Grist | Topics | 10 Results

RESULTS		Results 1 – 10 of 10
Headline	Author	Published	Section
ANWR of the heartland? Why plowing up Conservation Reserve Program land won't solve the food crisis	Tom Philpott	11 Apr 2008	Gristmill
Uh oh. The New York Times reports that 'thousands of farmers are taking their fields out of the government's biggest conservation program, which pays them not to cultivate.' Rather then let the ground lie fallow, they're planting it with corn, soy, and wheat -- the price of each of which stands near or above all-time highs. 'Last fall, they took back as many acres as are in Rhode Island and Delaware combined,' The Times reports. And there's serious pressure to bring mo ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, business, cellulosic ethanol, economy, food, industrial ag (all these topics)

Can industrial agriculture feed the world? Part 2 Global food riots edition	Tom Philpott	10 Apr 2008	Gristmill
A couple of months ago, I raised the question, can industrial agriculture feed the world?I was being intentionally provocative. For decades, policymakers have treated low-input, diversified agriculture -- 'organic' in the sense described by the great British agriculture scholar Sir Albert Howard -- as a kind of hippy indulgence. Sure, it's nice to grow food without poison, but you can't feed the world that way. To feed the globe's teeming masses, you need loads of mined ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, business, food, industrial ag (all these topics)

Smithfield's European strategy The hog giant CAFOizes Poland and Romania to gain access to Western Europe	Tom Philpott	09 Apr 2008	Gristmill
Farmers in Iowa and North Carolina -- the two states that together house nearly half of U.S. hog production [PDF] -- won't be surprised by this report, from the International Herald Tribune: The American bacon producer, Smithfield Farms, now operates a dozen vast industrial pig farms in Poland. Importing cheap soy feed from South America, which the company feeds intensively to its tens of thousands of pigs, it has caused the price of pork to drop dramatically ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, business, European Union, food, industrial ag, Poland, Romania (all these topics)

Who owns your tomato? Another big horticultural seed company bought by Monsanto	Matthew Dillon	04 Apr 2008	Gristmill
When Monsanto buys into a market, they buy in big. In 2005, Monsanto's seed/genetic trait holdings were primarily in corn, cotton, soybeans, and canola. That year, they purchased Seminis, the world's largest vegetable seed company (see And We Have the Seed) specializing in seed for vegetable field crops. Now their takeover of the vegetable seed sector continues, as they have announced the intent to purchase the Dutch breeding and seed company, De Ruiter Seeds.This pur ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, business, Department of Justice, food, industrial ag, regulation (all these topics)

Superweeds on the march In Arkansas, state ag officials turn to Syngenta to solve problems caused by Monsanto	Tom Philpott	14 Mar 2008	Gristmill
In the late 1990s, farmers in the Southeast began planting Roundup Ready cotton -- genetically engineered by Monsanto to withstand heavy doses of Roundup, the seed giant's own blockbuster herbicide. As a result, use of Roundup exploded -- and the farmers enjoyed 'clean' (i.e., weedless) fields of monocropped cotton. But after a point, something funny happened -- certain weeds began to survive the Roundup dousings. These 'superweeds' had somehow gained Roundup resist ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, business, food, industrial ag, toxics (all these topics)

Meat Wagon: Beef behemoth If deals go through, three firms will own 90 percent of the U.S. beef market	Tom Philpott	05 Mar 2008	Gristmill
In Meat Wagon, we round up the latest outrages from the meat and livestock industries. You'd be hard-pressed to find an industry more consolidated than beef-packing. Just four companies slaughter 83.5 percent of cows consumed in the United States. In standard antitrust theory, a market stops being competive when the four biggest players control 40 percent. The beef industry's extraordinary concentration gives the Big Four massive leverage to dictate how beef is ra ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, business, food, industrial ag (all these topics)

Biofuels: good for agrochemical/GMO biz GMO giant Monsanto wows Wall Street, consolidates its grip on South America	Tom Philpott	13 Feb 2008	Gristmill
While debate rages on Gristmill and elsewhere about whether biofuels are worth a damn ecologically, investors in agribusiness firms are quietly counting their cash.As corn and soy prices approach all-time highs, driven up by government biofuel mandates, farmers are scrambling to plant as much as they can -- and lashing the earth with chemicals to maximize yields. At a Wall Street meeting on Tuesday, genetically modified seed/herbicide giant Monsanto promised investors ...
Topics: agriculture, Argentina, Big Ag, biofuels, Brazil, business, energy, food, GMOs, industrial ag (all these topics)

Feedlot meat production: nothing if not profitable Tyson Foods chief nets $10 million -- oops, no, $24 million	Tom Philpott	27 Dec 2007	Gristmill
Update [2007-12-28 10:14:4 by Tom Philpott]:According to AP, Tyson CEO Richard Bond made total compensation of $24 million in 2007, not $9.88 million, as reported by Bloomberg. Here's how industrial meat production works: you stuff animals into pens, feed them genetically modified, nutritionally suspect corn and soy (along with growth hormones), and force them to wallow in their own waste while keeping them alive with regular lashings of antibiotics.Then you haul the ...
Topics: industrial ag, business, Big Ag, agriculture, food (all these topics)

Unrigging the game How to stop the agribiz giants from impeding the growth of local food.	Tom Philpott	26 Apr 2007	Gristmill
In today's Victual Reality I discussed how a few companies dominate U.S. food production, and how their market girth weighs heavily on efforts to rebuild local-oriented, environmentally and socially responsible food networks. Now I'd like to add a few words on what might be done to remedy the situation. First of all, it's important to note that heavily consolidated food markets rig the game to favor large-scale, industrial-style farming. As companies like Cargill a ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, business, food, industrial ag, local food, sustainable ag (all these topics)

Archer Daniels Midland: The Exxon of corn? ADM is doing for soil what Exxon has done to air.	Tom Philpott	02 Feb 2006	Gristmill
Amid all the hoopla over President Bush's State of the Union address, Archer Daniels Midland's quarterly report (PDF), released Tuesday, got little attention outside of Wall Street -- where it drew cheers, sending ADM's share price to an all-time high. At the company's conference call with analysts, the Wall Street Journal reports, John M. McMillin of Prudential Securities 'likened [Archer Daniels Midland] to Exxon Mobil Corp., which just announced its own record-brea ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, business, food, industrial ag (all these topics)

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