Michael Pollen is an authoritative figure in the realm of food that, indeed, has portrayed some very interesting and beneficial perspectives. However, he also has a tendency to use his position of power to infiltrate societal views when it comes to agriculture and eating. In “Visible Farmers/Invisible Workers” by Sarah D. Wald, Pollen is dissected critically for his lack of attention paid to the workers that allow the United States to produce megatons of food each year.…
Not only this, but “the farmers profit margin dropped from 35% in the 1950 's to about 9% today.” (Mckibben, 54) This means that “to generate the same income as it did in 1950, a farm today would need to be roughly four times as large.” (Mckibben, 55) As a result of this perpetual growth and centralization, problems like “huge sewage lagoons, miserable animals, vulnerability to sabotage and food-born illness”(mckibben, 61) have become commonplace. Not only this, but “we are running out of the two basic ingredients we need to grow food on an industrial scale: oil and water.” (Mckibben, 62) The situation has become so dire that “we are now facing a near simultaneous depletion of the underground aquifers which have been responsible for the unsustainable, artificial inflation of food production.” At this point of realization, Mckibben begins indulging the reader in a large number of facts that promote a more localized form of farming as the solution to a seemingly endless number of issues. Initially the point is raised that “sustainable agriculture leads to a 93% increase in per-hectare food production.” (Mckibben, 68) The next idea raised is that, “since World War 1, it has been cheaper to use…
Pollan talks about most of the organic food we consume today is produced from the so-called “industrial organic” farms, which belong firmly to the industrial food chain rather than the ideal organic food chain. First, the reality of “organic food” chain is largely inaccurately reported.…
The last hundred years in America and abroad, the farm and food production industry has revolutionized and been expanded past recognition of the simple entity it once was. It has been studied that the majority of food at the store, though seemingly varitous, is distributed by only a handful of monopoly companies (Food Inc.: great movie, it is eye-opening to the food industry). The result is that exotic, foreign food items are normal commodities to the middle-class (and above) diet. The implications of this new system of food production, transportation, and commercial resale has raised questions and inspired a local food promoting movement to combat such practices. Main goals of these “Locavores”…
The film, Food, Inc., argues that our food system has been corrupted by corporate interests; as a result, we are put in danger by very items that should guarantee our survival. We should reclaim our right to health by eating more locally produced organic food and ensuring all people have access to such food. The film wants the viewers to think negatively of the business of mass production of the foods that we eat on a daily basis. The logical fallacies allow the film to capture the attention and emotions of its audience by giving a reason for their concerns, but without any legitimate statistics or facts to back up their claims. The use of these logical fallacies in the film help strengthen its arguments by making the audience feel as if the corporations are exploiting the farmers and their traditions, causing families to go through avoidable obstacles, and making the companies and government look like the “bad guys” in this web that is called the food industry. However, the reality is that the food industry isn’t as evil as depicted by the fallacious arguments in the film.…
People are often at odds to choose between food like organic verses inorganic food or products. And what is the difference and is one actually better for you or is just there to makes it easier for you to justify eating it If you think one is not using the industrial food chain. After reading "The Omnivore's Dilemma", my own personal opinion about the food industry and that many Americans don’t know how or how our food is even processed and grown or raised or how it gets to the grocery store. An example I love is my mom is a kindergarten teacher and she was doing a lesson on food and where our food comes from and the kids new that food comes from a grocery store and that was it. They had no clue that they food they eat had to be grown somewhere else and then brought to the store for them to buy. The next question was who like chicken nuggets and they all raise their hands and then she asked what is a chicken nugget and none of them could answer her. When my mom said they come chickens all they kids were grossed out and said they don’t eat chickens. This just shows today that kids aren’t being told how their food gets to their plate and I feel that this is a very important concept for people to know not just kids. Going along with that people don’t know how food affects out bodies and after reading this book it makes you think about what you eat a lot…
In The Pleasures of Eating by Wendell Berry, written in 1989 and published in the Center for Ecoliteracy, we are asked to question the things we do. The main audience of this article is for “City People,” otherwise known as people who use grocery stores like Walmart or Smiths. Our entire life we have become so accustomed to getting produce and groceries the fastest way we can, and the fastest way we get them is through a grocery store. We very rarely get food from the farm anymore and nobody questions why. We “city people” have become caught up in getting the cheapest food instead of going to the farm and getting the highest quality produce.…
There are many ways to describe a topic or an event. Authors, for example, have their own unique style to present their argument when faced with a group of listeners. This unique style that accompanies every author can be announced in various forms of expression, such as statistics, social media, and artistic perspective to show their ideas as well as their opinions. The fact that pictures have no words makes it one of the best ways of persuasion because it can be interpreted in many different ways. In addition, these interpretations have no boundaries because none of them can be considered wrong.…
The following chapter delves into the principles of organic farming and their various implementations in modern America. Pollan shows that as organic food has grown in popularity, its producers have adopted many of the methods of industrial agriculture, while losing sight of the organic movement's anti-industrial roots. A meal prepared from ingredients purchased at Whole Foods represents this food chain at the table. As a study in contrast, Pollan visits a small-scale organic farm, where natural conditions are adhered to as closely as possible, very few artificial inputs are used, and waste products are recycled back into the system. He then prepares a meal using only local produce from small-scale organic farmers.…
The first section of this article deals with a brief history of locavorism. In this section, the writer goes into some of the history of the movement and how the movement has changed from a small group of friends to be the largest, most influential food trend in the country. From the beginning, of the article we are given hints that the author is in support of the idea of locavorism when he tells us how he favours local foods over certified organic ones and the reasons why, even though he states that the movement still has a long way to go.…
If one is familiar with terms like "food miles," "eco-consciousness," and "sustainability" then one already knows where this paper is headed. If not, those terms are being used more often since the increasingly popular locavore movement. To understand the locavore movement one must know what a locavore is and its purpose, and the positive and negative aspects of localvorism.…
This documentary is more or less broken down in a ¬¬form of chapters, using supportive authors of several books on food industry, interviewing knowledgeable individuals, safety advocates, and farmers to advocate the reality of food industry. The documentary first illustrations a supermarket filled with different food items. As the camera focuses on the fruits and vegetable the speaker states “The tomatoes you buy in the grocery store are picked when green and then ripened with ethylene gas.” The process of food production has changed in the eyes of many, over the years. Many of us don’t know where the food comes from. Since 1950’s the fast food industry have had transformed the current method of raw food production. The goal is, “production of large quantities of food at low direct inputs (most often subsidized) resulting in enormous profits, which in turn results in greater control of the global supply of food sources within these few companies.” Only top four companies are handling the meat industry, which are implacable to the animals, workers and environment. The consumption of meat by an average American has raised tremendously so has the demand of fast foods. The methods of production have whole new level. First, thirty percent of American land is based on corn. The government policy pays farmers more to overproduce this easy-to-store crop. The corn is then modified in different chemical forms, which is used ninety percent in most of our industrial foods. The farm animals are feed corn to increase their weight for high dense meat. The cows, chicken, pigs and more over…
fresh food” standard. The Locavore movement has impacted the middle income families in several different ways. They have become scavengers for “fresh, vine ripened foods grown on local farms…” (E) Believing that they are not only helping themselves, but helping their community and the environment as well.…
In American society, the environmental movement has gained the attention of many people. One of those movements is the “locavores”. Although some benefits are gained within this movements, there are also several less-examined effects of this movement that should be noted as well. People might think they do less harm to the environment, but they are misguided. They might help out their community but they end up hurting the other nations, they don’t really reduce the gas emitted by transportation and there nutrients in food is a small portion larger.…
There’s a saying that two wrongs don’t make a right. According to the DPIC (Death Penalty…