Myths and Dangers

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Myths and Dangers A Look at the Messages and
Realities of a Food System based on Industrial
Agriculture Natalie Halbach

Emerson National Hunger
Fellow Jess Miller

Community Farm Alliance Fellow
Community Farm Alliance
Community Farm Alliance
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The following PowerPoint was presented at the
seventh annual Healthy Food, Local Farms
Conference on October 1st, 2005,
in Louisville, KY. The presentation was the
first half of a two-part workshop that examined
the realities of a food system based on
industrial agriculture and CFAs vision for an
alternative Local Independent Food Economy
(L.I.F.E.). The Community Farm Alliance and
the Sierra Club co-sponsored the
conference.
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What are the Myths?
Lets look at what the media tell us.
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Food is Cheap
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We have abundant choice.
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Convenience is Good
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The US Feeds the World
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Undernourished Population (2000 - 2002)
Hunger is not a U.S. Problem
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Our Food is Safe
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Industrial Agriculture is Sustainable
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Bigger is Better
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Questioning the myths
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Myth Food is cheap
Sure its cheap, I can order a meal off the
dollar menu!!
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So who pays the hidden costs? WE DO in taxes
Through the Supplier Credit Guarantee Program,
the USDA guarantees 65 of loan payments due to
large U.S. commodity traders.

Since the 1980s, this indirect subsidy has cost
tax payers nearly 4 billion.

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Who pays the hidden costs?
FARMERS
The average Kentucky farm income is 12,000/ year
The poverty line is 19,350 for a family of four.
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Who pays the hidden costs?
WE DO Land degradation
Heavy machinery livestock grazing compact
soil, killing beneficial soil organisms and
stripping vegetation that holds topsoil in place
Topsoil is being depleted faster than it can
regenerate
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Who pays the hidden costs?
WE DO Water Usage/ exploitation
The Ogallala Aquifer is a critical resource for
agriculture in the Midwest. Its water table is
dropping as much as 1 m/year
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Who pays the hidden costs?
The U.S. EPA blames current farm practices for
70 of the pollution in the nations rivers and
streams
WE DO Pollution
Only 1/3 of nitrogen applied to plants is
absorbed. Nitrogen run off creates dead zones
in bodies of water by depleting oxygen needed
for plant and animal life.
The Gulf of Mexico dead zone is the size of New
Jersey.
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Who pays the hidden costs?
WE DO Fossil Fuel Dependency
Food travels an average of 1,300 miles from farm
to dinner plate.
In 1992, the food production system accounted
for 17 of all fossil fuel use in the United
States.
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Myth Food is safe
Well it tastes alright!
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Where is the danger?
PESTICIDES In the late 1990s, USDA data showed
that nearly 3/4 of conventionally grown crop
samples contained pesticide residue.
Industrial agriculture necessitates heavy
pesticide use because monocropping (planting only
one plant in a field) makes fields more
vulnerable to pests than those planted with
several crops.
Half of the herbicides used in the U.S. in 1991
were applied to corn, soybeans, or cotton.
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Where is the danger?
The UN has estimated that 2 million poisonings
and 10,000 deaths occur worldwide each year from
pesticides.
Preliminary studies link pesticides to elevated
risk of cancer and disruption of the bodys
reproductive, immune and nervous systems.
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Where is the danger?
IRRADIATION, ANTIBIOTICS
Irradiation
the typical dose for irradiated meat is 15
million times the energy involved in a single
chest x-ray, and 150 times the dose capable of
killing an adult.
Antibiotics
40 of the antibiotics used each year in the
United States are for animals
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Where is the danger?
ANTIBIOTICS
Heavy use of antibiotics in factory farming of
animals has caused bacteria to develop antibiotic
resistant strains.
Campylobacter bacteria the most common cause of
food-borne illness in the US increased its drug
resistance from 0 in 1991 to 20 in 1999.
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Where is the danger?
WASTE

• A University of Iowa study found that people
  living near large-scale hog facilities reported
  elevated incidence of
• headaches
• respiratory problems
• eye irritation
• nausea
• weakness
• chest tightness

Fumes and manure runoff from factory farming
operations can endanger human health
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Where is the danger?
OBESITY

• 64.5 of American adults are either overweight or
  obese.

2/3
30 of all corn grown in the U.S. is turned into
corn sweetener, the key ingredient in ¾ of all
processed foods. The rise in obesity correlates
with the rise in the use of corn sweeteners since
the 1970s.
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Myth BIGGER IS BETTER
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Its Definitely Bigger
Today, just 2 of farms produce 50 of all U.S.
agricultural products.
4 firms handle more than 80 of all beef
slaughter. 20 years ago, the concentration
was less than 40.
Even organic doesnt guarantee local, small
scale, or less-processed. Horizon commands 70 of
the U.S. market for organic milk which they
ultra-pasteurize to ship long distances,
depleting the nutrient quality.
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But is it Really Better?
A 2 lb bag of breakfast cereal burns ½ gallon of
gasoline in its making.
The food processing industry in the United
States uses 10 calories of fossil fuel energy
for every calorie of food it produces.
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Is it really better?
We have found depressed median family incomes,
high levels of poverty, low education levels,
social and economic inequality between ethnic
groups, etc., ... associated with land and
capital concentration in agriculture (10).
University of California anthropologist Dean
MacCannell
Between 1987 and 1992, America lost on average
32,000 farms each year, 80 of them family-run.
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Is it really better?
Between 2003 and 2004, Kentucky lost 2,000 farms
- from 87,000 to 85,000.
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Myth We Have Abundant Choice
But the grocery store has food for aisles
and aisles!!
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Choice
The Illusion of
General Foods Int., Gevalia, Maxim, Maxwell
House, Sanka, Seattles Best, Starbucks, Tazo,
Torrefazione Italia, Yuban, Kool-Aid, Country
Time, Crystal Light, Tang, Fruit2O, Veryfine,
Oscar Mayer, Taco Bell, California Pizza Kitchen,
DiGiorno, Jacks, Tombstone, Back to Nature,
Kraft (and all its versions of Delux, Easy Mac,
etc) Boca, Woodys, Breakstones, Knudsen, Light
N Lively, Philadelphia, Temp-tee, Athenos,
Churney, Cracker Barrel, Handi Snacks, Harvest
Moon, Hoffmans, Plly-O, Kraft Delux, Old
English, Cheez Whiz, Easy Cheese, Bakers,
Bulls Eye, Carbwell, Postum, Post CarbWell, Post
Honey Bunches of Oats, Shake n Bake, Oven Fry,
Grey Poupon, Sauceworks, Cream of Wheat, Milk
Bone, Dream Whip, D-Zerta, Jell-O, Knox Gelatin,
Minute, Balance, Ever Fresh, Cool whip, Certo,
Sure-Jell, Claussen, Honey Maid, Nilla, Oreo, all
of Post cereals, Good Seasons, Seven Seas, A1,
Stove Top, Barnums Animals, Biscos, Café Crème,
Cameo, Chips Ahoy, Dads, Famous Chocolate
Wafers, Family Favorites, Old Fashioned, Ginger
Snaps, Lorna Doone, Mallomars, Marshmallow
Twirls, National Arrowroot, Newtons, Nutter
Butter, Pecan Passion, Pecanz, Pinwheels,
Snackwells, Social Tea, Stella Doro, Teddy
Grahams, Wild Thornberrys, Air Crisps, Better
Cheddars, Cheese Nips, Crown Pilot, Doo Dad,
Flavor Crisps, Harvest Crisps, Nabisco Grahams,
Nabs, Premium, Ritz, Royal Lunch, Stoned Wheat
Thins, Triscuit, Uneeda, Wheatsworth, Zwieback,
Cornet Cups, Corn Nuts, PB Crisps, Jet-Puffed,
Terrys, Toblerone.
Brand names of Kraft Foods
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We have abundant choice?
Foreign owned companies controlled 15 of U.S.
grocery store sales in 1998

• In 2000, the top four grocery retail firms held
  72 of the market share in 100 cities.

• In 2001, Wal-Mart operated 888 stores in the U.S.
  and 832 outlets in 10 foreign countries

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Myth Convenience is good.
But Im so busy and I have so many places to go
and people to see!
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The cost of convenience
Monocultures are easier to harvest, process
and package.
Varieties Lost from 1903 to 1983
Tomatoes 80.6
Lettuce 92.8
Field Corn 90.8
Sweet Corn 96.1
Apples 86.2
But come at the cost of our heritage and
biodiversity.
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Convenience Costs! This bill shows the breakdown
of each dollar spent on food. The farm value is
the amount that farmers receive BEFORE they pay
labor and production costs.
Source ERS-USDA. 2002. food marketing and price
spreads USDA marketing bill. briefing room
(web-source), http//www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/Fo
odPriceSpreads/bill/
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The Marketing Bill shows the breakdown of the
food dollar that goes to marketing costs. The
labor portion does not include farm labor.
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Only a small share of the cost of convenience
foods goes to the farmer
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Myth We Need US Food to Feed the World
Fine. Maybe we dont eat the cheapest food on
the planet or grow it efficientlywe need it to
feed all those poor countries, right?
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Food for the World?
Do we feed the world?
International Society for Ecology and Culture.
Local Food, Globally. Slide Presentation.
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Food for the world?

• Between 1994 and 2004, US imports of fruits and
  vegetables more than doubled (to 12.7million).

We now import more fruits and
vegetables than we export.
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Food for the World?
Current global food production is enough to
provide every human with 3,500 calories daily
yet 800 million people worldwide are still
hungry.
People will only cease to be poor when they
control the means of providing and/or producing
food for themselves.
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Food for the World?
The hungry produce their own food when they have
access to fertile land. However, the best land
is often enclosed for large-scale production of
export crops like coffee, cotton or cocoa.  
Also, subsidies allow U.S. commodity producers to
sell products on the world market at a lower
price than they produce them. This dumping
pushes down prices so low that poor farmers
struggle to buy food for their families.
Dumping cost West African farmers 300 million in
lost potential income in 1991.
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A Hungry Nation
38 million Americans are food insecure.
That is 9 times the population of Kentucky
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Impacts Kentucky

• Farm numbers declining
• High rates of obesity, cancer, heart disease and
  diabetes
• Unequal access to healthy foods
• Strains on our natural resources

So what are we going to do about it?
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Money is power, but not the only or the best kind
of power
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The Community Farm Alliance is a statewide
grass-roots organization that organizes people to
work for change around issues of concern to
family-scale farmers.
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Sources Cited
Bread for the World Institute. Strengthening
Rural Communities Hunger Report 2005.
Washington, D.C. 2005. Center for Disease
Control. Kentucky Obesity by Body Mass Index.
Nov. 5, 2003. http//apps.nccd.cdc.gov/brfss/Trend
s/trendchart.asp?qkey10010stateKY Consumer
Reports. The Truth About Irradiated Meat.
Online article, August 2003. http//www.consumerr
eports.org/cro/food/irradiated-meat-803/overview.h
tm Economic Research Service, USDA. Food
Marketing and Price Spreads USDA Marketing
Bill. Updated June 21, 2002. http//www.ers.usda
.gov/Briefing/FoodPriceSpreads/bill/ Farm Labor
Employment Characteristics of Hired Farm
Workers. Updated November 13, 2003.
http//www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/Farmlabor/Employm
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Lawrence, MD, Polly Walker, MD, MPH How
Sustainable Agriculture Can Address the
Environmental and Human Health Harms of
Industrial Agriculture. Environmental Health
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http//www.jhsph.edu/Environment/CLF_Press/CLF_pub
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The Tragedy of Industrial Agriculture.
Washington Island Press, 2002. Krissoff, Barry
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Outpace Exports. Amber Waves. June 2005.
http//www.ers.usda.gov/AmberWaves/June05/Findings
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Medicine. Center for Science in the Public
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PowerPoint Briefing, Washington, D.C., August
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Harpers, New York, February 2004. Cont.
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McCauley, Marika Alena. A Monopoly in
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http//www.oxfamamerica.org/whatwedo/where_we_work
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