Health, Taken Seriously

I’m so happy to see my latest passion, our food supply, is the subject of the cover story of Time magazine.  The August 31, 2009 issue featured an article titled The Real Cost of Cheap Food:  America’s Food Crisis and How to Fix It by Bryan Walsh.  Walsh discusses the destructive way we treat our soil and the animals which provide us food, and how in turn that food is destructive to our bodies.  A few highlights:

• Our energy-intensive food system uses 19% of U.W. fossil fuels, more than any other sector of the economy.
• Americans eat four times as much meat and dairy as the rest of the world.
• Less than 1% of American cropland is farmed organically.  (I have to say that I’m actually shocked by this.)
• Americans spend less than 10% of their incomes on food, down from 18% in 1966.
• The Federal Government has poured more than $50 billion (!) into the corn industry, keeping prices for the crop artificially low.
• Taxpayer subsidies basically underwrite cheap grain.
• 70% of antimicrobial drugs used in America are given not to people but to animals.  In 1998, the Institute of Medicine estimated that antibiotic resistance cost the public-health system $4-5 billion each year!
• Antibiotics are not given to sick animals, but are used as a preventative measure “because they are kept in pretty unspeakable conditions.”
• Sustainable food has an elitist reputation, but each of us depends on the soil, animals, and plants–and as every farmer knows, if you don’t take care of your land, it can’t take care of you.

Filed under: Environment, Food and Nutrition on September 26th, 2009