Our Food is Killing Us
Hi hi,
This month, I dive into our food system. Honestly, unpacking all of our global food system would take hundreds of videos and the rest of my life, but today I honed in on just a few key points that I felt must be made. One of the biggest is that the fertilizer industry which supplies farmers millions of tons of nutrients each year, is essentially a front for fossil fuel companies to make even more profits and launder their dirty fuels. I talk a lot more about it in the video below. If you’re interested, I’ve also included three quotes and three links I found useful during my research.
Three Quotes:
“I don’t think any of us wants to get bigger… It’s just the curse of a commodity business. We made all the focus on production, and all the economics, the subsidies, are tied to production. We have a production-focused agriculture policy.”
— Iowan Farmer Seth Watkins via Inside Climate News
One of the great problems of the twenty-first century is: If, in the future, highly mechanized farmers operating at a large scale produce all of the food needed in the world, what will happen to the billions of people that are involved in farming? There are not enough jobs available as displaced farmers move to the city slums, so they try to get by in the “informal economy.” Thus, the growth of large farm units is creating dislocations and more food insecurity.
— Fred Magdoff
“Of eight leading fertilizer companies examined for this report, seven showed extensive past or current ties to the fossil fuel industry through board interlocks, corporate ownership structures, or direct engagement in fossil fuel production. Notably, this is in addition to well-known historic ties to fossil fuel industries among longtime agrochemical leaders like DuPont and Dow”
— Center for International Environmental Law
Three Links:
A Rational Agriculture Is Incompatible with Capitalism (Monthly Review)
The Farm Bureau: Big Oil’s Unnoticed Ally Fighting Climate Science and Policy (Inside Climate News)
Fossils, Fertilizers, and False Solutions (Center for International Environmental Law)
Hope you have a wonderful weekend,
Charlie