The Future of Food

Will the planet be able to feed future generations? This question is by no means a new one, but the context in which it is being asked is. In the past, many worried that the ever-increasing rate of population growth would leave us with simply too many people to feed. However, the combination of huge increases in crop yields and evidence that the rate of population growth is slowing has redirected attention away from the issue. The original question, however, is still hotly debated.

In recent years, many have argued that our food system is not sustainable, meaning it is damaging the environment to such an extent that it will be unable to support the demands of the future. One of the reasons this has become an issue is because of the global transition towards a diet containing more meat, alcohol luxury foods. These types of food take a great toll on the environment because they require more agricultural inputs than they supply to the consumer. For example, Michael Pollan explains that it takes about 10 lbs of grain to produce 1 lb of beef. Another problem is that the intensive cultivation of non-rotated crops with large additions of fertilizer severely depletes the soil. Warren Belasco in “The Future of Food” argues that the shifts and innovations that have made possible the unprecedented quantity and variety of our current food system also have unintended consequences that will trouble future generations sooner than we think.

Belasco identifies two types of possible solutions to this crisis. The first is the technological fix. In this solution profit-seeking free enterprise will continue to innovate and will eventually solve sustainability issues with technology. In my opinion, however, we have already done too much damage for this solution to work alone. The second solution is the anthropological fix. In this solution future generations will have to change their attitudes about food. People will adopt more environmentally friendly diets, such as vegetarianism, and forget their desire for unsustainable foods such as cheap beef. Belasco recognizes that the future may need to require a combination of the two options.

I may be a pessimist, but I do not think our planet will adopt solutions until it is too late. I think that only when the negative effects of our food system are already hurting people’s ability to feed themselves will anything be done to fight the problem. And by this time, there will be many years of crisis before any solutions begin to work.

Will the planet step up and work make our food system sustainable before its too late?

Are the current fears just like the fears of population growth from the past? Meaning that the global economy will just naturally find a solution?

The Scarcity Falacy

More people in the world are hungry today than were hungry ten years ago. In 2009, nearly 15% of the world’s population was hungry. At the same time we are producing more food than ever. In “The Scarcity Fallacy”, Scanian, Jenkins, and Peterson argue that poverty, inequality, conflict, and corruption, but not scarcity, are the causes of world hunger. With over 2800 calories available per persons per day, higher than at any other point in human history, its clear that there is enough food out there to feed everyone, it just is not being evenly distributed. This uneven distribution of food is partially because most of the surpluses of the developed world will never make it to the developing world where 95% of the hungry live. For example, international food aid, a US program to remove excess grain from domestic markets, is sent to countries of geopolitical value to the US that do not really need the food. Another problem that prevents food from getting to those in need is the increasing corruption in emergency food delivery programs.

The first thing that needs to be done, according to the article, is a worldwide recognition of food as a human right. Second, inefficiency and corruption must be removed from existing programs to ensure that food aid gets to those in need. Third, direct cash aid should be used more often as a substitute to dumping cheap food into the market. This prevents local farmers from making money and can actually decrease the availability of food. Third, sustainable agriculture should be promoted through education and assistance. Fourth, gender inequalities should be combated. The article argues that, “providing women with control over childbearing, giving them access to education, allowing them the right to own land and businesses, and facilitating the economic activities with micro-credit and other innovations will significantly reduce hunger.”

I was shocked to hear that world hunger was getting worse. This highlights my main point. Hunger needs to be made a bigger issue. Increasing awareness of the problem will not only increase the amount of aid, but will also help improve the aid. It is clear that the system is inefficient, and more people studying it and suggesting solutions will make a difference.

Discussion Questions:

How can we increase awareness of hunger and make it an issue that gets more attention?

Whose responsibility is it to fight world hunger?

"Who Eats Emergency Food?"

Everyday millions of people of differing backgrounds venture to their neighborhood kitchen or food pantry because they have found themselves in a variety of circumstances. Janet Poppendieck, in the “Who Eats Emergency Food?” chapter of Sweet Charity, identifies the types of people most likely to eat emergency food and describes some of the most common reasons people are forced to use emergency food. She shows that the statistics makeup of those living under the poverty line (that is in terms of gender, race, age, ext.) nearly matches the makeup of those who visit pantries and kitchens. This makes sense because the original poverty line was calculated based on food. Any household “that could not afford to purchase a nutritionally adequate diet by allocating a third of is income to food purchase” was considered poor (51). Recent studies, however, find that many pantry clients actually have income around 150% higher than the poverty line. While Poppendieck acknowledges that people above and below the poverty line use emergency food for many reasons, she argues that there are four leading causes.

Out of these three, employment related issues are the most common. The chronically unemployed and those who have recently lost their jobs head to pantries because their lack of income leaves them unable to afford food. She also identifies the rise of part-time employment as a cause because these workers are only able to find one job with too few hours to have enough money for food. The second major reason Poppendieck describes is high shelter costs. The rise in housing and energy costs, especially in urban areas, means that people are paying a larger percentage of their income on shelter and less on food. Also, many choose to use pantries during temporary hard times because they do not want to move to lower cost housing. In addition, many chose to heat their homes rather than pay for food because they know that they can get food for free. Inadequate public assistance is the third reason. Because the government does not provide the chronically ill, injured, and elderly with enough money, medical and other necessary expense take precedent over food, which they can get for free. Programs like GA, SSI and TANF simply do not accurately assess the needs of the poor. Because food stamps do not keep people from using emergency food, Poppendieck contends that they are the fourth major cause. Because one can turn a food stamp into cash by buying then returning food, people use their food stamps to pay for other expenses. In this way government aid that is designed to minimize the need for emergency food actually contributes to it. So should the government take action to prevent this stamp to cash exchange?

In my opinion, Poppendieck fails to recognize the two-sided nature of her high shelter costs example. The availability of emergency food would actually contribute to the increase in the cost of housing. Emergency food allows people to allocate more of their income towards housing, which increases the demand for housing. If emergency food were not available, people would be unable to keep their homes, the demand for housing would decrease, and housing prices would drop. I bring up this issue merely as discussion, not to recommend it as a solution.

Discussion questions:

Does Poppendieck oversimplify a not so simple situation?

Does her analysis suggest anything that can be done to help minimize the need for emergency food?

"Who Eats Emergency Food?"

Everyday millions of people of differing backgrounds venture to their neighborhood kitchen or food pantry because they have found themselves in a variety of circumstances. Janet Poppendieck, in the “Who Eats Emergency Food?” chapter of Sweet Charity, identifies the types of people most likely to eat emergency food and describes some of the most common reasons people are forced to use emergency food. She shows that the statistics makeup of those living under the poverty line (that is in terms of gender, race, age, ext.) nearly matches the makeup of those who visit pantries and kitchens. This makes sense because the original poverty line was calculated based on food. Any household “that could not afford to purchase a nutritionally adequate diet by allocating a third of is income to food purchase” was considered poor (51). Recent studies, however, find that many pantry clients actually have income around 150% higher than the poverty line. While Poppendieck acknowledges that people above and below the poverty line use emergency food for many reasons, she argues that there are four leading causes.

Out of these three, employment related issues are the most common. The chronically unemployed and those who have recently lost their jobs head to pantries because their lack of income leaves them unable to afford food. She also identifies the rise of part-time employment as a cause because these workers are only able to find one job with too few hours to have enough money for food. The second major reason Poppendieck describes is high shelter costs. The rise in housing and energy costs, especially in urban areas, means that people are paying a larger percentage of their income on shelter and less on food. Also, many choose to use pantries during temporary hard times because they do not want to move to lower cost housing. In addition, many chose to heat their homes rather than pay for food because they know that they can get food for free. Inadequate public assistance is the third reason. Because the government does not provide the chronically ill, injured, and elderly with enough money, medical and other necessary expense take precedent over food, which they can get for free. Programs like GA, SSI and TANF simply do not accurately assess the needs of the poor. Because food stamps do not keep people from using emergency food, Poppendieck contends that they are the fourth major cause. Because one can turn a food stamp into cash by buying then returning food, people use their food stamps to pay for other expenses. In this way government aid that is designed to minimize the need for emergency food actually contributes to it. So should the government take action to prevent this stamp to cash exchange?

In my opinion, Poppendieck fails to recognize the two-sided nature of her high shelter costs example. The availability of emergency food would actually contribute to the increase in the cost of housing. Emergency food allows people to allocate more of their income towards housing, which increases the demand for housing. If emergency food were not available, people would be unable to keep their homes, the demand for housing would decrease, and housing prices would drop. I bring up this issue merely as discussion, not to recommend it as a solution.

Discussion questions:

Does Poppendieck oversimplify a not so simple situation?

Does her analysis suggest anything that can be done to help minimize the need for emergency food?

Ritzer's Rationalization

In “The McDonaldization of Society”, George Ritzer examines how rationalization is affecting our society. He defines a rational society as “one which emphasizes efficiency, predictability, calculability, substitution of nonhuman for human technology” (372). Rationality is changing every corner of our society from theme parks to surgery to the way we eat. For example, the way we eat and obtain food has changed drastically as a result of rationality. In an effort to increase efficiency, people have gone from home cooked meals to fast food, takeout and TV dinners. This saves them valuable time and money, but at the expense of their health. This is because fast-food restaurants, like McDonald’s (hence McDonaldinization), use the cheapest possible ingredients prepared in the least amount of time resulting in food of the lowest quality. Because of the rationalization of our food industry, many have lost sight of the most basic goal of eating: to obtain nourishment. The focus is instead placed on obtaining the highest quantity of food for the least money.

Rationalization also brings predictability at the expense of variety and creativity. Fast food restaurants and food producers work very hard to maintain consistency in all of their products. Individuals learn to like one specific food, packaged and prepared with such predictability that they will reject other possibilities. Ritzer even claims that theme parks and campgrounds that used to be “highly unpredictable affairs” have become predictable (374).

One way to ensure predictability and increase efficiency is to replace human labor with nonhuman technology. Skilled workers that practiced their individual techniques and knowledge on every meal once prepared food. McDonald’s now employs workers who use procedures where every move they make is planned out and every piece of food receives the exact same treatment. By standardizing every step and minimizing customer interaction with workers, McDonald’s maintains control over its employees and customers.

While rationality may be a good business model, it often has very negative effects on customers as well as the laborers within the system. Rationalization takes away the individuality that makes us human. It also pushes important issues, such as nutrition, to the side in favor of more marketable, but less important, issues, such as size. Because of this, “rational systems are not reasonable systems” (378). Can we really blame this rationalization or is rationalization really the result of some other force that actually causes the problems? Furthermore, can Ritzer really claim that rationalization has an overall negative effect? In his examples he tends to ignore possible benefits, such as feeding people on low budgets. I do agree with Ritzer, however, when he claims that rationalization makes our society uninteresting.

Is rationalization the result of people’s preferences or the economic advantages that make it successful?

How Corn Makes Us Fat

In “The Consumer”, Michael Pollan explains how corn has contributed to the obesity epidemic in the United States. He recognizes that the corn industry is a not direct cause of the increase in the rate of obesity. Instead he argues that the price of corn products as well as their poor nutritional values is a major “cause behind the causes” that have left us more obese (102). Corn is so abundant in our foods for many reasons: corn yields per acre are the highest of any crop; the government subsidizes corn; corn can be turned into many useful products, and corn products are cheaper than the alternatives. Because of these reasons corn is the main ingredient in a wide variety of foods including chips, soda, supplements, candy, chicken, and beef. If we look at the process step by step the problem becomes clear. The government subsidizes corn, an already high yielding crop, so it is produced in massive quantities. It is then turned into its unhealthy subunits. We then turn these subunits into unhealthy foods such as chips, candy, soda, beef, chicken, and pork. As a result of cheap corn prices these products are the cheapest calories on the market. People then buy these products because they are cheap and taste good (because they are sweet and high in fat). And because people buy these products so often they become obese and suffer from diseases such as diabetes. As a result, government subsides of the corn industry actually “guarantee that the cheapest calories in the supermarket will continue to be the unhealthiest” (108). At the same time the surgeon general is leading efforts to fight the obesity epidemic.

Does this mean we should stop subsidizing corn? Or is a continued effort to discourage people from eating unhealthy food the best solution? In my opinion, the best way to fight this problem is from the source. The government should shift corn subsidies to healthy nutrient rich foods such as carrots or rutabagas. They should continue this shift until the cheapest food choices are healthier than the current ones containing corn. Because it is so well established, corn based foods will still be prevalent. We still need to answer the question, how can we discourage people from eating unhealthy foods without simply making it more expensive relative to healthy foods?

Is There An American Cuisine?

Cuisine is an aspect of culture, but does every culture have a cuisine? Sidney Mintz, in “Eating America”, explores whether or not the United States has its own cuisine. When I think of nations with distinctive cuisines I usually think of Italy, China, India, Thailand and France, because these are the nations that restaurants in my area use to identify with. A cuisine, however, is more than just styles of cooking practiced by restaurants. In my opinion, a cuisine is a group of foods and style of cooking them. Mintz, however, argues that, “a cuisine cannot exist unless there is a community of people who eat it, cook it, have opinions on it and engage in discussions involving those opinions” (29). Using this definition, can we say that the United States has its own distinct cuisine? It’s clear that the US has regional cuisines, such as Cajun cooking, but Mintz maintains that there is no true American cuisine. Some think of hamburgers, hotdogs, barbecue, fried chicken, and French fries as the American cuisine, but this group is too narrow and does not have the same type of root in our culture as the cuisines of other nations.

Sidney Mintz goes into great detail to attempt to explain why the US does not have a cuisine. She traces the absence back to the way in which the US was created and populated. When people migrated to America, they brought with them their cultures. This created what is often described as the melting pot of cultures. It would then follow that the cuisines of these immigrants would all melt together to form a new cuisine. Because these cultures were coming together in an industrial era with a growingly commercialized food system, these cuisines did not melt together. Instead they formed a tossed salad of cuisines, where each maintains its own identity. Nations develop cuisines when they have access to a limited number of ingredients and cooking techniques for a very long period of time. This promotes a homogenized style of cooking that with time becomes a cuisine. The US, however, has access to an unprecedented number of ingredients and techniques. On top of that, the commercialization of the food industry, that is the switch from home cooked to prepared food bought from sellers (everything from hotdog stands, to restaurants, to TV dinners), has also prevented the developed of an American cuisine. In my opinion, it is not possible for a country as large as the US, founded as recently as the US, which was populated by people who totally rejected the culture of the natives and came from a huge variety of backgrounds, to develop a cuisine.

Cloning Livestock

In “The Other Other White Meat”, Ben Paynter explores the use of cloning in the livestock industry. Despite having a clichéd title that barely makes sense, the article gives an insightful look into the many sides of the cloning issue. Cow and pig breeders have turned to cloning in an effort to make their animals the best they can be. Cloning allows the breeders take an animal with particularly desirable traits and produce an offspring that carries all of these traits. Traditional breeding and artificial insemination do not guarantee that the offspring will take on the traits that made their parents so valuable. This is why breeders are willing to pay more than ten times as much to have their animals cloned.

Although there has been to evidence to show that cloned meat or milk is any different, many still argue that products from cloned animals should not be allowed in stores. Currently the FDA has banned cloned meat from supermarket shelves. This is largely because no long term generational studies on cloned meat have been finished. Several of the breeders Paynter visited, however, all felt safe enough with the cloned meat that they would eat it themselves. Should the FDA reconsider its policies? I think that we will eventually find out that cloned meat is just as safe as regular meat, but until then the FDA should adopt some policy to deal with this issue. Stickers that tell the consumer they are eating cloned meat would be a good idea because this would support the cloning industry and warn those who are wary of cloning. An important aspect to consider, however, would be the impact that cloning would have on the livestock industry. Would it push it towards an even more harmful industrial state? Or would it push it towards a more high tech industry with smaller more environmentally friendly farms?

The Livestock Industry: A breeding ground for viruses

The swine flu is yet another problem we can attribute to our modern meat industry. Mike Davis, in “The swine flue crisis lays bare the meat industry’s monstrous power”, explains that the H1N1 swine flu evolved in industrial pigsties of the American pork industry. While this article was written before the H1N1 swine flu had made the move from pigs to humans, Davis correctly anticipates the flu’s pandemic status. On the modern pig farm pigs, whose immune systems have been weakened as the result of selective breeding, live in extremely high population density pens in pools of their own filth. Pigs were not always raised in this high-density manner. “In 1965, for instance, there were 53m US hogs on more than 1m farms; today, 65m hogs are concentrated in 65,000 facilities” (Davis n.pag.). These farms, which can have tens of thousands of pigs under one roof, make for an ideal breeding ground for pathogens, such as the swine flu.

By intensively farming livestock in this way, we have basically created factories for pathogenic viruses. While H1N1 turned out to be only mildly dangerous, no one knows how deadly the next virus will be. And with the rate of mutation that is possible in these virus factories, there will surely be many more viruses making the transition from livestock to humans in the coming years.

The worst part about this situation is how little is being done to combat this problem. As of April 2009, Davis explains that although researchers were aware of that H1N1 could make the move to humans, our government ignored suggestions to create even an official system to monitor the virus. And the pork industry is not helping either. In fact, a Pew Research Center Commission, while investigating virus mutation in livestock, “reported systemic obstruction of their investigation by corporations, including blatant threats to withhold funding from cooperative researchers” (Davis n.pag.). This practice is completely unacceptable. When a livestock farming company uses practices that could create viruses possible of killing thousands, they should not be allowed to interfere with investigations. And if they are there should be a public uproar against them.

A few questions I think this reading raises:

-Do the economic costs of the health care required to combat viruses created on industrial livestock farms as well as the loss in productivity that results from people getting sick actually outweigh the economic savings that result from the improved efficiency of this type of farming?

-Who should be responsible for monitoring the pathogens being created on livestock farms? The Government? The WHO? The companies that are actually breeding the viruses?

The Problem With Industrial Produce

In “The Illusions of control: industrialized agriculture, nature, and food safety”, Diana Stuart explores some of the health concerns that have arisen in our modern produce industry. Stuart looks specifically at the 2006 outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 in bagged spinach. Most believe that the spinach was contaminated while still in the fields by wild pigs that transported the E. coli from a neighboring beef farm, where the high concentration of cattle produced the disease. As a result, in an effort to keep their farms safe and prevent future contamination, some farmers began clearing out surrounding forests where wild animals might live and shooting any wild animals that came on their farm. This also led farmers and packagers to increase the amount of chemical sprays and washes that the spinach received to prevent disease. Both of these practices cause obvious environmental problems with the destruction of animals and their habits and the pollution of runoff that occurs because of chemicals. The clearing of surrounding habits is particularly concerning because many of the plants that are being cleared are there because the help to filter the fertilizer and pesticide filled runoff that comes from the farm. Stuart also explains that this has this outbreak has contributed to the development of new technologies, such as optical bacteria testing devices, that only give the illusion of safety. Stuart argues that all of these “solutions” are just temporary and ineffective solutions to a larger problem.

The real problem is that the extreme large-scale of the produce growing and packaging industry not only causes contamination problems but also proliferates them. Large-scale industrial production allows us to provide produce at low prices. But are we actually paying more because of the medical costs of the health problems the produce causes? This would be a very interesting question to study.

Should we abandon the idea of large-scale agriculture just because of the health problems? In my opinion, no, because the frequency and severity of food borne illness outbreaks does not seem to be high enough to warrant such a reaction. This does, however, provide us with yet another reason to buy local agricultural products, which tend to be safer smaller-scale operations, whenever possible.

The Ethics of Meat

I have already explored some of the environmental, health, and economic problems with meat production, but I have yet to discuss the ethical problems. What is it that makes the treatment of an animal unethical? Is it possible to raise animals or eat ethically? These are just a few questions that immediately come to mind. In “The Ethics of Eating Animals”, a chapter from The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Michael Pollan explores the question; is it ethical to eat animals? Writing this chapter Pollan comes in with a certain bias because he, at least at the point of writing the book, is a vegetarian so would be inclined to answer the question with a no. Pollan, however, does an excellent job of expressing both sides of the issue and does not let his own bias bleed strongly into the writing.

The majority of the animals we eat have complex enough nervous systems that most scientists agree that they can feel pain. Whether or not we should be allowed to cause animals pain and suffering is up to debate but at the center of the issue of ethics. Why should humans have the right to end the lives of other animals just because we dominate them? The argument that I found most interesting, however, was Pollan’s evolutionary look at the issue. If man stopped eating meat than the many species that thrived in our meat producing industry may cease to exist. Domesticated animals rely on us to survive, thus their number one interest is that we still have a reason to take care of them. However, if there were no more pigs then there would be no more suffering pigs.

Another interesting way of thinking of the issue is to look at how many animals are killing in the growing and harvesting of crops. The countless animals that are killed in the plowing and tilling of fields and the animals that are killed through the use of pesticides, both directly and indirectly have to be taken into account. Some suggest that if your intent is to kill the fewest animals, the best diet may be the biggest animal possible, such as grass feed beef cattle.

Localism: The 150 mile challenge

Nowadays the food we eat comes from all over the world. While the worldly selection of your average supermarket means we have huge variety of chow choices, it also carries a great cost. We not only pay more for the food because of shipping costs, but the environmental effects of the fossil fuel burned in the shipping process also add to the costs. In “Miles to Go Before I Eat”, Mark Anderson explores an extreme solution to this problem; only eat food that is grown, produced, and sold within a 150 mile radius of your home.

This practice, known popularly as Localism, has obvious drawbacks and advantages. One of the main drawbacks is the huge change in diet that this practice entails. Chances are that you will have cut processed foods, wheat (that means everything made with flour), spices, salt, sugar, rice, coffee, tea, and most fruits out of your diet, just to name a few. You will also be on a constant quest around the countryside to find new local foods, which may actually use more fossil fuels than your new diet is saving. But that’s just my theory. The advantages of localism, however, are also clear. First of all, it prevents the problems discussed in the previous paragraph. Second, you will be helping out local farmers and your local economy. And third, your diet will probably be a lot healthier.

But is localism, even if the radius was expanded to say 300 miles, really a practical solution? I think that a better idea would just be to switch to a partially local diet. Anderson points out that even eating only one local meal a week could save a huge amount of oil. If more people started regularly shopping at their local farmers market it would be a much better solution than the one explored by Anderson. Because honestly the cost of shipping salt and spices is really not that significant. So what can be done to up the popularity of farmers markets and local foods?

The Virtues of Grass Farming

Today, the majority of our agricultural industry has been split into crop growing and animal raising. This means that the livestock owners are buying the agricultural products of another farm in order to feed their animals. This is very different from the traditional method of animal raising where farmers would feed their livestock from product they grew themselves. There still, however, exist some farms that practice this type of farming.

In the “All Flesh is Grass” chapter of The Omnivore’s Dilemna, Michael Pollan visits one of these farms in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. The Polyface Farm is owned and operated by Joel Salatin, a farmer who is committed to the old agrarian-pastorial ideal of grass farming. On 100 acres pasture in another 450 acres of forest, Salatin raises chicken, beef, turkeys, eggs, rabbits, pigs, tomatoes, sweet corn, and berries (Pollan 125). With relatively little machinery, Salatin uses his grasses to raise a large amount of animals in an altogether sustainable process. Every year his perennial grasses provide feed and hay for his animals, without having to be replanted, and his animals provide the constant nibbling and fertilization that is necessary to keep the grass healthy.

This simple yet elegant system served as the foundation for agriculture since man started farming. So what in the last century or two has caused humans to abandon this system? Is it because the old style agrarian system is just too expensive, uses to much space, or would be unable to meet the demands of our population? I would argue that that the higher costs of grass raising animals is what has driven us away from the system. But does it really have higher costs? In my opinion, the health and environmental problems that the current industrial meat industry causes end up far outweighing the additional production costs of the old-style agrarian system. The only problem is we do not have to pay for the costs till later, and our society has a hard time understanding anything but immediate costs.

A look at Industrial Meat

For my first entry I will be discussing “The Feed Lot” chapter from Michael Pollan’s Omnivore’s Dilemma and the industrial meat industry as a whole. In this chapter, Pollan follows the life 534, a beef steer that he has purchased, from its life as a young calf to its last months of life spent in the feedlot. Despite artificial insemination of 534’s mother, Pollan’s steer spent the first six months of its life grazing on prairie grasses with its mother just as cows have been traditionally raised throughout history. In the next eight months of 534’s life, which also turn out to be his last, he is shipped off to the feedlot and becomes a part of our modern meat industry. His feed is changed to corn, which will make 534 sick because cows are not evolved to eat corn. To keep the cows healthy, they are fed a cocktail of hormones and antibiotics. These drugs also protect the cow from the dangers of the feedlot environment. Not only do the cows spend all their days wallowing in their own filth, they are also kept in densely populated pens, which promotes disease. Pollan suggests that a large reason beef causes so many health problems is as a result of the combination of feeding cows corn, drugs, hormones, and the horrible conditions of the feedlot. The feedlot itself also causes major environmental problems because of the huge amounts of toxic waste that comes from the cows.

This raises the important question of what has driven the meat industry to this state? Pollan explains that corn is a major cause of this problem. Because of the tremendous overproduction of the government subsidized American corn industry, it is the cheapest feed available. The goal of our meat industry is to produce the most meat at the lowest price. Therefore, from an efficiency standpoint, corn is the logical solution. It is illogical, however, because feeding cows corn causes environmental problems and national health issues that all did not exist in the days when cows grazed on grass and meet was expensive. The meat industry has become a situation where all the actors have goals that result in a solution that is bad for everyone. The corn producers want to sell their corn, the meat industry wants to produce meat at the lowest price, and the consumer wants to buy food at the lowest price. In a discussion we had in class today, a classmate said that corn allows us to meet the meat demands of our population. I then suggested that maybe it is better if we do not meet our meat demands. To which several classmates replied that they would rather have meat. This exemplifies the overall situation because my classmates are unable to feel the negative effects of their decision, thus they make the logical decision to continue to demand meat. In my opinion, when these types of problems arise it is the job of the government to step in and create policies to advance a solution. Right now, however, we do not have a solution and we are paying the price. The question that we need to answer is what is the best course of action to solve this problem?