Bio-Strategy?

After four weeks in Germany....I can vouch that the word bio is uttered at least three hundred times a day from the public-run TV networks.  When you walk into a grocery....even the smaller operations....bio-signs are actively posted and in full view.  Herr-doctor So-V-So will appear nightly to talk up the positive nature of bio foods and how we should adapt.

So I've come to analyze and ponder this 'mess'.

Bio foods tend to cost more than the regular items.  Doesn't matter what it is....it's at least ten to twenty percent more than the regular products.

Taste?  I'm told they taste different.....perhaps better.  Scientifically proven?  No.  People thinking it tastes different merely a perception?  Maybe.

It's an odd method of how products were normally marketed and sold in groceries in Germany.  Products were trucked in from various countries of Europe, and in some cases as far away as Africa, South America, or Asia.  The bio items?  They are all local produce.  Rarely do you see any bio products that travel more than a hour away from the grocery.

The bio producers?  Well.....they are all small farm operations.  I doubt if any of these farmers have more than two hundred acres of property.

All of this leads to an interesting scenario.  What the bio farmers hint is that their produce is pure and without any poisons or pesticide.  This is all true for the most part.  How long can they produce such pure items without some bug or fungus interrupting their cycle?  It's an interesting question.

Eventually, some fungus is going to enter the bio-system and disrupt the cycle.  So when the customer is now absolutely focused on only bio-products and can't buy anything else.....suddenly the supply dwindles, and the prices surge.  If you were paying one price today for a bio-watermelon.....the price could double or triple in just a few weeks because of some fungus.

How many people are absolutely focused on only bio-products?  The news media in Germany doesn't really say.  I'd take a guess that ten percent of society is now buying the products and believe the talk about purity.  Would they pay double the cost to stay bio-clean?  I'm guessing they would.

This all brings me to a vision of Germany in 2030....where the bulk of German society says bio is the only way to go, and their cost of staying bio-pure is on a upward spiral.

Finally, I sat and watched some piece on bio-beer this past Sunday.  Germany has a number of rules in place.....for almost four hundred years....about the purity of German beer.  Somehow, they've been able to convince the public that bio-beer is the next step in this strategy.....to stay bio-pure.  Yet, the stringent rules on the purity of German beer have been around for several centuries.

At the rate we are going.....I'll need some bio-toilet paper shortly.  And after that.....some bio-water.