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I think a lot of people are missing the point of the article. It's not saying that pumping food full of high-fructose corn syrup is this great and wonderful thi

by cwyers 11y ago

I think a lot of people are missing the point of the article. It's not saying that pumping food full of high-fructose corn syrup is this great and wonderful thing that has no downsides. It's pointing out how technology has made food more affordable and accessible, and asking to "go back" to how things used to be means condemning lots of people to poverty. If we want to make food healthier, we need to figure out how to make better food affordable, not try to return to a past that never was.

logicchains 11y ago
It's not just about affordability, it's also about education. Plain rice, flour and the like are much cheaper per calorie/nutrient than junk food, and healthier, but many people simply don't know how to cook. I know families in Asia, for instance, who while being almost an order of magnitude poorer than the American poverty line are still a lot healthier, because they know how to prepare their own food from staples.
briantakita 11y ago
Subsidies are what makes industrial food "more affordable". It's interesting that you bring up people "in poverty". People "in poverty" do much better when they can grow their own food using more natural methods such as polycultures. Centralized Industrial agriculture is what created the situation where they were not able to grow their own food by decimating their local markets, buying up all of their land, & destroying their ecosystems. Also, till methods using monoculture annual monocultures is more resource & energy intensive than no-till methods using perennial polycultures.
- EdwardDiego 11y ago
  > Subsidies are what makes industrial food "more affordable". My country has no agricultural subsidies, indeed the competitiveness of our agricultural sector is shaped by it, and if international trade were to cease, we'd be largely self-sufficient in foodstuffs although we'd lose some of the cheaper options for things like tinned tomatoes. Despite our lack of subsidies, we have yet to revert to 19th century living standards.
  - eru 11y ago
    Which country?
    - EdwardDiego 11y ago
      New Zealand. We went through a very painful era in the late 70s when agricultural subsidies were removed, it ended a lot of farms that were unsustainable without them, with some farmers committing suicide and some very painful impacts on rural communities, but our agricultural sector is much the better for it. The fact that we can compete effectively in the EU and USA against subsidised and tariff-protected local farmers despite the tyranny of distance is an indication of it. Unfortunately, our current government is leaning towards indirect subsidisation of aspects of the agricultural sector via funding for irrigation works and omitting action on the environmental externalities of intensive dairying, but we'll never again be in a place where people are being paid just for owning animals or growing a certain crop.
      - saalweachter 11y ago
        Just out of curiosity, what were the agricultural subsidies like in NZ before they were abolished? In the US, the direct subsidies are something like $0.25 / bushel for most grains, with price guarantees of around $2 / bushel. Market rates tend to be $4-15 / bushel, depending on the grain. There are, of course, indirect subsidies through the beef and ethanol industries, but that gets more complex. I'm curious if the NZ subsidies were more distorted than that -- in the US, the subsidies will definitely encourage over-production (which I consider a good thing), but I'm not intrinsically bothered by a $0.25 / bushel subsidy on $4-7 / bushel corn.
        vram22 11y ago
        Interesting, is the term "bushel" still used? I'd have thought it was somewhat archaic by now (having only read it in that context in children's stories, as a kid), but what do I know.
        11y ago
- EliRivers 11y ago
  People "in poverty" do much better when they can grow their own food using more natural methods such as polycultures. But having individuals, or small groups (ie. families) grow their own food is massively expensive compared to modern industrial techniques. The cost per whatever you want to measure it in (if you're that poor, the question is "will I stay alive or will I starve?" so calories is a pretty good measure) of a small group growing their own food is huge. I actually calculated it myself the last time I came back from a country with an enormous proportion of agricultural labourers using broadly manual and outdated techniques, in which famine is a recent event. They were spending an enormous amount on trying to make enough food to stay alive. It takes me literally between five and ten minutes to earn enough to buy food that will keep me alive for a day. If I were to decide to create that food myself, it would not be five or ten minutes of my time each day.
  - vegedor 11y ago
    Is the situation that simple? A lot of produce you consume might actually come from manual labor, at least AFAICT. Granted, not as much that you would ave to starve, but still. > it would not be five or ten minutes of my time each day In optimal conditions, it would be 5 minutes to sow and 5 minutes to pick. The plants grow on their own. Of course, it isn't that easy, but neither is working only 5 hours a month.
EliRivers 11y ago
As an example, the amount of life-sustaining food we can get from a cow using modern techniques is so much more than by using old techniques. Yeah, sure, some of it doesn't look very pretty; cry me a river. For a very, very long time throughout human history dying because there wasn't enough food to eat was something everyone had in the back of their mind (and still do in many places). Much processed food and big bags of frozen vegetables and so on is healthy and cheap; it's got what you need to stay alive in good condition and doesn't have (for example) arsenic in it, which to my mind is pretty much the definition of healthy food. Fat, protein, whatever; once it's broken down to cross the stomach, it all looks the same. It's only a problem if people simply eat too much (or not enough) of something.

by cwyers 11y ago

logicchains 11y ago

It's not just about affordability, it's also about education. Plain rice, flour and the like are much cheaper per calorie/nutrient than junk food, and healthier, but many people simply don't know how to cook. I know families in Asia, for instance, who while being almost an order of magnitude poorer than the American poverty line are still a lot healthier, because they know how to prepare their own food from staples.

briantakita 11y ago

Subsidies are what makes industrial food "more affordable". It's interesting that you bring up people "in poverty". People "in poverty" do much better when they can grow their own food using more natural methods such as polycultures. Centralized Industrial agriculture is what created the situation where they were not able to grow their own food by decimating their local markets, buying up all of their land, & destroying their ecosystems. Also, till methods using monoculture annual monocultures is more resource & energy intensive than no-till methods using perennial polycultures.

EdwardDiego 11y ago
> Subsidies are what makes industrial food "more affordable". My country has no agricultural subsidies, indeed the competitiveness of our agricultural sector is shaped by it, and if international trade were to cease, we'd be largely self-sufficient in foodstuffs although we'd lose some of the cheaper options for things like tinned tomatoes. Despite our lack of subsidies, we have yet to revert to 19th century living standards.
- eru 11y ago
  Which country?
  - EdwardDiego 11y ago
    New Zealand. We went through a very painful era in the late 70s when agricultural subsidies were removed, it ended a lot of farms that were unsustainable without them, with some farmers committing suicide and some very painful impacts on rural communities, but our agricultural sector is much the better for it. The fact that we can compete effectively in the EU and USA against subsidised and tariff-protected local farmers despite the tyranny of distance is an indication of it. Unfortunately, our current government is leaning towards indirect subsidisation of aspects of the agricultural sector via funding for irrigation works and omitting action on the environmental externalities of intensive dairying, but we'll never again be in a place where people are being paid just for owning animals or growing a certain crop.
    - saalweachter 11y ago
      Just out of curiosity, what were the agricultural subsidies like in NZ before they were abolished? In the US, the direct subsidies are something like $0.25 / bushel for most grains, with price guarantees of around $2 / bushel. Market rates tend to be $4-15 / bushel, depending on the grain. There are, of course, indirect subsidies through the beef and ethanol industries, but that gets more complex. I'm curious if the NZ subsidies were more distorted than that -- in the US, the subsidies will definitely encourage over-production (which I consider a good thing), but I'm not intrinsically bothered by a $0.25 / bushel subsidy on $4-7 / bushel corn.
      - vram22 11y ago
        Interesting, is the term "bushel" still used? I'd have thought it was somewhat archaic by now (having only read it in that context in children's stories, as a kid), but what do I know.
        11y ago
EliRivers 11y ago
People "in poverty" do much better when they can grow their own food using more natural methods such as polycultures. But having individuals, or small groups (ie. families) grow their own food is massively expensive compared to modern industrial techniques. The cost per whatever you want to measure it in (if you're that poor, the question is "will I stay alive or will I starve?" so calories is a pretty good measure) of a small group growing their own food is huge. I actually calculated it myself the last time I came back from a country with an enormous proportion of agricultural labourers using broadly manual and outdated techniques, in which famine is a recent event. They were spending an enormous amount on trying to make enough food to stay alive. It takes me literally between five and ten minutes to earn enough to buy food that will keep me alive for a day. If I were to decide to create that food myself, it would not be five or ten minutes of my time each day.
- vegedor 11y ago
  Is the situation that simple? A lot of produce you consume might actually come from manual labor, at least AFAICT. Granted, not as much that you would ave to starve, but still. > it would not be five or ten minutes of my time each day In optimal conditions, it would be 5 minutes to sow and 5 minutes to pick. The plants grow on their own. Of course, it isn't that easy, but neither is working only 5 hours a month.

EliRivers 11y ago

As an example, the amount of life-sustaining food we can get from a cow using modern techniques is so much more than by using old techniques. Yeah, sure, some of it doesn't look very pretty; cry me a river. For a very, very long time throughout human history dying because there wasn't enough food to eat was something everyone had in the back of their mind (and still do in many places). Much processed food and big bags of frozen vegetables and so on is healthy and cheap; it's got what you need to stay alive in good condition and doesn't have (for example) arsenic in it, which to my mind is pretty much the definition of healthy food. Fat, protein, whatever; once it's broken down to cross the stomach, it all looks the same. It's only a problem if people simply eat too much (or not enough) of something.