 |
| Learning how to farm organically is the first step of nourishment |
Mineral is one of the most
easily neglected nutrients in
modern diet.
The main reason is
due to the chemical agricultural practice
in modern time.
Modern chemical agriculture
deviates from the traditional
organic farming,
abuses on synthetic fertilizers, pesticides and
hormonal
catalyzer, to boost the growth of crops and plants.
It seems like a positive
evolution in agriculture,
having more harvest,
feeding more people.
However,
chemical agriculture has conferred side effects,
including the pandemic issue
of mineral deficiency in modern diet.
This is because：
（1）The application of chemicals harms the microbes
in the soil.
When microbes are not able to grow properly in the soil,
they
cannot transform the elemental minerals into organic minerals.
In general,
plants are not able to absorb elemental minerals in the soil.
When the soil
microbes are not surviving,
there will not be sufficient organic minerals for
plants.
Therefore, when these organic minerals-deficient crops
are consumed by
routine,
people are naturally lack of minerals.
（2） Modern agriculture also abuses on
Nitrogen,
Phosphorus, Potassium as well as
hormones to catalyze the growth of crops.
Growth-boosted crops, because they are harvested early,
have less time in
contact with the soil.
Chemical
fertilizers and hormones although
may speed up the growth of the plants,
do
not speed up the absorption of minerals from the soil.
Hence, eventually,
growth boosted crops
tend to be lack of mineral due to the limited soil contact.
Usually, our need for minerals is minute,
therefore a lot of
people thought
it’s not hard to get enough minerals in their daily diet.
But,
they do not realize crops harvested early,
could not even fulfill the basic
mineral needs!
Mineral is part of a balanced diet,
as it dictates
metabolism,
nervous signal transduction,
cellular communication,
immunity and
many essentials life mechanism.
Long term deficiency in minerals
could bring along a lot of
health hazards including
obesity, diabetes, cancer, cardiovascular diseases,
depression etc
Vegetarian often neglect the consumption of mineral,
falling
into these pitfalls:
(a) Preference for white rice to brown rice:
Brown
rice contains a lot of minerals,
and most minerals are located in rice bran and
rice germs.
Whereas white rice,
because has been polished away the bran and
germ layers,
suffers from tremendous loss of minerals.
Therefore, vegetarians
who avoid brown rice,
and consume white rice for long term will be deficient of
minerals.
(b) Preference for leafy vegetables and fruits to
root vegetables:
Different plant parts harbour different types of nutrients.
Some plant parts contains more vitamins (e.g. fruits),
some contains more
proteins (e.g. seeds) and
some contains more minerals (e.g. roots).
If
vegetarians have high preference for leafy vegetables and fruits,
then there
will be a tendency of consuming less mineral.
(c) Misunderstanding about organic produce:
Organic
produce as above mentioned
are richer in minerals.
Some vegetarians may be
mistaken that
there is no nutritional difference between
organic produce and
conventional produce,
hence thought there is no need to consume organic food.
This is another reason of mineral deficiency.
Due to the fact that modern produce are mainly chemically
grown,
and that foodstuff nowadays are highly processed and refined,
mineral
deficiency has become a global pandemic issue.
If this nutrients crisis is not
solved in time,
the incidence of degenerative diseases will keep climbing.
Although we may not be able
to reverse chemical agricultural
practices
back to organic ones in short period;
we could still support organic
foods
according to our own financial capacity.
In order to upkeep our
wellbeing,
we should remind ourselves on
the intake of more wholesome grains
and root vegetables.
If there is necessity,
we could also consider some
multi-minerals supplements.
The Veg School’s Signature Veg Nutrition Course commencing 21 Sep 2014 (1.30pm-5.30pm), will further elaborate about balanced nourishment via safe and scientific plant based regime. You are welcome to join us. Details in http://TheVegSchool.net/TVS-VNC-HY.pdf
Well regards,
Kee Yew
pureland2012-at-gmail.com
{Learning Holistic Wellness for Wisdom and Compassion}
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment