Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>]

from a long time grower friend nearby

A Food Manifesto for the Future
By MARK BITTMAN  February 1, 2011, 10:28 pm
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/01/a-food-manifesto-for-the-future/?ref=opinion


"Nearly everything labeled “healthy” or “natural” is not."

For decades, Americans believed that we had the world’s healthiest and safest 
diet. We worried little about this diet’s effect on the environment or on the 
lives of the animals (or even the workers) it relies upon. Nor did we worry 
about its ability to endure — that is, its sustainability.

That didn’t mean all was well. And we’ve come to recognize that our diet is 
unhealthful and unsafe. Many food production workers labor in difficult, even 
deplorable, conditions, and animals are produced as if they were widgets. It 
would be hard to devise a more wasteful, damaging, unsustainable system.

Here are some ideas — frequently discussed, but sadly not yet implemented — 
that would make the growing, preparation and consumption of food healthier, 
saner, more productive, less damaging and more enduring. In no particular 
order:

      End government subsidies to processed food. We grow more corn for 
livestock and cars than for humans, and it’s subsidized by more than $3 
billion annually; most of it is processed beyond recognition. The story is 
similar for other crops, including soy: 98 percent of soybean meal becomes 
livestock feed, while most soybean oil is used in processed foods. Meanwhile, 
the marketers of the junk food made from these crops receive tax write-offs 
for the costs of promoting their wares. Total agricultural subsidies in 2009 
were around $16 billion, which would pay for a great many of the ideas that 
follow.

      Begin subsidies to those who produce and sell actual food for direct 
consumption. Small farmers and their employees need to make living wages. 
Markets — from super- to farmers’ — should be supported when they open in 
so-called food deserts and when they focus on real food rather than junk 
food. And, of course, we should immediately increase subsidies for school 
lunches so we can feed our youth more real food.

      Break up the U.S. Department of Agriculture and empower the Food and 
Drug Administration. Currently, the U.S.D.A. counts among its missions both 
expanding markets for agricultural products (like corn and soy!) and 
providing nutrition education. These goals are at odds with each other; you 
can’t sell garbage while telling people not to eat it, and we need an agency 
devoted to encouraging sane eating. Meanwhile, the F.D.A. must be given 
expanded powers to ensure the safety of our food supply. (Food-related deaths 
are far more common than those resulting from terrorism, yet the F.D.A.’s 
budget is about one-fifteenth that of Homeland Security.)

      Outlaw concentrated animal feeding operations and encourage the 
development of sustainable animal husbandry. The concentrated system degrades 
the environment, directly and indirectly, while torturing animals and 
producing tainted meat, poultry, eggs, and, more recently, fish. Sustainable 
methods of producing meat for consumption exist. At the same time, we must 
educate and encourage Americans to eat differently. It’s difficult to find a 
principled nutrition and health expert who doesn’t believe that a largely 
plant-based diet is the way to promote health and attack chronic diseases, 
which are now bigger killers, worldwide, than communicable ones. Furthermore, 
plant-based diets ease environmental stress, including global warming.

      Encourage and subsidize home cooking. (Someday soon, I’ll write about 
my idea for a new Civilian Cooking Corps.) When people cook their own food, 
they make better choices. When families eat together, they’re more stable. We 
should provide food education for children (a new form of home ec, anyone?), 
cooking classes for anyone who wants them and even cooking assistance for 
those unable to cook for themselves.

      Tax the marketing and sale of unhealthful foods. Another budget 
booster. This isn’t nanny-state paternalism but an accepted role of 
government: public health. If you support seat-belt, tobacco and alcohol 
laws, sewer systems and traffic lights, you should support legislation 
curbing the relentless marketing of soda and other foods that are hazardous 
to our health — including the sacred cheeseburger and fries.

      Reduce waste and encourage recycling. The environmental stress incurred 
by unabsorbed fertilizer cannot be overestimated, and has caused, for 
example, a 6,000-square-mile dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico that is probably 
more damaging than the BP oil spill. And some estimates indicate that we 
waste half the food that’s grown. A careful look at ways to reduce waste and 
promote recycling is in order.

      Mandate truth in labeling. Nearly everything labeled “healthy” or 
“natural” is not. It’s probably too much to ask that “vitamin water” be 
called “sugar water with vitamins,” but that’s precisely what real truth in 
labeling would mean.

      Reinvest in research geared toward leading a global movement in 
sustainable agriculture, combining technology and tradition to create a new 
and meaningful Green Revolution.

I’ll expand on these issues (and more) in the future, but the essential 
message is this: food and everything surrounding it is a crucial matter of 
personal and public health, of national and global security. At stake is not 
only the health of humans but that of the earth.

This column appeared in print on February 2, 2011. It will appear in 
Opinionator regularly.