Real Organic Podcast
Farmers interview scientists, activists, politicians, and authors engaged in protecting USDA organic food against an active corporate takeover. Real Organic Project released its add-on food label in stores and markets in 2021, and is focused on introducing eaters across the United States to our movement and its allies. In this podcast series, you'll meet the best organic and regenerative farmers around, as well as journalists, climate experts, policy makers and chefs (Dr. Vandana Shiva, Paul Hawken, Leah Penniman, Bill Mckibben, Alice Waters, Dan Barber, and Eliot Coleman - to name a few!) who support our mission and have lent their voices and insights to explaining the importance of keeping corporate cheaters out of the real food movement. As bad players aim to redefine what food is for the sake of their own profits, we believe there is too much at stake for both human and planetary health today and into the future. Feed the soil, not the plant!!
Episodes
276 episodes
JM Fortier At Farmer Friday: Growing Vegetables For Profit
#269: Recorded live at Real Organic Project’s Churchtown event, this Farmer Friday talk features JM Fortier in front of an audience of working farmers, sharing the systems and economics behind one of the best-known small-scale market gard...
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Episode 269
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1:11:54
Bill McKibben: Here Comes the Sun for Farmers
#268: Bill McKibben discusses his new book, Here Comes the Sun, and the rapid rise of clean energy in a warming world. While much of the climate conversation focuses on damage and delay, McKibben argues that solar and wind have quietly...
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Episode 268
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52:06
StarWalker Organic Farm: Pasture Raised Organic Beef For All
#267: What does it take to bring truly pasture-raised organic beef to market when the processing system is stacked against small and mid-sized farms? Jason and Kristina Walker of StarWalker Organic Farm join Linley to talk about raising cattle ...
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Episode 267
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1:05:50
Brisa Ranch: Small Farms As Distributors
#266: Three farmer-owners of Brisa Ranch lay out a practical answer to a big question: how can small farms survive in a marketplace built for consolidated buyers and consolidated distribution? Their approach is to become “small farms as distrib...
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Episode 266
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1:11:57
Maria Rodale: Family Lore And Organic Farming Trials
#265: Maria Rodale comes from one of the most influential families in American organic history; here she shares how her grandfather J.I. Rodale connected human health to the way food is grown and helped popularize organic through publishing. Sh...
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Episode 265
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1:11:58
Allan Savory: Using Livestock To Reverse Desertification In National Parks
#264: What if some of the worst biodiversity loss and land degradation is happening inside protected national parks, even where there is no farming, mining, or fossil fuel extraction? Allan Savory, author of the new book
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Episode 264
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1:54:19
Barbara Damrosch: A Life In The Garden
#263: Barbara Damrosch's new book A Life In The Garden is a reminder that the best garden advice is practical: touch the soil, grow what you’ll eat, and keep learning season after season. Barbara shares stories with Dave from her lifetime of wr...
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Episode 263
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58:52
Sally Fox: Organic Cotton Chemical Dyes
#262: Sally Fox explains why growing organic cotton can't be simplified to “skip pesticides.” She lays out the hard parts people rarely price in: weeds, labor, fertility, and what happens after the bale leaves the field. She also argues the sus...
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Episode 262
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1:49:52
Max Goldberg: Threats to Organic - Hydroponics & Regenerative Confusion
#261: Organic Insider founder Max Goldberg unpacks the most urgent threats facing organic integrity today: the explosive growth of hydroponic “organic,” the quiet industry push to normalize gene-edited GMO 2.0, and the confusion and green...
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Episode 261
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1:12:29
Chuck Benbrook: Chemicals In Food DO Make People Sick
#260: Pesticide risk expert Chuck Benbrook returns for a clear examination of how chemical residues in food affect human health. This conversation responds directly to recent claims made on a popular medical podcast (The Checkup With Dr. Mike -...
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Episode 260
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1:48:12
Nancy Matsumoto: Women And Alternative Food Systems
#259: James Beard Award- winning author Nancy Matsumoto discusses her new book Reaping What She Sows : How Women Are Rebuilding Our Broken Food System. From grass-fed dairy farmers and Indigenous fishers to bakers reviving regional grains, Nanc...
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Episode 259
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1:04:20
Eliot Coleman on the Market Gardener Podcast
#258: What happens when one of today’s most influential market gardeners sits down with one of the founders of modern organic farming? JM Fortier interviews Eliot Coleman - author, farmer, and pioneer of soil-based organic agriculture. Their co...
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Episode 258
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1:35:29
Bob Scowcroft: A Carrot Caper Birthed The Organic Label
#257: Before the USDA organic seal existed, the movement was held together by trust, community… and the courage to confront fraud when it appeared. Bob Scowcroft, former executive director of CCOF and co-founder of OFRF, tells the inside ...
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Episode 257
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1:58:11
Will Brinton: Rethinking Carbon Sequestration - It's The Plant Canopy!
#256: Drawing on decades of soil respiration research, scientist Will Brinton explains why the most important action surrounding carbon sequestration isn’t simply in the soil - it’s the plant canopy that captures CO₂ the moment i...
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Episode 256
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1:08:12
Deborah Koons Garcia: Future Of Food 20 Years Later
#255: Filmmaker Deborah Koons Garcia joins us, 20 years after the release of her influential documentary The Future of Food, to reflect on how the food system has changed - and how it hasn’t. Deborah shares her thoughts about GMOs, corporate co...
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Episode 255
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58:48
Tom Philpott: Corporate Control And The Future Of Food
#254: Food systems journalist and author Tom Philpott joins Dave for a powerful discussion on the legacy of Joan Gussow, the myths driving industrial agriculture, and the political forces shaping what we eat. From nitrate pollution in the Corn ...
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Episode 254
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1:11:30
Helen Atthowe: Living Pathways for Mulch, Fertility and Habitat
#253: Farmer, researcher, and author Helen Atthowe has spent 40 years building soil ecosystems that feed themselves while offering their own, living biologic controls In this conversation with Dave Chapman, she explains how living pathways - st...
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Episode 253
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1:12:42
Leonard Diggs: Building Community-Based Farms for the Future
#252: Farmer, educator, and EcoFarm President Leonard Diggs joins Dave Chapman for a wide-ranging conversation about the evolution of organic agriculture, the legacy of EcoFarm, and the urgent need to move from commodity-based to community-base...
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Episode 252
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1:09:20
Michael Pollan: “Eat Food” Came From Joan Gussow
#251: Michael Pollan joins Dave Chapman for a wide-ranging conversation on the state of food, health, and the organic movement. Pollan reflects on his friendship with Joan Gussow, her prophetic warnings about industrial agriculture, and her inf...
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30:34
Karen Washington: Food Justice and the Power of Community
#250: Farmer, activist, and Real Organic ally Karen Washington joins Dave Chapman to talk about her decades-long fight for food justice and her friendship with food systems pioneer Joan Gussow Karen traces her journey from growing up in the Bro...
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Episode 250
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55:54
Hugh Kent: Saving A Real Organic Farm Through Direct Marketing
#249: Florida blueberry farmer Hugh Kent of King Grove Organic Farm shares the story of how corporate power and USDA negligence nearly drove his organic farm out of business - and how he saved it through direct marketing. Speaking at the Saving...
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Episode 249
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33:51
Eliot Coleman: The Self-Fed Farm
#248: Pioneer organic farmer Eliot Coleman returns to the Real Organic Podcast to share the ideas behind his newest book, The Self-Fed Farm and Garden: A Return to the Roots of the Organic Method. In conversation with Real Organic Project co-di...
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Episode 248
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1:12:01
"Eat Food": The Amazing Work Of Joan Gussow
#247: This week, we celebrate the life and work of Joan Gussow, the visionary nutritionist whose thinking transformed how many understand the connection between soil, food, and health. You'll hear from many food systems activists and thinkers, ...
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Episode 247
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1:01:43
Emily Oakley: A Standalone Label for Real Organic Project
#246: In this talk from the Saving Real Organic conference at Churchtown Dairy, Emily Oakley explains why so many small-scale, soil-based farms are dropping USDA certification - and why the time may be right for Real Organic Project to pursue i...
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Episode 246
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26:04
Saving Real Organic: Linley + Dave At Churchtown
#245: Recorded live at the Saving Real Organic conference at Churchtown Dairy on September 27, 2025, co-directors Linley Dixon and Dave Chapman share a joint message about the future of organic farming and our movement’s next chapter. ...
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Episode 245
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57:52