Why Is Hungry For Profit Agribusiness

Agribusiness is the industrialization and globalization of the farming industry, more often than not it also involves the mechanization of the labor in order to streamline it. At a glance agribusiness may be seen and even portrayed as the solution to the global food issues, but that is far from the truth as we have seen in the documentary film Hungry for Profit agribusiness’ main purpose is profit as in the end agribusiness is in fact a business. With this in mid it should not come as a surprise that agribusiness, despite all the propaganda, isn’t a solution to the world food issues, in fact one can argue it is a cause for some as they choose to sell their product to foreign markets instead of locals ones in order to make more money. One example of this is seen in the Philippians were Del Monte began to set up operations, but in doing so also began to drive out local farmers and take over their land. Unlike some other instances that we saw in their
film where such an act was done by the government or with its assistance, in the Philippians though it was mostly done by the company itself by buying out the farmers who wanted to sell. Those who did not want to sell though face repeated visits and offers from the company and should they continue to resist they would end being visited by what is best described as third party thugs who would intimidate them and force them to sell. Most farmers have then gone to work for the company as day labors earning very little helping farm and process the fruits of the companies’ labor for shipment to foreign countries where they can be sold off for a higher price than if they were sold locally. Another example of how agribusiness isn’t what many companies say it is comes from the Dominican Republic where the government made attempts to draw agribusiness in an effort to gain income and get investments for their country. This attracted gulf and western who ended up setting shop this did lead to investments and factory jobs, but did more harm than good. For one for every dollar that was invested by the company the Dominican Republic lost 83.7 dollars. That and as many citizens of the republic can attest to the government seems to care more about the company than its people as it’s a source of income for them despite the fact that the company gains more from them than they do. Basically, the prospect of income and the need for it has made the government relay on agribusiness at the cost of its people and their land.
Brazil is another country that has experienced the consequence of allowing agribusiness to set up shop in their country as their profit making has been a mixed blessing as it has allowed the country to make some profit from the soybean plantation that have been created by various business, but it has led to the destruction of small farming operations throughout the country.
Those whose farms have been destroyed or overtaken by the plantation have usually ended up working in the plantations for subpar pay which is barely enough to keep families fed as it cost two days’ pay for an average brazilian to buy a kilo of black beans. Some have managed to stay or obtain land in the wake of an agribusiness founding, but said land is usually poor and unfit for farming without heavy investment, something people working for the plantations do not have as a result of their poor pay. This poor pay exists because it is an incentive for the company to set up shop as low pay allows for greater income and draws business into the
country. Agribusiness has been touted by the companies and their supporters as a solution to food scarcity problem that is plaguing our world. As we have seen this is not the case as in the end these companies are business whose main goal isn't to help people, but to make a profit even if it means sending their product to foreign countries or even destroying it if it will not be profitable enough. Yet, we have also seen that if you remove the profiteering aspect of the agribusiness they can do what they said they said they could as we have seen in mexico where local farmers united into a collective and used the same tactics agribusiness used, but did not focus on making a large profit instead they focused on making a living and sold both locally and internationally.