The New American Food System, Part I

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http://www.mercola.com/2003/dec/10/us_food_system.htm

 

 

Dr. Mercola's Comment:

 

The following article is from the Price Pottenger Nutrition Foundation (PPNF)

newsletter, " Health and Healing Wisdom. " I am a member of this exceptional

non-profit organization founded in 1965 whose mission is as follows:

 

" Through the dissemination of the ancestral wisdom practiced by pre-industrial

societies, and through modern scientific validation of the principles of sound

nutrition, the Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation (PPNF) provides guidance for

the reversal of modern " civilized " dietary trends that promote disease and

physical & mental degeneration. "

 

PPNF is dedicated to achieving real human health in " harmony with nature's laws

through the right use of technology and the practical application of the

principles of sound nutrition, " and provides accurate information on " whole

foods and proper preparation techniques, soil improvement, natural farming, pure

water, non-toxic dentistry and holistic therapies in order to conquer disease;

prevent birth defects; avoid personality disturbances & delinquency; enhance the

environment; and enable all people to achieve long life and excellent health,

now and into the 21st century. "

 

After reading this article, you may be interested in learning about all the

benefits you'll get by joining PPNF, who are dedicated to helping foster the

improvements that Professer Ikerd alludes to below.

 

 

 

 

 

By John Ikerd, PhD, Professor Emeritus, University of Missouri

Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation--Health & Healing Wisdom, Vol.27 #3

(excerpted from original presentation [1])

 

 

 

The 20th century was the American Century--as is commonly conceded by

historians. During the 20th century, the United States replaced Great Britain as

the dominant global economic power, and America’s corporate version of

capitalism replaced socialism and competitive capitalism as the world’s dominant

economic model.

 

The United States came from behind to beat the Soviet Union to the moon and take

leadership in space. The United States came from behind to pull ahead of Japan

in electronics and communications technologies. And, America replaced the whole

of Europe as the single dominant global military power.

 

 

 

The American Century was a time during which economics gained precedents over

all else--including politics, society, and culture. America struggled

economically, along with the rest of the world, during much of the first half of

the century. But, America built the foundation for its modern industrial economy

during World War II, used its post-war economy to help Europe and Japan rebuild,

but afterward, never looked back.

 

America’s desire for maximum economic growth provided the motive for its

unrestrained “corporatist” economy, which later became the model for much of the

rest of the world. Research and development supported by economic growth allowed

America to take world leadership in space and electronics. And, economic growth

made possible the most powerful and dominant military force ever assembled in

the history of humanity.

 

A New Century, A Need for New Direction

 

 

 

But, as we enter a new century, there are growing questions concerning the

sustainability of the American economic engine of growth. Growing evidence of

air and water pollution during the 1960s raised questions concerning the

inherent negative environmental impacts of the industrial paradigm of economic

development. The energy crisis of the 1970s raised concerns about the extractive

nature of the “free market” economy, and its inherent reliance on limited

supplies of non-renewable resources.

 

A return to the “economics of greed” during the 1980s raised concerns about the

growing economic gap between the “haves and have-nots.” And, when the “economic

bubble” of the 1990s burst at the turn of the century, many more people began to

question whether America’s economic growth is sustainable.

 

 

 

Until now, the environment has been the focus of primary concern for

sustainability. Relentless economic growth was depleting non-renewable resources

and polluting the natural environment. Today, there are growing questions of

social and cultural sustainability. Our relentless pursuit of economic

prosperity is separating people within families, communities, and society as a

whole and is destroying the social fabric of our country.

 

 

 

In our quest for global economic supremacy, the United States has become a

splintered nation of disconnected people. The American economy may be the envy

of the rest of the world, but few would choose the American social culture,

without strong economic incentives to do so.

 

We live in an increasingly unhealthy society. The health of any society is

reflected in the quality of relationships among its people--within families,

communities, and society in general. And, during the latter half of the 20th

century, American society has become increasingly disconnected, our

relationships have become increasingly unhealthy and dysfunctional, and there is

growing evidence that we live in an unsustainable society.

 

Our Modern Disconnect

 

 

 

It’s no coincidence that people have become disconnected from each other, as

well as from the earth, during the last few decades--during the latter stages of

industrialization. Disconnectedness is an unintended, but inescapable,

consequence of the industrial approach to economic development.

 

The fundamental principles of industrialization are specialization of function,

standardization of process, and consolidation of control. When workers

specialize in doing fewer things, each person can become more efficient in the

task they perform, and by working with others, can produce more with less total

work than when working separately.

 

By standardizing tasks and standardizing products at each stage of production

both workers and products become interchangeable, greatly facilitating the

coordination of separate specialized functions. Finally, specialization and

standardization simplify the production process, facilitating mechanization and

routinization, and making it possible to centralize management functions and

consolidate large numbers of workers and functions into large business

operations. Economists call the resulting increase in efficiency “economies of

scale.”

 

The principles of industrialization are the same in automobile manufacturers,

large-scale vegetable processors, retail superstores, or a confinement animal

feeding operation. The gains in efficiency from industrialization are achieved

by carrying out specialized functions by standardized means under centralized

management. Our growing social disconnectedness is not a coincidence of, but a

direct consequence of, American industrialization.

 

Americans Growing Distance from their Food

 

 

 

Nowhere in America is our economic and social disconnectedness more evident than

in our systems of food and farming. Most consumers, particularly younger

consumers, have no sense of where their food actually comes from or who produces

it.

 

Even those who know that farmers grow crops and raise livestock, and [that]

others process and package these crops and deliver food to grocery stores and

restaurants, still have little sense of what’s actually involved in this

process. We shouldn’t be surprised that consumers have no real understanding of

food, because they have no sense of connectedness with the land or with the

farmers who tend the soil to bring forth their food.

 

 

 

Before industrialization, when America was an agrarian nation, people either

produced their own food, or they bartered for or bought it from someone who had

produced it. The relationship between consumer and producer was direct and

personal.

 

As the economy became more specialized, merchants such as butchers, bakers, and

brewers bought from producers and sold to consumers, and the farmer/consumer

connections became one-step removed. Then came grocery store owners, who bought

from the butchers, bakers and brewers, and then, consumers were at least

two-steps removed from the farm.

 

 

 

As the food system moved beyond the early stages of industrialization, control

of the system began to consolidate in the hands of a few large food

corporations. New industrial technologies and organizational models required

increasing capital investments.

 

First, independent entrepreneurs were displaced by family corporations, but

eventually few families could accumulate enough capital to compete. As market

power and political power replaced economic efficiency as the primary motivation

for consolidation of control, only the giant publicly held corporations were

able to compete.

 

 

 

In farming, independent family farms were replaced by family corporations, which

are now being replaced by corporately controlled contract production--factory

farming. In food retailing, the “mom and pop” corner grocery stores were

displaced by “regional and national chains” of large supermarkets, which now are

also being displaced, by “global chains” of even larger retail “super-centers.”

Independently operated restaurants and delis were displaced by franchised

restaurants and fast food joints.

 

 

 

Independent food processors and wholesalers were displaced by giant food

processing and distribution firms, which since have been absorbed into five or

six even-larger “global food chain clusters.”

 

As the four or five dominant global food retailers link up with the existing

“global food chain clusters,” they eventually will control all phases of the

global food system from “dirt to the dinner plate,” including agricultural

production.[2]

 

 

 

What does it matter if people don’t understand where their food comes from, if

they think it is manufactured rather than grown? People don’t understand where

their automobiles come from, or their clothes, their houses, their movies, or

[where] much of anything else comes from, and no one seems to be complaining

about their lack of knowledge of such things. However, all disconnections among

people matter, even if no one complains.

 

The seeds of dissention are sown in the gaps of understanding and appreciation

that exist among people. Conflict, frustration, depression, malaise, and many

other miseries in life are but symptoms of our lack of understanding and

appreciation for each other. People may not have associated the symptoms with

the cause, but the cause still matters. And, it matters even more that we

consumers understand our connections with farmers.

 

 

 

Many farmers feel a great sense of frustration that people don’t understand how

life in general is connected to life in the soil and the life of people who till

the soil. They feel they are forced to destroy the natural productivity of the

soil, to degrade the natural environment, and to destroy the social fabric of

their communities, because they believe the only thing food consumers are

concerned about is price.

 

Many farmers feel that they are forced to value the economic bottom-line above

virtually all else, above their neighbors and communities, and sometimes even

above their families, because they believe the only thing consumers care about

is “cheap food.”

 

Farmers want to be good neighbors and good stewards of the land, but the

competitive pressures of a consumer-driven, market economy won’t let them.

Instead, the land, the quality of rural life, and ultimately the ability of the

earth to support human life will be destroyed, because of the disconnectedness

of Americans from the land and from the people who farm it.

 

Our Self-Abusive Love Affair with Fast Food

 

 

 

Unfortunately, the only link between farmers and consumers is a disconnected,

dysfunctional, and unsustainable food system. As a prime example, Eric

Schlosser, in his recent bestseller, Fast Food Nation, attempts to assess the

social cost of our “love affair” with fast foods.

 

Food eaten “away from home” now claims a share approaching half of all food

purchases in America. And, “fast food” places, such as McDonalds, Kentucky Fried

Chicken, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut, account for nearly half of all food consumed

away from home. Schlosser states that “fast food” has triggered the

homogenization of our society.

 

Fast food has hastened the malling of our landscape, widening of the chasm

between rich and poor, fueled an epidemic of obesity, and propelled the

juggernaut of American cultural imperialism abroad. He documents how fast foods

have lured us into choosing diets deficient in nearly everything except

calories, supporting practices deceptive in every aspect, from advertising to

flavoring, and systems that degrade nearly everyone and everything involved in

the process.

 

 

 

The fast food industry has lured low-income consumers, along with the affluent,

into paying ridiculously high prices for low-quality meats, potatoes, vegetable

oil, and sugar.

 

However, the high dollar-and-cent costs are but the tip of the iceberg. The true

costs of quick food must include the costs of poor health, lost dignity in work,

degraded landscapes, and ethical and moral decay in business matters, including

international trade and investment.

 

 

 

With the rapid consolidation now taking place among food supermarket chains, the

“fast food” story undoubtedly has relevance for the whole of food retailing. The

independent food processors, distributors, and retailers today are under the

same economic pressures as independent family farmers.

 

They are fighting for their very economic survival. They can’t afford to be too

concerned about the well-being of their employees, their suppliers, or their

customers; they have to look out for themselves. If their labor costs are too

high because of generous salaries and benefits, they can’t compete.

 

If they pay too much to farmers or other suppliers of raw materials, their

profit margins will disappear. If they don’t take advantage of the natural human

frailties of their customers, their competitors will. If a store or processing

plant isn’t profitable in one community, they have to move to another,

regardless of the impact on the community. The independent food marketer, like

the family farmer, is in a struggle for economic survival.

 

The New Farmers Improving the " Disconnected Landscape "

 

 

 

The negative consequences of corporate industrialization most certainly are not

limited to the food system. The same type of social disconnection is occurring

all across society--increasingly, people relate to each other through the

marketplace rather than face to face.

 

Confidence, commitment, and trust have been replaced by guarantees, contracts,

and regulations. And when disputes arise concerning market transactions, they

are settled in the courts. The reservoirs of personal goodwill from which

conciliation and consensus must be drawn have been depleted.

 

Our national disconnectedness is not a mere “coincidence with”

industrialization; instead, it is a direct “consequence of” industrialization.

And equally significant, we will not become reconnected as a people until we

move beyond industrialization to a fundamentally new and different era of human

progress.

 

 

 

Thankfully, a new American culture is being created to replace the current

culture of economic materialism. These new farmers face many frustrations and

hardships along with the joys of success. Creating a new culture isn’t easy--on

farms or anywhere else.

 

These farmers are trying to learn how to do what no one yet knows how to do, and

they are doing it with little help from anyone other than each other. They are

on a new frontier, and life on any new frontier quite typically is difficult.

But more and more of these new farmers are finding ways to succeed.

 

To be continued next issue ...

[ Part I, Part II ] Next >>

 

 

 

 

John Ikerd is Professor Emeritus (Agricultural Economics), University of

Missouri, Columbia, MO. This article is reprinted with the kind permission of

the author. E-mail: JEIkerd @ aol.com; Web site:

www.ssu.missouri.edu/faculty/jikerd.

 

 

 

References

 

De Tocqueville, Alex. Reprinted in 2000. Democracy in America, Bantam Books, New

York.

 

Gladwell, Malcolm. 2000. The Tipping Point. Little, Brown and Company, Boston,

New York, and London.

 

Kummer, Corby. 2002. The Pleasures of Slow Food. Chronicle Books, San Francisco.

 

Putnam, Robert. 2000. Bowling Alone. Simon and Schuster, New York, London,

Toronto, Sydney, and Singapore.

 

Ray, Paul and Sherry Anderson. 2000. The Cultural Creatives. Three Rivers Press,

New York.

 

Schlosser, Eric. 2001. Fast Food Nation. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston and

New York.

 

[1] The full text (see website) was prepared for presentation at the Ohio

Ecological Food and Farming Association 23rd Annual Conference, Johnstown, Ohio.

March 8-9, 2003.

 

[2] For summaries of global food consolidation studies, see articles by Mary

Hendrickson, PhD, and William Heffernan, PhD, in Small Farm Today Magazine,

April 1999 and July 2001, also available on the Internet at

http://nfu.org/images/heffernan.pdf and http://nfu.org/images/heffernan_1999.pdf

 

 

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