by Jim Goodman
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Screws them is more like it, consumers too!
Corporate agribusiness divides farmers 0
Posted 2 weeks ago Most farmers Jim Goodman knows see organic farming as just another way to farm, curious, perhaps a bit backward, but to most conventional farmers organic farming doesn't even register. With agribusiness however, it's another story. They're not content with just 96.5 percent of the food system, they want it all. Read More -
The pen is mightier than agri-business
Why are (some) farmers afraid of Michael Pollan? 26
Posted 1 month, 3 weeks ago Author Michael Pollan is no stranger to controversy. He has broadened the discussion of what we eat, where and how it is grown, big vs. small, organic farming vs. conventional. When he speaks some in the audience will love him, some will not. Read More -
We're going to hold your feet to the fire, are they getting hot yet?
Obama needs to take a stand on trade 0
Posted 3 months, 2 weeks ago Candidate Obama said, in an Obama Administration, meetings would be conducted with transparency and the active involvement of citizens, labor, the private sector and non-governmental organizations. So why hasn't he scrapped the Security and Prosperity Partnership? Read More -
Drinking the Kool-Aid of Corporate America
Why are milk prices plummeting? 10
Posted 5 months, 2 weeks ago Dairy farmers are in deep trouble. Milk prices have fallen by half since last year, dropping to a 30-year low. Consumption has fallen in light of the slowing world economy and now there is a huge milk surplus, or so the “experts” tell us. But milk prices, like the rest of the world economy, crashed because of a globalized, unregulated free market system, not because of surplus product. Read More -
Think Before You Eat, Agriculture and the Environment 0
Posted 6 months, 3 weeks agoFarmers claim to be stewards of the environment, some would say it's best friend; others, its worst enemy. The truth is we can be both.
Humans have never left a small footprint, we have always tried to shape the environment to suit our needs. Initially farming had one purpose, food; farming provided a more stable diet than the hunter-gatherer existence.
As we became more "civilized" our effect on the land… Read More
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Cutting the fat
USDA sees a food problem, but not the solution 1
Posted 9 months ago Albert Einstein once said, "The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them."The same can be said of U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack's newfound commitment to "get Americans to eat more healthful foods while also boosting crop production to feed a growing world population." As he notes, "These two goals have often been at odds." Read More
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Centrist cabinet, progressive president?
What happened to the big win for progressives, the environment, and organic food? 5
Posted 10 months, 2 weeks ago Who found it more difficult to get excited about an Obama presidency, the Democratic Leadership Council or the progressive wing of the Democratic party? The DLC folks are riding high, calling themselves "The New Team." The progressives came away empty-handed.Progressives assumed change would extend to President-elect Barack Obama's Cabinet, but we never expected the change to be a reflection of the Clinton administration or, worse yet, the Bush administration. We thought change would mean, well, something different. New people, ideas, economic reforms, energy policies, a withdrawal from Iraq, and a new face to the world.
The political junkies… Read More
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For a 'change we can believe in,' dump industrial agriculture
Studies show mono-cultures, GMOs, and globalization are problems, not solutions 3
Posted 10 months, 3 weeks ago With the arrival of 2009, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) notes nearly a billion people a day go hungry worldwide. While India supplies Switzerland with 80 percent of its wheat, 350 million Indians are food-insecure. Rice prices have nearly tripled since early 2007 because, according to the International Rice Research Institute, rice-growing land is being lost to industrialization, urbanization, and shifts to grain crops for animal feed. Read More -
Food is different
Food should be controlled by farmers, not corporations 0
Posted 11 months, 2 weeks ago Food is an important part of most Holiday celebrations, not just because we need food to live, but food connects us to our culture, our past, and whether we know it or not, our future. Food Is Different: Why the WTO Should Get Out of Agriculture is a great book by Peter Rosset -- one that everyone who cares about food should read. The book is dedicated to Lee Kyung Hae, the Korean farmer who took his life in protest against the World Trade Organization on September 16, 2003, at the WTO protest march in Cancun Mexico.I was there.… Read More
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Safety dance
Will a new administration give us the ‘safest food supply in the world’? 2
Posted 1 year ago How many times have we been told we have the safest food supply in the world? Do we really?I suppose it depends on the comparison. Somalia? Kenya ? Eritrea? In developing countries, close to two million children die every year from contaminated food and water. These countries don't have much of a food supply, safe or otherwise, so compared to them, we do quite well.
How do we fare compared to other industrialized countries? The Centers for Disease Control and Preventions estimates that there are 76 million cases of foodborne illness yearly in the U.S. -- roughly 1 out… Read More
