Prince Charles: "Patron Saint" Of Organics

(CBS)  For a guy born, as CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips puts it, with a drawer full of silver spoons in his mouth, Prince Charles often doesn't get much of a break.

But, says Phillips, his romantic history aside, the prince is now being credited with being well ahead of the curve on some of the more popular causes of our time -- environmental protection, and organic farming and gardening.

In October 2005, Charles told 60 Minutes, "I'm just trying to say that we ought to redefine the way in which progress is, is seen. Is it progress to rush headlong into upsetting the whole balance of nature, which is what I think we're beginning to do?"

At Highgrove, his 1,000-acre private estate in western England, he has set the standard not just for organic farming -- he has a big business selling organic products -- but for organic gardening, Phillips observes. No chemical fertilizers or poisonous pest control is used there, yet he's created what's widely accepted as a horticultural masterpiece.

It's not a passion he's come to lately. He didn't follow this trend, Phillips points out, he set it.

"I think he's a man of huge vision," says Patrick Holden, who runs the British Soil Association, Britain's Organic food certification body. "In the '70s, he was talking about the environmental crisis, in the '80s he cottoned on to organic farming as a solution to build a more sustainable agriculture, and he was so far ahead of the curve that he was dismissed, and in some cases is still dismissed today. And yet, we should listen to what he says."

The prince once made the mistake of saying out loud, Phillips recalls, that he talked to his plants, reinforcing the impression that he was -- as the expression goes -- different from you and me. But, as the organic movement has taken off, Charles is now seen as a naturalist guru, and has just published a new how-to book, "The Elements of Organic Gardening." Put away those pesticides, he says. Garden by natural laws. It may be labor-intensive rather than chemical-intensive, but he's proven, he says, that it can work.

For a man whose job it is to wait for a job (as king), Phillips notes, he's proving to be a pretty good businessman.

"He's the patron saint of organics," says royals-watcher Victoria Mather. "He espoused organic agriculture and organic gardening long before it was fashionable. Now, it's super-fashionable. What a great time to release a book about it!"

The book is a lavish portrait of the rarely-seen gardens at Highgrove. The prince is very protective about the place. But it's full of helpful hints, and his philosophy that too much of nature has been destroyed in the name of progress.

Still, not everyone thinks the issue is that clear-cut.

Nick Cohen, a columnist for "The Observer" comments, "The world has 6 billion people, and you're going to get a lot more, (and) you're not going to be able to feed them with organic agriculture, or if you're going to do it, you're going to have to cut down every rainforest and turn them into fields. Only with industrial agriculture can you avoid mass famine and starvation, and Prince Charles ... just doesn't like to think like that; he's a deep conservative in some ways, as you'd expect. He's a member of a royal family!"

The prince has, Phillips remarks, developed two specialties: gardening and controversy. With his new book, he's combined both.

[michellem99-2009]

His highness, can teach the sighted and thing or two.It does not say if her grace works in the garden with him. It seens the queen taught her children better than those here. Can yer pic Bush getting his paws dirty in the food garden. I tryed as child.

[michellem99-2009]

snidegrass,yer handy in yer verse,. I can''t grow food. I don''t have the means or space. When foster mother had garden, I could not/can''t see to help in it.

[christmas59]

Organics, properly done, can actually produce MORE than chemically grown and are healthier, as well. Hydroponics are also a great way to help areas in need--much less water, less parasite problem, and higher quality, more abundant production. We need to use chemicals when we try to push for more production with less effort--but is that really worth the trade off in the long run? We have the ability to feed the world--we just need to use common sense!

[christmas59]

Organics, properly done, can actually produce MORE than chemically grown and are healthier, as well. Hydroponics are also a great way to help areas in need--much less water, less parasite problem, and higher quality, more abundant production. We need to use chemicals when we try to push for more production with less effort--but is that really worth the trade off in the long run? We have the ability to feed the world--we just need to use common sense!

[christmas59]

Organics, properly done, can actually produce MORE than chemically grown and are healthier, as well. Hydroponics are also a great way to help areas in need--much less water, less parasite problem, and higher quality, more abundant production. We need to use chemicals when we try to push for more production with less effort--but is that really worth the trade off in the long run? We have the ability to feed the world--we just need to use common sense!

[christmas59]

Organics, properly done, can actually produce MORE than chemically grown and are healthier, as well. Hydroponics are also a great way to help areas in need--much less water, less parasite problem, and higher quality, more abundant production. We need to use chemicals when we try to push for more production with less effort--but is that really worth the trade off in the long run? We have the ability to feed the world--we just need to use common sense!

[springpondbv]

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Stephen L. Tvedten

[gaye5]

sometimes what we call progress is in effect a very large backward step, and if we don''t watch it these backward steps will destroy us..

Education is a good example, every year they bring out new methods to teach the children and yet although they know more in some ways than 50 years ago they know less, they cant spell correctly, their English is rotten and their maths is almost non existent..
Then we think we are in the enlightened age for ***, but our marriages are breaking down, children are being destroyed, women dump their children into daycares because they say that they have to work, hmmm, and even amongst older children, sexual diseases are drastically on the climb, and still the good people do nothing...yep we sure are improving.. and at what cost..

[gaye5]

snidegrass, good point, grow our own food and we wont need the space for farming it all,,
I had read that organic gardening yielded more than commercial gardening, and if that is correct we wouldn''t need a larger area for gardening at all...

[tnt1954]

on the general subject of food and farming, it
oughta be mandatory to grow food in your flat or
apartment via hydroponics or electric light in
the closet, or if you have a lot, on your garden.
decorative landscaping is such a foolish waste
of land. in the southern united states where fasting
is a necessity not a choice at times, they grow
huge cornfields even in the front yard. starving
to death is one of the worst ways to go. watching
others starve to death before your very eyes is
almost worse. food riots may come. preservatives
keep food much longer than they could formerly.
refrigeration does also. freezers too. the good
ship earth should hold together and feed itself.
we seem to be shipwrecked out here in the middle
of space, or nowhere. just to make do. 6 billion
mouths to feed three times a day. what a challenge
to do it. stop arguing over how to do it, just
do it. polly wanna cracker? old mother hubbard
went to the cupboard to get herself some bread,
there was none. and the dog? might make a good
meal. scenarios like those are going on as i type.
junk food junkies will not cop to organic oreos.
for the fortunate rich, organic carrots and carrot
juice and a nut cutlet, as in ''thunderball'' by
ian fleming. i think it was called ''shrublands''.
and on tuesdays you get celery sticks with goats milk.
for those who must watch their cholesterol.
M felt so invigorated by the treatment.
all british hit men should go there and get in shape.