Throughout much of agriculture, a remarkable span of 10,000 years, farmers were largely the stewards of the land and the crops that they grew. Seeds collected from one year’s harvest were selected, stored, and used again for successive growing seasons. As Frank Morton, an organic seed breeder explains in this segment of the Seeds Of Life series, the role of the farmer at the center of agriculture began to change with the advent of hybrid seed development beginning with hybrid varieties of corn in the 1930’s.

Hybrid seeds are created out of two separate parent lines, each (parent) line, incapable of producing the desirable plant characteristics themselves. Only the seeds of their offspring, provide the desired mix of traits, measured by characteristics, such as : crop yield; protein content; oil quality; disease resistance, and other characteristics. Most importantly, especially to the commercial seed companies, the plants grown from these seeds do not produce useful seeds for further use. Once grown, the plants themselves are dead ends; no further selection under the farmers control can be made to create better crops for the future. Giving new meaning to the term “free enterprise”, hybrid seeds can only be purchased from the commercial seed companies (those in control of the proprietary parent lines); nature’s inherent generosity, circumvented.

Frank Morton, Willamette Valley Organic Seed Breeder; Wild Garden Seed

As Morton points out, beginning in 1965, a period he refers to as, the end of the golden age of plant breeding, there was a push to bring crops that could be made into hybrids, onto the market. This is what attracted the giant chemical companies into the seed business, hybrid technologies, and later biotechnology innovations, conferred the special ability to prevent farmers from saving and reusing seed, making their investments in seed technologies, and closely related chemical products, almost full-proof investments. Land grant universities that formerly conducted plant breeding research under the public domain, and made seeds available to commercial seed companies for sale to farmers, began to shift toward proprietary research to serve private interests instead*.

This is all part of an unfolding story, since after World War Two, there has been a massive consolidation of seed, chemical, and related industries to promote global trade. By virtue of size, certain economies of scale offered protection against new entrants into the marketplace, along with the ability to control prices both at the buying and selling end of the value chain. This ushered in the modern industrial food system, one of the most concentrated set of industries in existence today, and to which, the current Obama administration Justice Department is examining toward possible antitrust litigation.

Although hybrid seed technology helped shift the control of seed production to the seed companies, the introduction of transgenic seed technologies with the extension of patent protection rights dramatically transferred the control of seeds to these massive corporations, the full implications, have not as yet, been fully realized.

As Claire Hope Cummings writes in her book, Uncertain Peril: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Seeds, whoever controls the supply of seed, controls the world’s food supply. Should such concentrated power be allowed to reside within the private realm, or is food so fundamental a right, only governments representing the public interest be allowed to retain ultimate jurisdiction over such a resource?

See Related:
*The Genetic Engineering of Food and the Failure of Science – Part 2: Academic Capitalism and the Loss of Scientific Integrity (PDF)

Related Posts:

• Seeds of Life: David Vs. Goliath
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 2
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 4
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 3
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings
• Genetic Engineering: Road to Paradise or Paradise Lost?
• Seeds of Life: Beta Vulgaris
• Seeds of Life: The Organic Seed Breeder

“Seed breeding is basically taking the process of evolution and turning it into a more controlled process” —Frank Morton

Frank Morton, Organic Seed Breeder; Wild Garden Seed

Related Posts:

• Seeds of Life: David Vs. Goliath
• Seeds Of Life: Hybrids and the Emergence of Seed Monopolies
• Supermarket News Forecasts Non-GMO Uprising
• Seeds of Life: Beta Vulgaris
• Organic Livestock Recieve Emancipation Proclamation from USDA
• Oregon Food Bank Needs Your Help: Blog For Food 2010 Campaign Begins
• U.S. Adopts National Organic Standards: Victory for All, but…
• Temple Grandin: Humane Treatment of Farm Animals

Part 2: Raj Patel, author of The Value of Nothing, explains what food sovereignty means, and why people around the world are fighting to have a say in their own food system. This is as much a fight for social and economic justice as it is a fight to protect the environment, along with the ability of communities, states, and nations to determine their own food and agriculture policies.

Using Haiti as a tragic example of misguided U.S. foreign policy, the country used to grow their own rice before our international trade policies helped Haiti to become more dependent on other nations to feed their own people.

Lest one begins to think food sovereignty only applies to developing nations, Patel explains it’s a problem here at home, as well. He refers to the plight of the tomato pickers in South Florida to be paid a living wage. During the winter months, most of the fresh tomatoes consumed in the U.S. comes from these tomato fields. The Immokalee tomato pickers have faced cruel and exploitative working conditions for years; 1/4 of them live below the poverty line. Over the years, about 1000 South Florida Immokalee pickers have been freed by authorities from what can only be described as modern slave conditions. In this example, how do we define food sovereignty as it relates to economic exploitation? In the name of free market enterprise, how far as a nation do we allow economic exploitation of our own people, and by extension, through our foreign policies and international trade laws, impose our free market values against the interests of other sovereign nations? From such a system, who truly profits, and who truly loses?

In Patel’s analysis of this struggle, food sovereignty is a deep problem that impacts social, environmental and economic concerns. He argues, our free market driven economy only exists because of the huge subsidies that are extracted from nature, and disproportionately, from women—the true costs inflicted upon the environment and upon societies remain largely a separate tab, unclaimed, and continuing to mount.

Related Posts:

• Raj Patel: The Value of Nothing-an Overview (video)
• A Important Case of Preserving Food Sovereignty and Avoiding Green Revolution Calamity
• A 21st Century Social Contract Between Agriculture & the Public
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 2
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 4
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 3
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings
• Seeds Of Life: Hybrids and the Emergence of Seed Monopolies

Part 1: Raj Patel, food activist, scholar, and author of two important books: Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System and his new book (now on the New York Times Best Seller list), The Value of Nothing: How to Reshape Market Society and Redefine Democracy shares his views about our market driven economy, and what he sees as a necessary direction forward for civilization to survive, and people and communities to flourish.

In his previous book, Stuffed and Starved, Patel examined the global food system, and the transnational corporations that ultimately control the price and availability of the food we buy in the supermarket. From giant food processors to goliath food distribution and transportation companies to global agrichemical and seed companies, the bigger the corporation, the greater their potential competitive advantage by managing costs through economies of scale, and through the ability to exercise monopolistic might and political power. In key sectors of the global food system, the cost of entry demands a substantial degree of largesse—money. Do these advantages result in substantial benefits to the farmer, to the eater, to local communities, to the environment?

To Patel, the answer sadly, is a resounding, no! We have created a system that delivers cheap calories, but cheap we discover contains only the illusion of being cheap. The price we pay for this market driven, industrial agriculture system exacts a deferred subsidy from the planet (in the form of increased atmospheric greenhouse gas accumulations, and other forms of environmental degradation), and according to Patel, also, a disproportionate subsidy from poorer nations (the global south), and from women whose work is undervalued and often unpaid. Economists refer to these costs as externalities. These are largely hidden costs that are not incorporated into the price of the final product, nonetheless they represent real costs that eventually come due.

In Patel’s new book, The Value of Nothing, he hones in on what it means to have corporate monopolies that can manipulate both price and supply, coupled with a “free market” philosophy that hijacks government oversight and public protection, where the price of something bears little relation with its true value.

Patel argues that corporations, driven only to achieve profits, do not try to satisfy real human needs. For example, Patel presents us with the true cost of a hamburger, not a $10 hamburger (that would be considered to many, pricey enough) but a $200 hamburger! How can that be? When you factor in all the externalities, including the loss of biodiversity, the clear cutting of vast areas of rainforests to raise cattle to supply ample meat to the fast food industry, the fertilizer and fossil fuel needed to grow and transport corn for animal feed used to feed cattle, and other costs—it adds up to being a real whopper.

Of course, this isn’t just about hamburgers, or the cattle industry in general—Patel explains further, it’s the global south that subsidize the price of food in our industrial food system. The full bill will be presented over time in the form of greater weather variability, increased drought, reduced agriculture production zones, increased food and energy prices, increased poverty and greater food insecurity, and increasing levels of diet related illness: diabetes; heart disease, cancer, and other chronic afflictions. These maladies are not mere future predictions, many of these problems already exist, and have increased in severity over the last several decades, attributed in part, to our global food system.

One of the fascinating elements in The Value of Nothing, how we hold to our ideologies (despite recent, clear, and almost incontrovertible evidence) that the “free market” approach is no substitute for strong government regulation and oversight over industry, and no justification in the belief that markets, left to their own devices, will self-gravitate toward greater economic order and efficiency. Indeed, within the Newtonian world in which our planet is a residing member, where the natural forces of gravity do still apply, the evidence supports the contrary view of unregulated (and nontransparent) markets leading to economic bubbles, disorder and without—just in time—massive government intervention, societal collapse.

The false beauty of unfettered markets, and laissez-faire government policies toward industry—reinforces the decidedly dangerous and misguided belief that corporations will act responsibly within the larger context of achieving their goals and advancing their economic interests; and (voila!) the public good will be served. More realistic a view (at least from the public interest perspective), Patel writes of the Weendigo, a mythical race that consumes everything in its path; never satiated, all consuming, until finally, it devours its own life support systems. Patel argues, the transnational corporation (the artificial man) is the modern day Weendigo, built from the ground up to accomplish one thing: deliver profits, without cease.

There is a unique role for government to play—to set the rules of the game, and enforce those rules vigorously and fairly. To moderate the rapacious nature of the “artificial man”— the corporation. To insure a balance between the pursuit of profit and preserving the equality of opportunity; between overseeing the engine of commerce and work, and the protection of our fragile ecosystems upon which all of life, including our own, depends for survival.

Patel refers to a World Bank study, Agriculture at a Crossroads (PDF) that addressed the principal question posed by Robert Watson, its chief scientist about how to feed the world in 2050 with a projected population of 9 billion people (today we are at 6 billion)? The study concluded, according to Patel, “…a need to shift away from the current industrial system of agriculture because it doesn’t adequately value natural resources.” The point Patel clearly makes thoughout his book, within the larger framework that includes our present day food system, but also the wider economy at large, we need to reexamine how we value our national resources, our communities, the work that women do throughout the world, and in general, how we address the needs of the most vulnerable in society.

This interview was filmed at Powell’s Books, in Portland, Oregon.

Next time: Part 2 Food Sovereignty

Related Posts:

• A 21st Century Social Contract Between Agriculture & the Public
• Raj Patel: Food Sovereignty
• Carlo Petrini: Now We Have A Dilemma: Part 3
• States ban practices that support CAFOs
• The Fight Over the World’s Food Systems
• Carlo Petrini: Good, Clean, and Fair: Part 6
• Carlo Petrini: Give Value To Food 5
• Carlo Petrini: Creating A Sustainable Community: Part 4

January 18, 2010; Part 2: Over the next 30 years, the Portland Metro area is projected to increase in population size by 1 million people. Since the 1970’s, the state, and in particular the Portland metro area that occupies 3 counties (Multnomah; Clackamas; and Washington), have remarkably managed their urban growth efficiently (and wisely) through the use of the Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) process. Each city and county within the state as administered by the Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development (LDLC), are required to develop an UGB within their jurisdiction; urbanization is only allowed to occur (expand) inside of this boundary area, over a 20 year horizon of time. What makes this process unique, is the level of coordination involved from the local to the state level, coordination between cities, counties, and the state that oversees (and must approve) the final process for each locale. Further, within the Portland Metro area, where the largest population center of the state resides, there is great pressure for urbanization. It is here, unlike anywhere else in the country—the UGB is also coordinated by a super agency, Metro, that exercises land use jurisdiction over the 3 counties and 20 cities that comprise this region.

What are Urban and Rural Reserves: (from Oregon Metro)
“Urban Reserves will be designated by Metro on lands currently outside the urban growth boundary that are suitable for accommodating urban development over the next 40 to 50 years. Rural Reserves will be designated by each county on lands outside the current urban growth boundary that are high value working farms and forests or have important natural features like rivers, wetlands, buttes and floodplains. These areas will be protected from urbanization for the next 40 to 50 years.”

Portland Metropolitan Urban and Rural Reserves Map. Approximately 29,000 acres in Washington County has been proposed for Urban Reserves designation, 1/3 of its available open lands.

These land use designations will provide the basis for managing future urban growth, the degree to which the current UGB may expand over the next 40-50 years, and where that expansion will occur. Land use planning is often a balancing act of competing interests, needs, and desires of a community and a region. Agricultural lands are largely in competition with industrial uses, to the degree both require large tracts of open land to operate.

As Jim Johnson, land use planner for the Oregon Department of Agriculture explains in the video, the Urban Reserves designation carries risk in the form of long-term uncertainty to farmers whose land falls under this new designation. Regardless of whether their land, or areas near their land become absorbed inside an expanding UGB line, the speculative value of their property will increase with an Urban Reserves designation (as opposed to a Rural Reserves designation), and the economic pressures of approaching urbanization will likely promote the demise of farming along these urban fringe boundaries.

Agriculture is one of the most important economic engines of the state’s economy. The soils that occupy much of the open lands under consideration for Urban Reserves designation are also among the finest agricultural soils in the state, possibly in the world. Once these areas become open to urbanization, it becomes much harder for new farmland to be used for farming, and existing farms to thrive.

Our world is changing faster than our ability to comprehend the full impact of the changes that are underfoot. Changes to the environment from the threats of climate change, of increasing water scarcity, and of environmental degradation argue for caution in our future growth plans, and an emphasis on the efficient use of land inside an established UGB lines.

The growing importance of urban agriculture to the quality of local communities, and to its future economic well-being, are issues that will likely only increase in importance over time.

The results of this Reserves Process, and how it’s able to play out over the next several decades will determine in large measure whether the Portland area preserves its unique character of small urban farms, specialty seed and crop production zones, and farmer’s markets near its urban center. What’s at stake is the local food production and local food economy of this region; the ability to meet the local needs of an additional 1 million people for food, and help feed a world outside its borders— growing ever more hungry for quality food.

What Happens Next: (from Oregon Metro)
“The Core 4 [ editor's note: the Core 4 are the 3 counties plus Metro] completed their initial proposed regional reserves map on Dec. 16 and have released it for public consideration. In early 2010, you will have an opportunity to attend public open houses to view maps, learn about the rationale behind the boundary lines and read the intergovernmental agreements that will formally establish the reserves system. County and Metro staff and elected officials will be on hand to answer questions and you’ll have the opportunity to provide your perspective. Or you can attend a “virtual open house” on the Metro web site where you can view the same materials and answer survey questions.”

“Following this comment period, the Core 4, on behalf of their respective governments, will propose final maps and intergovernmental agreements for formal approval by the three commissions and Metro Council in February 2010. [ Editor's note: Final maps and agreements will be forwarded to the state's land use agency for review before final approval." [ Editor's note: The Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development will review the final maps and intergovernmental agreements to insure consistency with the state laws. ]

To find out more information about the Reserves Process, and how you can participate, visit the Oregon Metro site. Download current Reserves map (PDF).

Related Posts:

• Urban Growth Boundary: Oregon Agriculture, Economy, and Managed Growth (video)
• Farmers, conservation groups join to preserve farmland near Portland’s suburbs
• Coalition of Farming, Conservation Groups Provide Alternative Vision for Region’s Growth
• A City Looks Toward Defining Its Future

Part 1: In physics, the second law of thermodynamics, which deals with the natural flow of energy distribution (no, you won’t be tested on this part), stipulates that localized “systems,” (think of an ice cube melting), will disperse outward, unless a counter force is applied to contain it. In population centers of the country, urban sprawl and resource depletion are the natural consequences of increasing populations (the melting ice cube), unless countervailing forces (land use laws) are effectively applied to manage growth, and protect finite resources. In biology, uncontrolled growth is known as cancer, and cities and states across the U.S. that have forsaken a coordinated approach toward long range urban planning, have been stricken by the effects of sprawl, to varying degrees impacting the local environment, and the quality of life for effected communities.

Damascus, near Portland, Oregon

Oregon is among the very few states, and the Portland area, of the even fewer major metro areas, that have for decades effectively fought back the forces of development, and resisted converting ever more parcels of urban land for re-zoning to industrial and commercial use, overemployed in other places under the banner of job creation and the promise of wider economic prosperity. Since the 1970’s, growth in the Portland area has been confined within carefully crafted boundaries, the Urban Growth Boundary (UGB), outside of which, urban growth was not allowed to occur.

Yet by 2040, the Portland Metro area is projected to increase in population size by 1 million residents, and the UGB will have to expand more in order to meet the demands for future jobs, housing, and roads, etc.. It is this statistic that has fueled (over the past few years) a new process, the Reserves Process, to deal with this huge anticipated growth, and that ultimately will decide the fate of open lands for future development for decades to come. The Reserves Process, underway now, and scheduled for completion the early part of this year (2010), will designate areas of land for Urban Reserve, Rural Reserve, and Undesignated Reserve, within the three county Portland Metro area: Washington, Multnomah, and Clackamas. These designations will apply only to land outside the current UGB, and will form the basis for where the future UGB will be allowed to expand over time to accommodate the necessary growth for the next 40-50 year term.

CUpS sat down with Jim Johnson, land use planner for the Oregon Department of Agriculture, to discuss the Reserves Process, how the land use laws in Oregon came into being, and what they are designed to accomplish. This is part of an ongoing Food News series that will examine Oregon’s land use measures, including a more in-depth look at the Reserves Process itself, and the possible long-term impacts of these new land designations on local farms, and urban agriculture in the region.

Definitions: From the Clackamas County website Urban Overview (PDF)

• Urban Growth Boundary (UGB)—a line drawn by Metro (representing all 3 counties) with the cities and counties that seperates urban land from rural land.
• Urban Reserve—an area outside the current UGB suitable for accomodating population and job growth for the next 40-50 years. [editor note: Over this same period of time, as the UGB needs to expand, areas under this designation would be available for incorporation inside a newly established UGB line, as deemed necessary.]
• Rural Reserve—an area outside the current UGB to be preserved and protected for agricultural uses and natural resources for the next 40-50 years.

Listening to Jim Johnson, two things are abundantly clear:

1. The contribution of agriculture to the State of Oregon is substantial with the Portland Metro area contributing 1/5 of the total share of agriculture production value for the entire state.
2. The three counties that make up the metro area, and that are actively being examined under the Reserves Process, a good portion of this land contains among the best agricultural soils in the state, in the nation, and possibly, the world. The very types of prized soils that are increasingly vanishing around the world.

In 50 to 100 years, Johnson sees the possibility that the United States could become the next Saudia Arabia in terms of food production. The outcome of the Reserves Process may well determine how big a role Oregon actually plays in such a future.

Related Resources:
Metro
Urban Growth Boundary
Urban and Rural Reserves in Clackamas County
Urban and Rural Reserves- Washington County
Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development (LCDC)

Related Posts:

• Urban Growth Boundaries: The Reserves Process (Video)
• Farmers, conservation groups join to preserve farmland near Portland’s suburbs
• Coalition of Farming, Conservation Groups Provide Alternative Vision for Region’s Growth
• A City Looks Toward Defining Its Future

Cooking Up a Story: Food News

In part 2, Claire Hope Cummings raises a number of troubling concerns that are at the heart of what she feels threatens our future food supply.

Click on image to enlarge

Seed Industry Structure 1996-2008; graphic courtesy of Dr. Phil Howard, Michigan State University. https://www.msu.edu/~howardp/

There are about a handful of global agrichemical companies, and Cummings believes they are threatening the livelihoods of farmers, limiting the range of food choices in the marketplace, and introducing new technologies that pose a threat to agriculture, and the environment.

Cummings maintains that their efforts are not in pursuit of noble purpose, to feed the world (as they would like us to believe), but their real intent is the pursuit of power and profit. She emphasizes the point that while Capitalism rightfully rewards risk, these corporations use their monopolistic power to impose their will upon farmers, and thus the marketplace, in the choice of seeds available for farmers to grow; restrict the the reuse of seeds for future harvests; restrict the ability of farmers and scientists to conduct further breeding research; and in other ways that transfer their own risk to others, while continuing to reap giant profits. For further information, see also: The Failure of Science”: New paper makes a damning case against genetically modified food crops, from our friends at the Ethicurean.

Cummings touches upon a wider concern, the loss of integrity and independence of our land grant colleges to conduct scientific agricultural research. Research that used to be intended to serve the public good, according to Cummings, has over several decades, shifted toward serving the narrow commercial interests of private corporations.

Related Posts:

• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 4
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 3
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings
• Genetic Engineering: Road to Paradise or Paradise Lost?
• Seeds Of Life: Hybrids and the Emergence of Seed Monopolies
• Seeds of Life: David Vs. Goliath
• Paul Roberts: The End of Food
• Monsanto’s Adventures in Court

Beta Vulgaris, the latin name for the beet species, includes the sugar beet, table beet, and swiss chard varieties. Although each variety is grown for different agricultural purposes, botanically, they are the same plant. Being open pollinated plants from the same species, and not hybrids, they are susceptible to cross-contamination from the pollen of other nearby Beta Vulgaris varieties.

Beta Vulgaris, sugar beet root. The roots of a sugar beet can grow as large as a basketball, and contain large amounts of sugar

A young swiss chard plant; Beta Vulgaris species

This is the second installment of an ongoing Food News series titled Seeds of Life. Frank Morton, an organic seed breeder from Philomath, Oregon, shares his concerns over the contamination threat from the introduction of transgenic sugar beet crops into the Willamette Valley where his farm is located. For Morton, his main concern, and the reason for his lawsuit against the USDA (and APHIS), is to protect the purity of his swiss chard organic seed from cross pollination (and thus contamination) with the newly introduced transgenic sugar beet crops being grown in the valley. The Willamette Valley is prized for having just the right soils and climate for being a renowned seed production region, surprisingly, possessing unique characteristics few places can match. In Frank Morton’s own words from GMO’s at the Brink: “The Willamette Valley is a world class place to grow seeds, and I love to say that…, because few people realize what a rare thing it is to find an ideal seed production location. Middle latitude, fertile soils, mild wet winters, moderate dry summers, ample irrigation water, a predictable long dry harvest window, and very short agricultural history, distinguish our Valley from most others.”

In a similar but unrelated lawsuit, a St. Louis court recently found Bayer AG, a German Agrochemical conglomerate liable for contaminating two farmer’s rice fields in Texas that resulted from the unintentional escape of Bayer’s two transgenic (test) strains of herbicide resistant rice (engineered to be tolerant to Bayer’s Liberty brand of herbicide). As a result of the transgenic rice contamination, their rice crop was a total loss as both farmers were unable to sell to their oversees markets. It should also be noted, in both instances, neither transgenic (rice) strain had been approved for human consumption.

Next Time: Seeds of Life: Organic Seed Breeder

Related Posts:

• Seeds Of Life: Hybrids and the Emergence of Seed Monopolies
• Seeds of Life: David Vs. Goliath
• Seeds of Life: The Organic Seed Breeder
• A Important Case of Preserving Food Sovereignty and Avoiding Green Revolution Calamity
• Temporary Stay Against GM Introduction Granted to India’s “king of Vegetables”-the Aubergine
• South Australia alone on GM canola ban
• Monsanto’s Adventures in Court
• Monsanto’s GMO Corn Linked To Organ Failure, Study Reveals

Center for Food Safety, et al. v. Thomas J. Vilsack, et al.

Frank Morton in a Field of Transgenic Sugar Beet Plants in the Willamette Valley

This interview took place this summer prior to Judge White’s September ruling in favor of Frank Morton, and the other plaintiffs.

This ruling marks a resounding renunciation of the USDA/APHIS 2005 decision to deregulate and thus allow the unrestricted commercial development of “Event H7-1”, a Glyphosate tolerant sugar beet engineered by Monsanto and the German company KWS. Deregulation opened the door for transgenic sugar beet production in the Willamette Valley of Oregon, one of the most fertile agricultural regions in the world. The judge ordered that an environmental impact statement be conducted because USDA/APHIS failed to adequately consider the impact on the environment from stated cross contamination concerns, and the socio-economic impacts on consumers (eaters), farmers, and other market participants over the question of the continued availability of non-transgenic sugar beet crops.

In 2006, most of the sugar beet production was from conventional seeds but the Roundup Ready transgenic variety increased sharply in 2008 to about 60% of production, and rose again this year to estimates as high as 95% of the total U.S. market. The United States is among the largest producers of sugar, more than half comes from the production of sugar beets. Most of the U.S. sugar beet seed is produced in the Willamette Valley, where between 3000-5000 acres of sugar beet seeds are grown each year. The sugar beet plants grown from these seeds occupy areas of the western and mid-west regions of the country; the largest concentrations of (harvested) acres are in North Dakota, Minnesota, and Michigan.

From Frank Morton’s perspective, his livelihood depends upon the ability to produce organic seeds that are not contaminated with transgenic genes spread from neighboring GMO related species of plants. In the Willamette Valley, an elaborate, but voluntary system exists to coordinate the growing of a diversity of crops to prevent the accidental cross-pollination and contamination that can occur naturally between related species. In the case of sugar beets, Morton’s Swiss Chard organic seed is commercially threatened by neighboring GMO sugar beet plants; the tiniest of contamination if it were to occur, would prevent him from selling his Swiss Chard organic seeds to his customers here and abroad. In addition, the introduction of any GMO crops into the ecologically unique Willamette Valley without a thorough environmental impact study sets a dangerous new precedent for more unregulated transgenic crops to follow.

Monsanto has recently decided to appeal to the U.S. Supreme court an earlier decision that forced the company to remove its GMO Alfalfa from the market (except under very limited conditions), pending the completion of an environmental impact statement. The alfalfa decision, in part, helped establish the precedent for the judge’s ruling in this Roundup Ready sugar beet case.

Next Time:

Related Stories:
Organic grower inspires beet lawsuit
Monsanto Loss Hurts Farmers
The GMO sugar beet
USDA Proposes Further De-regulation of GMOs (August 2007)
Non-GMO beet seed available
Biotechnology, the Media, and Public Policy (American Enterprise Institute)
The Dirty Little Secret of Organic Seeds
Crop Scientists Say Biotechnology Seed Companies Are Thwarting Research (NYT)
Monsanto asks Supreme Court to review alfalfa ban

Related Posts:

• Seeds Of Life: Hybrids and the Emergence of Seed Monopolies
• Seeds of Life: The Organic Seed Breeder
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 2
• Genetic Engineering: Road to Paradise or Paradise Lost?
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 4
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 3
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings
• Seeds of Life: Beta Vulgaris

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In this final segment, Marion Kalb, director of the Farm To School program, suggests practical ways to work with food service directors, and others, to bring fresh, locally produced foods, into the school cafeteria lunchroom. Kalb shares success stories of schools in different areas of the country that have offered kids fresh vegetables and fruits, demonstrating that they will develop wider tastes for these foods when given a proper chance. Do you know of a Farm To School program in your school? What was your child’s experience?

For more information how you can bring a program to your community, contact these organizations: Coalition For Food Security: National Farm To School Program; National Farm To School Organization; and this conference that took place in Portland, Oregon, March 19-21, 2009: 4th National Farm To Cafeteria Conference.

Related Posts:

• Farm To School: A Conversation with Marion Kalb-part 2
• Farm To School: A Conversation with Marion Kalb
• The Long Awaited Pig Roast
• Dumpster Diving
• Meet a Farmer: Joya Parsons, Chicken Farmer
• Oregon Food Bank Needs Your Help: Blog For Food 2010 Campaign Begins
• Raj Patel: The Value of Nothing-an Overview (video)
• Getting local foods to local tables: Part III, a farmer’s perspective

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Part 2: Marion Kalb continues the conversation around the Farm To School program, acknowledging that added costs for fresh foods are a challenge, but also explaining practical ways to overcome some of those obstacles. Pointing out, in some cases, the cost of fresh, locally supplied foods are less expensive than their out of state counterparts.

With hundreds of billions of dollars in stimulus money about to be provided by the taxpayer, how about including in the stimulus package provisions to fund a national Farm To School program? Imagine, if we could provide healthy, fresh, and locally produced fruits and vegetables to school kids throughout the country, how this may positively impact the economies of rural communities, advance the health of school kids, and provide hands-on education to encourage healthier eating habits for the next generation of American adults.

How important would offering fresh, locally produced fruits and vegetables in schools, be to your family?

See Related: Farm To School: A Conversation with Marion Kalb

Related Posts:

• Farm To School: A Conversation with Marion Kalb-part 3
• Farm To School: A Conversation with Marion Kalb
• A Sustainable Farmer Talks Corn
• My Journey to a more Sustainable Food Lifestyle-Part 4
• My Journey to a more Sustainable Food Lifestyle-Part 3
• My Journey to a More Sustainable Food Lifestyle-Part 2
• Meet a Farmer: Joya Parsons, Chicken Farmer
• White House garden ‘ex-seeds’ expectations

In Part 2 of this Cooking Up a Story: Food News interview, Mark Bittman, best-selling food author, and New York Times Columnist, lays out the central tenet of his life’s work as a food writer, and home cook. The “minimalist” view that we need to eat substantially more plant based foods, and consume substantially less animal products than what currently defines the typical Western diet.

Bittman’s argument is not (for the most part) with the hamburger in terms of the quality of the cow, his beef is with our wholesale substitution of plant based foods for meat products, and highly processed foods. This raises an interesting question, if as Bittman suggests, we consumed 90% less meat products, and processed foods, and correspondingly increased our intake of the remaining foods (fruits, vegetables, legumes, and grains), how would this impact our current agriculture system? What would be the effect on food sustainability, public health, and on our food economy, if such a substantial change in our eating habits were to take place? Tell us what you think.

Related: Food Matters with Mark Bittman-1

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In Claire Hope Cummings very fine book, Uncertain Peril: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Seeds, she dedicates a chapter to corn, and her visit to a region of Mexico, the center of origin where ancient corn began. Centers of origin, as Cummings explains, are the few places on earth where a species first came into existence, and evolved over thousands of years. Plant varieties were selected by farmers and adapted to fit a local region. It is the place where the greatest diversity of a given species continues to survive. In Oaxaca, a southern mountainous region in Mexico, there are believed to be over 85,000 subvarieties of corn cultivated over a 7000 year period of time.

Corn to the indigenous people in this region is more than just an economic good, it forms a foundation for how their culture has evolved throughout time. Corn “prescribes reciprocity,” when someone performs a favor, a favor is also returned. This is extremely important, writes Cummings, since there are often land conflicts between members of the community. Corn provides food, and the promise of food for the next harvest, taking care of the corn, means also taking care of each other, and the environment.

In her story about corn, and the culture that grew up around the corn, there is a cautionary tale to consider. As “modern agriculture” became introduced through NAFTA (the North America Free Trade Agreement), cheaper, (highly subsidized) U.S. corn supplanted native corn in Mexico. As the Zapotec farmers switched to modern hybrids promising higher yields, they also took on greater economic debt for the needed fertilizers and pesticide chemicals the hybrid plants required. When their crops underperformed, many farmers gave up, and left their community. The sharing of seeds among farmers also largely disappeared.

This all brings us back to one of Cummings central themes in her book, and also in her interviews here. Food is more than just a means of making money. Food is necessary for physical survival, but it’s also necessary for the social, and moral lessons that we draw as a people that help define our own lives and culture. Industrial agriculture separates the production of food from the biological systems that interact and nurture life; those systems are seen as largely obstacles in the way of achieving efficient production.

Cummings makes an impassioned plea on behalf of the natural world, if we ignore these warnings, we do so at our own peril.

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• Paul Roberts: The End of Food
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Claire Hope Cummings

Claire Hope Cummings, in this third segment of interviews hones in upon the essential problems plaguing our agriculture system, she argues is a direct result of the industrialization of agriculture. “Our bodies are not machines”, Cummings reminds us, all the parts of a biological (agriculture) system must remain healthy if we are to produce healthy food to feed healthy people. Industrial agriculture production is not intended to feed the world, according to Cummings, it’s designed to maximize profits for a relatively, few corporations that control the food system.

The overarching theme is corporate monopoly and control (power); the massive consolidation within the food industry ultimately threatens not just the availability of certain foods, it encourages monopolistic practices that undermine the health of the farm, the environment, and the health of the eater. Cummings warns us loud and clear, with Genetic Engineering, and other newer more pernicious technologies (nanotechnology, synthetic biology, and robotics, etc.), we are not employing our human ingenuity to work in accordance with the laws of Nature, we are seeking to control and dominate Nature.

Cummings raises troubling moral and philosophical issues we must tackle forthrightly, or risk a terrible fate. How should new technologies be used in agriculture, who decides, and for what purpose? Do we have the moral right (not to mention the inherent wisdom) to use technologies that sever our bond with the natural world? With the reliance upon industrial agriculture, have we lost the vital connection between the farmer, the land, and the eater, to the point where we have endangered ourselves, and the planet?

On Wednesday, in the final part of this series, Claire Hope Cummings shares her hope for the future.

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• Seeds of Life: David Vs. Goliath
• Paul Roberts: The End of Food
• Monsanto’s Adventures in Court

Cooking Up a Story: Food News

In this 4-part series, journalist, environmentalist, and author of Uncertain Peril: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Seeds, Claire Hope Cummings speaks out on behalf of the natural world, and for a new approach to solving the environmental, social, and philosophical problems inherent in our present food system. According to the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment report, a comprehensive, 4 year study commissioned by the United Nations, over the past 50 years, human activity has altered the planets ecosystems more than any comparable time in human history. Industrial agriculture plays a big part in this report. The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment concludes that we have degraded 60% of the (Earth’s) infrastructure services, and that this “has resulted in a substantial and largely irreversible loss in the diversity of life on Earth”.

Claire Hope Cummings explains that the Capitalist system often relies upon “the mentality of scarcity” model to increase profits. In agriculture, this mentality of scarcity takes many forms, including that of major seed companies restricting the uses (through utility patents) of their GMO seeds (non-GMO seeds can not be granted an utility patent); thus, by restricting supply, drive up their monetary value. Formerly, what may have been freely available to reuse for future harvests, or for breeding research by farmers, or public institutions, may no longer be available for such purposes. For some, this is how capitalism—at its finest—operates. But, we are not talking here about industrial widgets, we are talking about the control of seeds. Cummings, warns in her book, “whoever controls the future of seeds controls the future of life on earth”. Should any private entity be granted the right to control the future food supply?

For those who believe that Man can (or should even try to) control nature, Cummings makes a powerful argument for the wisdom she decries as so lacking: to know the limits of our present knowledge, and more carefully consider the introduction of new technologies before releasing them upon the world. Nature has evolved successfully over ions of time; the modern industrial agriculture system has proven itself to be less successful, and not sustainable over a short span of time. The pursuit of cheap and abundant food, has in truth created enormous costs to society in the form of climate change, environmental degradation, resource depletion (oil and water, in particular), loss of biodiversity and soil fertility, and foods low in nutritional value. Clearly, the illusion of cheap food, and the mounting realities of the industrial food system cry out for real change.

Sustainable agriculture, and it’s underlying approach to working with nature, Cummings believes offers many of the answers that communities need to consider in order to develop their own local food economies, and build lasting economic vitality. In sharp contrast to the “scarcity” mentality, for Cummings, what we need to learn the most, is the value of “generosity,” as embodied in the “lesson of the seed”. “Food isn’t just nutrition”, says Cummings, “the culture of food has values in it that teach how to live” .

For additional information: Food Ecosystem Services (PDF), the food chapter from the Millennium Assessment Report

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Portland Fruit Tree Project provides a valuable service that helps communities benefit directly from local resources. Fresh fruit that grows on neighborhood trees is collected by volunteers, and dropped off at local Food Banks for distribution to those in need. The great thing about this program is that in large part, the fruit would not be harvested or eaten by anyone—if not for fruit gleaning. Everyone involved benefits, including the trees, as harvesting is beneficial to their health!

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This ocean series is dedicated to the celebration and reflection of World’s Ocean Day, on Monday, June 8, 2009.

It would not be hard to imagine the impact on the land’s ecosystems, if humans mostly hunted wolves, and other predators for food at the top of the food chain. As Alison Barratt, from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program informs us, that is precisely what we do when we fish for tuna, salmon and other top predators of the sea. Artificially disrupting the mix of predator to prey (in this case, through industrial fishing practices on a massive, global scale), damages the built-in mechanisms that keep animal populations in proper balance, and harms natural ecosystems that support life.

Here is a partial list of sustainable fish choices that are environmentally friendly to harvest, abundant, and well managed from the Seafood Watch Pocket Guides:

All Regions

Some Best Choices

Arctic Char (farmed)
Catfish (U.S. farmed)
Crab, Dungeness
Halibut, Pacific
Mackerel, King
Mackerel, Spanish
Mahi Mahi / Dolphinfish (U.S. Atlantic troll/pole)
Sardine (U.S. Pacific)
Shrimp, Pink (Oregon)
Whitefish, Lake (Lake Superior, Lake Huron, Lake Michigan trap-net)

Some Good Alternatives

Basa (Imported farmed)
Black Sea Bass
Dogfish, Spiny (British Columbia)
Halibut, California (hook-and-line or bottom trawl)
Halibut, Greenland
Herring, Atlantic
Herring, Lake
Lobster, American/Maine
Salmon (Washington wild-caught)
Smelt, Rainbow (Lake Superior, Lake Michigan, Lake Erie)

Some Seafood to Avoid: Overfished, and/or fished or farmed in ways that hurt other marine life, or harm the environment.

Chilean Seabass
Cod, Atlantic
Crab, King (Imported)
Flounder (Atlantic)
Halibut, Atlantic
Halibut, California (set gillnet)
Rockfish (trawl-caught)
Salmon (farmed)
Swordfish (Imported)
Shrimp (Imported farmed)
Shrimp (Imported wild-caught)

Check out these related videos from this series: State of the Oceans Health: In Crisis (Part 1) Alison Barratt, from the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch program discusses the health of the oceans in relation to native fish populations, and the decline of their ecosystems. Sardines: Sustainable Food to Feed the World Dr. Geoff Shester, the Senior Science Manager, Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Sustainable Seafood Initiative describes a sustainably managed fish, high in protein and healthy nutrients, abundant, inexpensive to produce, that could feed a large number of people, affordably. So, what’s the problem?

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The oceans remain a relatively unexplored frontier, as only 5 percent of the ocean floor has been investigated. Put into context, more than 1,500 people have climbed Mount Everest, more than 300 have journeyed into space, 12 have walked on the moon, but only 2 people have descended and returned in a single dive to the deepest part of the ocean. —2009 Joint Oceans Commission Initiative

According to the results of two major scientific reports, the just released Joint Ocean Commission Initiative: Changing Oceans, Changing World (PDF); and the 2003 report by the Pew Oceans Commission entitled America’s Living Oceans (PDF), the health of the world’s oceans are in crisis from overfishing, pollution, climate change, and destruction of native habitat.

Both reports issue a call to arms; a need to comprehensively address the fundamental effects of human activity on the oceans, marine coastal areas, and estuaries. In addition to being a primary source of food for feeding growing populations of people (6 billion in the world today), the oceans moderate our climate; perform the essential role of absorbing excess carbon (half of all fossil carbon [dioxide] released into the atmosphere since the beginning of the industrial revolution has been absorbed in the ocean); through the creation of rain, the main source of our fresh water; and the largest generator of oxygen on the planet. Simply put, the fate of all life on Earth is thoroughly intertwined with the fate of the oceans.

Cooking Up a Story: Food News-Part 1

Alison Barratt, from the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch program discusses the health of the oceans in relation to native fish populations, and the decline of their ecosystems. In the last 50 years, industrial fishing practices have severely lowered fish populations, altering the balance of species diversity within ecosystems. Fishing practices have also led to destruction of native habitats, and increased collateral damage to unintended fish caught by accident (bycatch). Nitrogen pollution from agricultural runoff, sewage, and automobile and factory emissions, have created more than 150 different “dead zones,” areas of water—under a one-mile square radius to as large as 45,000 square miles in size containing such depleted levels of oxygen—within each, no fish can survive.

Some highlights taken from the Pew Oceans Commission report on the health status of the oceans:

1. As of 2001, the government could only assure that 22% of fish stocks under federal management (211 of 959 stocks) were being fished sustainably.
2. By 1989, populations of New England cod, haddock, and yellowtail flounder had reached historic lows. In US waters, Atlantic halibut are commercially extinct—too rare to justify a directed fishing effort. Populations of some rockfish species on the West Coast have dropped to less than 10 percent of their past levels.
3. A 2003 National Academy of Sciences study estimates that the oil running off our streets and driveways, and ultimately flowing into the oceans is equal to the Exxon Valdez oil spill-10.9 million gallons- every 8 months (NRC, 2002).
4. The amount of nitrogen released into coastal waters along the Atlantic seabord and the Gulf of Mexico frtom anthropogenic (human) sources has increased about fivefold since the Pre-industrial era, and may increase another 30% by 2030 if current practices continue (Howarth et al., 2000).
5. Over the past decade, nearly one million non-native Atlantic salmon have escaped from fish farms and established themselves in streams in the Pacific Northwest.
6. Coastal marshes, which trap floodwaters, filter out pollutants, and serve as “nurseries” for wildlife, are disappearing at a rate of 20,000 acres per year. Louisiana alone has lost half a million acres of wetlands since the 1950’s.
7. Bottom-dwelling invertebrates can take up to five years or more to recover from one pass of a (fishing trawler) dredge.
8. Climate change will modify the flow of energy and cycling of materials within ecosystems—in some cases, altering their ability to provide the ecosystem services we depend upon.
9. Just as the 20th century brought us into knowledgeable contact with outer space, the 21st will almost certainly connect us more intimately to our oceans. …As much as we love our oceans—our ignorance has been destroying them.

See related videos: Seafood Watch Discover how to find what fish are sustainably harvested, and how you can do your part to help improve the health of the oceans. Sardines: Sustainable Food to Feed the World Dr. Geoff Shester, the Senior Science Manager, Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Sustainable Seafood Initiative describes a sustainably managed fish, high in protein and healthy nutrients, abundant, inexpensive to produce, that could feed a large number of people, affordably. So what’s the problem?

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“…Originating from sources, whether fished or farmed, that can maintain or increase production in the long term without jeopardizing the structure or function of affected ecosystems.” The David Suzuki Foundation

“In simple terms, a particular seafood product is sustainable if it comes from a fishery whose practices can be maintained indefinitely without reducing the target species’ ability to maintain its population. In addition, it must not adversely impact any other species within the marine ecosystem by removing their food sources, accidentally killing them, or damaging their environment.” Greenpeace

Cooking Up a Story: Food News

Seafood Watch, a program of the Monterey Bay Aquarium began about 10 years ago to help raise consumer awareness and promote business practices to protect the ocean’s fish populations from overfishing, pollution, and native habitat destruction. Seafood Watch, in addition to compiling up to-date, and reliable information on marine life and the ocean’s ecosystems, produces a series of small pocket seafood guides, organized by region, to help consumers make informed choices about the fish they purchase in restaurants and in grocery markets.

As consumers take active charge in searching for better information about the fish they choose to purchase, food retailers, restaurants, and seafood suppliers face growing pressure to serve the needs of a more enlightened public. [For those tech savvy consumers, there's also an iPhone Seafood Watch application that provides the same information as the complete set of individual pocket guides.]

The point Alison Barratt makes is our food choices as consumers can produce a real difference; the key is to take charge in finding the right sources for information about sustainability, and then making our voices heard in the marketplace. When it comes to seafood, programs like Seafood Watch provide a one-stop shop for finding the right answers.

This Week: June 3; June 5— Cooking Up a Story: Food News show: State of the Oceans Health: In Crisis -Part 1: Alison Barratt, from the Seafood Watch Program describes the general condition of our oceans, and the growing concerns over their fate. In Part2- Barratt offers additional suggestions for consumers to help relieve the pressure on fish populations, and restore the natural balance of the ocean’s ecosystems.

From our friends at National Geographic, check out this wonderful video about the oceans, and their critical importance to the survival of the planet:

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In part 3 of Kitchen Literacy, Ann Vileisis talks about the need to start making connections between our consumption of food, and all the interrelated social, health, and environmental consequences that occur. Agricultural pollution is the single largest non-point source of water pollution (effecting rivers, streams, and wetland areas) in the United States. In her book, Ann looks to history to see how food, and our connection to food has changed, so that we may become more aware about the food we choose to eat. Eating well is an effective way to improve our knowledge about food, our own health, and the health of the environment. What does eating well mean to you? How do we learn how to eat well?

See also: Kitchen Literacy-Part 1; Kitchen Literacy 2

Related: The Big Leap The views expressed in this video may not reflect the mainstream view in America about western society’s degree of personal consumption, corporate power, advertising, and consequent effects upon the environment, and on indigenous peoples throughout the world. Regardless, it is worth hearing, and critically evaluating; these ideas relate, in our opinion, to the Ann Vileisis interconnectedness themes presented in her Kitchen Literacy book.

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PART 2—Continuing our conversation with Ann Vileisis, author of Kitchen Literacy, she explains how over time we became gradually disconnected from how foods were produced, and where they originated. Most importantly, the advertising industry played a significant role in changing American values toward food, and easing the transformation to the industrial food production system of today. No easy feat to accomplish, it took many years to fully inculcate society to the new norms of food consumption.

Kitchen Literacy-Part 1: A conversation with author, Ann Vileisis about her new book Kitchen Literacy; what we know about our food, and how we came to know it. For Ann, Kitchen Literacy came about because she was struck by how much she didn’t know about the common foods she encountered in the supermarket.

Related: Food Is Love: Advertising and Gender Roles In Modern America[sniplet postmetadata]

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PART 1—A conversation with author, Ann Vileisis about her new book Kitchen Literacy; what we know about our food, and how we came to know it. For Ann, Kitchen Literacy came about because she was struck by how much she didn’t know about the common foods she encountered in the supermarket. In conducting her research, she was surprised to learn how much people in pre-industrial times knew about their food. It was common then to know the sex and age of an animal, the farm it came from, and even the animal’s background before purchasing the meat.

Today, there is a renewed focus on the importance of food production, and distribution. A big part of this interest stems from a growing concern over food safety issues, also a concern in earlier times. In this 3-part series, Ann Vileisis shares some historical perspectives about our early food systems, and how in some ways, people are returning to ways of the past to reconnect with the food that they eat. In part two, Vileisis talks about the transition of populations from the farm to the city, and how our relationship with food profoundly changed with that shift. Part 3, the consequences of our modern agriculture system are discussed, and the important role that a historical perspective can help us navigate toward more sustainable agriculture practices.

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“Ecology is permanent economy”— Sunderlal Bahuguna, environmental activist and active crusader in the Chipko Movement

Dr. Vandana Shiva founded the Research for Science, Technology, and Ecology, (RFSTE) organization, inspired by her earlier involvement with the Chipko movement. In 1973, in a mountainous region in the Himalayas, women villagers, in heroic and desperate fashion, clung to the body of trees to protest against their forest being decimated by contractors for the State’s Forest Department. The entire ecology of the region, and thus the local economy of these villagers, depended upon preserving the integrity of their forest. The eventual success of this self-organized environmental movement to protect their own natural resources from exploitation, became a (non-violent) model for future environmental activism throughout the world.

In this final installment, Dr. Vandana Shiva takes us back to the role of organic farming, and to the organic farmer who she believes embodies the best scientists of our time. For Dr. Shiva, as a scientist herself, and a longtime environmental activist, it’s understanding nature and working within its laws that produces peace, prosperity, and a sustainable future. The seed of an organism is the embodiment of life itself; of hope and of survival. The notion that a seed can be owned by a corporation (through a patent), is a power too great to bestow upon any private or public entity. As a culmination of what Dr. Shiva has discussed in her other interviews, she is hopeful that it is not too late for people to stand up to the large corporations that drive our global food system, and to make personal choices that promote local and more sustainable food production.

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• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 4
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 3

Cooking Up a Story: Food News

In part two, Dr. Vandana Shiva expresses her strong views about the problems of hunger in the developing world; the struggle of farmers in India; biotechnology, and her prescription for the type of farming model she believes the world needs.

Related Post: Vandana Shiva: The Future of Food-Part 1

Dr. Vandana Shiva, explains the science of biotechnology (genetic engineering), and the dangers it poses to the world’s food supplies. Dr. Shiva is a scientist, an environmental activist, and an internationally recognized leader in the sustainable food movement.

Preview: Vandana Shiva: The Future of Food-Part 3 Airs: 4:00 AM (PST) Friday, April 24, 2009

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What inspired Jacob Bronowski’s classic science book, Science and Human Values resulted from his visit to Nagasaki in 1945. After witnessing the aftermath of that terrible destruction, he began to understand the power that science can unleash, and the responsibility of not only the scientist, and the scientific community at-large, but also it’s citizenry, to remain informed and actively engaged with the scientific decisions of the day. He did not view the scientist as a technocrat, nor a conjurer of magic, but one for whom the pursuit of science was to better understand nature’s laws, within a wider set of universal values, particularly the values of “tenderness, of kindliness, and of human intimacy and love”. These values were not to been seen as hard rules, they provided the foundation for a deeper understanding between just and unjust, between good and evil, between the means and the ends. Though his book was first published in 1956, it remains as important today, as then.

Cooking Up a Story: Food News

This 3-part series of interviews with Dr. Vandana Shiva about the future of food is one of the most contentious, revolutionary, profound, and important discussions of any, we have had to date on Food News. This is more than about the safety of biotechnology; it’s about the ability of all of us to have a choice of the foods that we eat, and for our farmers to be able to freely use their own seeds, and grow food in the manner that they choose. In developing countries like India, biotechnology introduces higher costs of production to the farmers, and makes them highly dependent upon a small number of companies to purchase their seeds, and required chemical inputs. Increasingly, farmers whose crops fail to produce anticipated yields are propelled into a cycle of debt that cause many to commit suicide. Food sovereignty of developing countries; ecological preservation of the biodiversity existing in nature; the ability of nations to feed their own people; the preservation of local culture entwined with past farming traditions; and the right of a people to have access to their own seeds, and to choose the traits they wish to propagate, these are all issues that require careful thought and discussion.

In part 1, Dr. Vandana Shiva explains the science of biotechnology (genetic engineering), and the dangers it poses to the world’s food supplies. Dr. Shiva is a scientist (a physicist by training); she is also a social activist, an environmentalist who believes in ecological sustainability (preserving biodiversity), and an internationally recognized leader in the sustainable food movement. As a woman, and as a pioneer, she has taken her stand among the peasant farmers of India, and indigenous people throughout the world as a defender of women’s and of nature’s rights.

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• Vandana Shiva: The Future of Food-Part 3
• Genetic Engineering: Road to Paradise or Paradise Lost?
• Vandana Shiva: The Future of Food-Part 2
• A Important Case of Preserving Food Sovereignty and Avoiding Green Revolution Calamity
• Temporary Stay Against GM Introduction Granted to India’s “king of Vegetables”-the Aubergine
• South Australia alone on GM canola ban
• Supermarket News Forecasts Non-GMO Uprising
• A Conversation with Claire Hope Cummings-Part 2

In this final installment, Joel Berg, executive director of the New York City Coalition Against Hunger (NYCCAH), offers his solutions for ending hunger in America. The good news Berg argues, we can accomplish this feat, but we need the federal government to streamline the many separate food nutrition assistance programs into a single program, and increase its access, and benefits to the poor.

Many people today are particularly outraged that a certain large financial insurance giant, requiring bailout by the government to the tune of hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars, recently paid some of their employees huge scheduled compensation bonuses, some amounting to millions of dollars each.

While not addressing this particular issue directly, in the myth of the self-made man, Berg goes to the true heart of the matter. The bonuses are a symptom of a much deeper societal problem: a philosophy that justifies huge compensation benefits to a few percentage of people at the top, but not a living wage to the many workers near the bottom. In a 2005 article, Wages and their impact on hunger and poverty, Berg suggests that since we pay CEO’s salaries so many times more than the average worker, this directly prevents companies from offering all their employees a living wage. He provides the following graphic example: “the average worker took home $517 in their weekly paycheck in 2003; the average large company CEO took home $155,769 in their weekly pay.”

Paying people living wages for their work, and consolidating and expanding upon the Federal Food Assistance programs, according to Berg, would end hunger in America. Berg suggests that citizens who care enough about this issue, to donate money to food organizations that help the poor, even better, to write your local State and Federal government representatives, and tell them you want a comprehensive program to end hunger in America.

See Related Videos: The Growing Face of Modern Hunger In America; Joel Berg: How To End Hunger In America

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Joel Berg, executive director of the New York City Coalition Against Hunger (NYCCAH), and author of the book All You Can Eat: How Hungry Is America, is a fierce food advocate for the poor in America. While serving 8 years in the United States Department of Agriculture under the Clinton Administration, he helped establish a National Government initiative to enable faith-based and other nonprofit groups fight hunger, and increase food security.

In this Food News series, Berg identifies the extent of the current hunger crisis, and traces the history of how we have systematically dismantled the federal nutrition safety net, while at the same time allowing income disparity in America to expand to historic proportions. Yes, Berg argues that those at the very top of the income ladder are too highly paid for the work that they do, and this does come at the expense of those at the other end of the income spectrum to earn a living wage. As Berg points out, over 30 million people living In America are not able to get enough food to eat on a daily basis, most of these people comprise the working poor, children, and the elderly. Though faith based groups, and nonprofit organizations have stepped up to help those in immediate need, over the span of several decades, the Federal Government has gradually reduced its support, and the gap between those needing immediate food assistance, and the available services, has been stretched beyond the breaking point*.

Excerpt from the book

How Conservatives and Liberals See Welfare and Poverty

Conservatives

Punish and scapegoat the poor

Focus on only the rare success stories of people who climb their way out of poverty with no government help.

Provide poor people with marginally less government funding, but never so little they starve in mass numbers.

Overemphasize personal responsibility

Believe that poor people are too lazy to work

According to Berg, both the Left and the Right have been wrong about Clinton’s welfare reform, and the much broader issue of poverty. Our underlying political assumptions blind us to the realities of people in poverty, and what to do about it.

Liberals

Patronize and glamorize the poor

Focus only on the rare people with so many problems they can’t move to self-sufficiency, no matter how much government help they get.

Provide poor people with marginally more government funding, but never enough so they can stand on their own.

Discount personal responsibility

Believe that poor people are too oppressed to work.

Berg believes the Federal Government must take the lead role again if we are to solve the hunger crisis in America. He has been a long-time critic of the Government in allowing the problem to grow. Recently he has become more optimistic, the present Obama Administration and Congress have shown real signs the Federal Government is now ready to offer more help. In part 2, Berg talks about the new Stimulus Plan, and offers his solutions toward ending hunger in America.

*Watch putting a human face to poverty, Cooking Up a Story: Stories profiles a working mother of three, as she and her husband (who also works) struggle between pay checks to feed their family. The Growing Face of Modern Hunger In America.

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• The Growing Face of Modern Hunger in America
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• A Important Case of Preserving Food Sovereignty and Avoiding Green Revolution Calamity

Cooking Up a Story: Food News

Fred Kirschenmann, a long-time leader in the sustainable agriculture movement, Distinguished Fellow at the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture, and a third-generation farmer (an organic farmer himself), completes his thoughtful reflections upon the future of agriculture from his talk at the Organicology conference in Portland, Oregon.

According to Fred Kirschenmann, the two remaining elephants in the room, Climate Change and Ecological Degradation also threatens the future of agriculture unless we change our farming practices. 92% of the farmland in the State of Iowa produces only two crops, corn and soybeans. This is an extreme example of the incredible efficiencies that result from the production of mono-crops, and yet as we enter a new long-term period of unstable climate, Kirschenmann contends that this lack of crop diversity is not economically, or ecologically viable. Nature favors biodiversity; as conditions change, only the hearty (from a diverse gene pool) thrive.

Ecological Degradation applies particularly to our soils. Over the past 60 years, Kirschenmann explains that we have treated our farm soil not as a living organism, but as a vessel to hold chemical nutrients that we supply (as needed); we have damaged the soil’s native capacity to regenerate itself. In effect, we have killed the living soil.

Concern for the state of our farmland soils, takes on further weight from a recent Iowa State University study: Iowa has lower-quality topsoil than 50 years ago. In this report, the soil fertility in Iowa has declined over a 50 year period of time, mostly attributed to the practice of farm tillaging. Over time, and as a result of the ongoing tilling, mixing, and plowing of soils, the soil has become more dense, more tightly packed together, making it less able to move water and air through it.

The 4 elephants in the room, taken together, may signal the beginning of the end for the modern industrial agriculture system, and the dream of its once most powerful champion, Earl Butz.

See Related: Fred Kirschenmann: The Future of Agriculture- Part 1; Fred Kirschenmann: The Future of Agriculture— An Introduction; Paul Roberts: The End of Food; and Paul Roberts: The End of Food-Part 2

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Fred Kirschenmann, a long-time leader in the sustainable agriculture movement, Distinguished Fellow at the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture, and a third-generation farmer (an organic farmer himself), offers some thoughtful reflections upon the future of agriculture.

Kirschenmann points out that much of what made modern industrial agriculture possible, depended upon relatively mild and stable climate conditions, and cheap oil. Both of these prerequisites no longer exist. Most experts expect that oil will contain to rise over the next 10-20 years, some even predicting $300 a barrel within just a decade. This alone, without the important environmental impacts of conventional agriculture, argues for profound changes to occur. The direction of change, whether we move toward sustainable agriculture practices, is at this time, an open question.

See Related: Fred Kirschenmann: The Future of Agriculture- Part 1; Paul Roberts: The End of Food; and Paul Roberts: The End of Food-Part 2

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Fred Kirschenmann steadfastly warns us, conventional agriculture, and its heavy dependence upon fossil fuels, and irrigated water, simply will not continue to offer a viable means for feeding the world. We have been drawing upon nature’s reserves of stored energy (hydrocarbons) and water resources at unsustainable rates, and those finite resources are diminishing rapidly; technology alone, will not provide substitute solutions. The argument that conventional agriculture (modern industrial farming) is necessary in order to meet the needs of a growing global population, simply ignores the realities of the elephants in the room. Sustainability, with an emphasis upon the concept of resiliency, and a renewed respect for maintaining the fertility (quality) of the soil, is to Kirschenmann now, the foundation of a new food system toward creating a food revolution.

Fred Kirschenmann: The Future of Agriculture-Part 2 Kirschenmann discusses the other 2 elephants in the room, and their potential effects upon our agriculture system.

See Related: Fred Kirschenmann: The Future of Agriculture- Introduction; Paul Roberts: The End of Food; and Paul Roberts: The End of Food-Part 2

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