear your organic-cotton-t-shirts around the house, out on the town and you may walk a little taller knowing the secrets of how it was made. Another plus is that organic cotton farms keep lots of people employed. The weeds are hand picked to keep the ground happy, instead of dumping mass amounts of chemicals (some originally used in warfare as nerve agents) on the land, which can have the unfortunate effect of getting caught in the wind and poisoning workers, ground water and the animals that depend on the ground water. Think of 67 million birds per year falling to their deaths, dropping from the sky and landing at your feet, or keeling over because they have ingested toxic pesticides. In fact, most of the pesticides used on regular cotton have been labeled possible, likely or probably known human carcinogens. What that means is that they can cause all sorts of cancer, they are endocrine disrupters, can cause developmental disabilities in children. Need any other reasons to switch to organic? How about knowing that as many as 20,000 deaths per year are attributed to accidental pesticide poisoning. We’ve got a few more. Organic farmers maintain a balance between pests and natural predators through healthy soil and crop rotation, or using a variety of crops. They even plant “trap”crops to entice the bad insects away from the cotton. In this scenario, pesticides aren’t needed because nature, smart as she is, takes care of herself. Organic farmers also wait for seasonal freezes to defoliate the plants, or they use water management to stimulate defoliation. Conventional farmers use even more of those fun pesticides I was just telling you about. They use more than 200 different types of chemicals just to manufacture the cotton. One of the controversial issues in the US today is the use of GMO’s or Genetically Modified Organisms. Europe and Japan refuse US products with GMO’s or they have to be labeled clearly stating they contain GMO’s. Here in the United States, we have no such fun labeling systems, so you could be eating GMO’s and not even knowing it. Why should that be a concern? We don’t know. That’s the problem. We don’t know the long-term effects on humans. GMO’s could turn out to be another case like DDT. Other countries are more cautious about what they put in their bodies. In the US we don’t even have the choice because we don’t know what’s in what. Conventional cotton uses up to 70% GMO seeds. GMO’s were developed to be resistant to certain insects so less pesticides would be needed. The problem that developed is that secondary insect infestations have far surpassed the primary infestations that would have happened if they hadn’t tinkered with the seeds. Some growers say they use even more pesticides with GMO’s than they did without. In 2000, 84 million pounds of pesticides were sprayed on only 14.4 million acres of conventional cotton, making cotton one of the highest using pesticides productions in the US. By contrast, organic cotton is grown on soil that has been chemical free for at least three years. It’s time to be one of the cool kids like Patagonia who no longer use conventional cotton. Wal-Mart and Target of all places now carry organic cotton t-shirts. So does LL Bean. Besides, now you can buy everything from handkerchiefs to kimono’s in organic cotton. Right now, only 0.5% of the cotton market is organic. You have choices. The more organic cotton that’s bought, the more will be made. Maybe one day, we will eradicate regular cotton for good and the world will be a better place for you and me! This article is from ONNO, a t-shirt company in Boulder, Colorado. www.onnotextiles.com
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