Our society is unhealthy and our food system could be the main cause. How did this happen? it all started with farmers receiving entitlements from the government not to farm. The farming family made more money without working their farm. At the time the government thought it was doing a good thing for our country. Then along came technology , machines replaced farmers and genetic engineering replaced natural food. Family farmers are now replaced with corporate industrial agriculture farms. Big business is now driving our food system and there is a disconnect between people vs consumers. We hear that people are hunger because we can not produce enough food but yet our caloric intake has increased in the last ten years. An interesting statistic compiled by UN's Food and Agriculture Organization has demonstrated that we can feed 2,720 calories per day per person in the entire world. Doesn't some like a food crisis to me. The real problem is the inability to earn money, working for a living. Another topic for another day. We also have a problem with oversight by our government to inspect our food system.We do not have a system in place or the man power to inspect food from other countries. The world has to come together to create a global organization to oversee the food system. Try to keep out corruption. We keep using technology to solution our food problems or truth be told, need for big business to make more money. Examples of technology solving our "food problem" supposedly people want their strawberries all year round, so what do we do ,we either import strawberries from another country or we genetically engineer the fruit to grow year round. The problem, we have no idea the effects genetic engineered food has on our bodies. We are consuming chemicals and altar genes into our bodies and we are wondering why we have an obesity problem in this country. Don't forget we also have an increase in neurological diseases. Today we have a grain shortage. What are scientists doing to solve the problem? Genetically altering rice to grow in certain weather conditions. I guess our scientists and politicians never listened to their mothers " don't play around with mother nature". Well, what does drive our food system today? Its not the farm community, its actually the color green not as in saving the environment . Food has become a commodity. Our food is traded on Wall Street as futures. When the valve of the food increases you can expect a price increase at your local supermarket. If something happens to a crop or an animal you can bet a scientist is developing a genetic answer for that product. We have also become a global economy. We can no longer view our economy as local or nationally. The world has changed, we must accept the change but improve the system. We can not go back, no matter how hard we try. First we take responsibility for our own bodies. We decide to eat healthy and let our consumer side drive the market. If we buy natural and or organic foods then the corp farms will respond. They want to make money, remember the old saying supply and demand drives the market. We become active in the global community, we embrace the opportunity and find our niche. We become active players and make change inside the system. Change is never made from the outside. We need to step up to the plate and start swinging or we will suffer in the end.
Our society is unhealthy and our food system could be the main cause. How did this happen? it all started with farmers receiving entitlements from the government not to farm. The farming family made more money without working their farm. At the time the government thought it was doing a good thing for our country.
Then along came technology , machines replaced farmers and genetic engineering replaced natural food. Family farmers are now replaced with corporate industrial agriculture farms. Big business is now driving our food system and there is a disconnect between people vs consumers.
We hear that people are hunger because we can not produce enough food but yet our caloric intake has increased in the last ten years. An interesting statistic compiled by UN's Food and Agriculture Organization has demonstrated that we can feed 2,720 calories per day per person in the entire world. Doesn't some like a food crisis to me. The real problem is the inability to earn money, working for a living. Another topic for another day.
We also have a problem with oversight by our government to inspect our food system.We do not have a system in place or the man power to inspect food from other countries. The world has to come together to create a global organization to oversee the food system. Try to keep out corruption.
We keep using technology to solution our food problems or truth be told, need for big business to make more money. Examples of technology solving our "food problem" supposedly people want their strawberries all year round, so what do we do ,we either import strawberries from another country or we genetically engineer the fruit to grow year round. The problem, we have no idea the effects genetic engineered food has on our bodies. We are consuming chemicals and altar genes into our bodies and we are wondering why we have an obesity problem in this country. Don't forget we also have an increase in neurological diseases.
Today we have a grain shortage. What are scientists doing to solve the problem? Genetically altering rice to grow in certain weather conditions. I guess our scientists and politicians never listened to their mothers " don't play around with mother nature".
Well, what does drive our food system today? Its not the farm community, its actually the color green not as in saving the environment . Food has become a commodity. Our food is traded on Wall Street as futures. When the valve of the food increases you can expect a price increase at your local supermarket. If something happens to a crop or an animal you can bet a scientist is developing a genetic answer for that product.
We have also become a global economy. We can no longer view our economy as local or nationally. The world has changed, we must accept the change but improve the system. We can not go back, no matter how hard we try. First we take responsibility for our own bodies. We decide to eat healthy and let our consumer side drive the market. If we buy natural and or organic foods then the corp farms will respond. They want to make money, remember the old saying supply and demand drives the market. We become active in the global community, we embrace the opportunity and find our niche. We become active players and make change inside the system. Change is never made from the outside. We need to step up to the plate and start swinging or we will suffer in the end.
Information gather from AlterNet.