While organic farmers may tout the environmental benefits of food produced without pesticides, the amount of greenhouse gases emitted through shipping is about the same as with non-organic food, University of Alberta researchers suggest.

Sean Cash, a professor in the department of rural economy, said consumers who buy organic products to be eco-friendly should also be mindful of other considerations. He encourages consumers to read labels carefully and ask retailers where the produce was grown.

'It doesn't mean that buying organic is bad … but it's not necessarily a black and white issue.'—Sean Cash, University of Alberta

"Think about what you purchase and what impact it might have on the environment or on other people," he said.

"When we rely on things like an organic label or other types of products that people are interested in such as fair trade products, having a simple label that can point us to products also means that we're maybe missing other parts of the story if we don't dig a little deeper."

Cash's student researchers collected information from six Edmonton grocery stores and asked suppliers about their shipping methods to calculate the emissions produced in transporting the food from the field to the grocery store. 

For a city the size of Edmonton, between 5,492 and 7,426 tonnes of carbon dioxide were produced for conventional produce as compared with 6,348 to 7,124 tonnes of CO2 for organic produce.

Still, Cash notes that there are still benefits to buying organic produce, including concern over pesticides.

The Certified Organic Growers Association says there were 3,618 certified organic growers in Canada in 2005.
(CBC)

"There are just a lot of trade-offs around this and it doesn't mean that buying organic is bad. There are certainly benefits — you are using fewer pesticides and other production chemicals — but it's not necessarily a black and white issue."

Consumers concerned about pesticide use: survey

Organic foods have grown in popularity in recent years, according to a Certified Organics Report released in May. Over half of Canadian households purchased organically grown food last year, citing pesticide use as their primary concern.

Source: The Canadian Food Inspection Agency

What qualifies as an organic food?
Organic foods are grown without the use of pesticides or synthetic fertilizers, hormones and antibiotics. The products have been grown without the use of technologies including genetic engineering or radiation.

The Canadian Organic Growers say there were 3,618 certified organic growers in Canada in 2005, with another 241 farmers in the process of converting their conventional farms to organic. More than 530,000 hectares of land are dedicated to growing organic food, the largest crop being wheat.

Last December, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency published a new set of rules for farmers wanting to carry a new "Canada Organic" label.

The federal watchdog says farmers will have to submit an application for certification with information on the substances used in production and methods of production.