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How important is our food to us? For all of human history, the most important thing to people has been where their food comes from. Suddenly, in just a couple of generations, we've lost that knowledge. That loss has come at a cost to our health, our economy, and our environment. Agribusiness and corporate food industry has taken control of the process and told us, "you don't have to worry about that...we'll take care of it", and we have let them. Now we find ourselves in a health crisis - because of poor nutrition in our junk food diet - a cultural crisis because of the loss of small farms - and an environmental crisis because of the fuel intensive pesticides and petrochemicals going into our food system.
_As stated in a recent Time Magazine article: Farm policies are a welfare program for the mega farms that use the most fuel, water and pesticides: emit the most greenhouse gas; grow the most fattening crops; have the most illegals; and depopulate rural America.
_This is scary stuff and we need to vote with our pocketbooks against it. There is a wonderful article worth reading in the New York Times Magazine on this very subject. It was written by Michael Pollen (author of Omnivores Dilemma) and is an open letter to the next president. It is called "In Chief".
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5 comments:
Wonderful post - I agree with the comment about corporate welfare for huge agri-business. And often those receiving the most government support are quick to deny healthcare from the government for low income families - and school subsidies. I love the bumper sticker - "It will be a great day when the military has to have a yard sale to buy bombs, and schools have all the money they need"
I feel as you do. I pretty sure this is going to be the next big scandal. I think we soon face the real cost of the food they are feeding us, and I bet that cost won't be quantifiable in dollars.
The first picture is very nice..and so sad that in reality this is also a problem, but how to counter it i wonder ?
Unfortunately the current population numbers are dependent upon this type of farming. To produce anything less is going to cause a major crisis and more unfortunate is that it's unavoidable because this cannot be sustained.
The Farmer works for a company that produces frsh organic herbs and they understand the the unbelievably rich Illinois soil is a living entity that must be nurtured.
- Suzanne, the Farmer's Wife
Thank for commenting Suzanne. I really appreciate your perspective!!
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