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So just take the farmers' word for it? How do you know the farmer is actually selling produce with pesticides as organic since they are more profitable?

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Ask yourself: whom would you trust more? A physical person in front of you, who's whole life depends on her business or a company which is legally set-up to maximize profit?

Physical people in front of you lie a lot, especially when they are desperate. I'd trust the large company more.

Would you trust a random individual who may or may not even be a farmer or a business that has obtained USDA organic accreditation?

But the USDA organic accreditation doesn’t mean pesticide free unfortunately. They still use a tonne (actually more by quantity) of pesticides, and those pesticides aren’t proven to be safer. E.g. Rotenone is shown to damage mitochondria, but is fine to be dumped on “organic” crops. So sadly it’s still actually very debatable whether you’re better off going organic or not.

Edit: think of “USDA Organic” label as more of an industry marketing gimmick that allows them to triple prices, than any genuine intent to produce safer foods.

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