As the director of a gourmet deli in Staten Island, Hassam Khan is responsible for overseeing financial statements, facilitating catering orders, and ensuring that the kitchen meets health and safety codes. Hassam Khan of Staten Island is also the director of an organic supermarket, where he maintains similar responsibilities.

A recent analysis published in the Biological Conservation journal warned of an impending extinction of insects, which could cause nature’s ecosystems to catastrophically collapse. The report noted that more than 40 percent of all insect species are on the decline, while one-third are already endangered. Dwindling as a whole by an annual rate of 2.5 percent, insects could be largely wiped out within 100 years.

Climate change and urbanization are listed as two factors contributing to this predicament, but the analysis identifies intensive agriculture and the use of pesticides as the main one. Because organic farms utilize only natural fertilizers and methods of crop protection from insects, they are much better for the continued survival of insects. Several leading scientists, including University of Sussex professor Dave Goulson, are proponents of buying organic food as a means of curbing the drastic decline of the global insect population.