And who shall feed us, one and all?

 

The nation’s continuing crises around food and farming intersect with every aspect of our lives. Agricultural activity accounts for about 11% of total global emissions of greenhouse gases. What if that could be reduced by 50%?  What a dent that would make in the rate of global warming.  But it will not be easy. The global agricultural system is home to some of the biggest challenges and opportunities facing us today; and where battles will be fought as we confront climate change in the future.

 

The pandemic has shone an unflattering light on a U.S. food system that was in crisis before COVID-19 came along to make matters much worse.  During the past several months, about 10 percent of American families are reported to have experienced hunger. At the same time,  millions of animals have been euthanized because there is no market for them, and lakes of milk have poured down drains. Migrant farmworkers, on whose labor the food system depends, are getting infected because of inadequate housing and lack of access to medical care. All this within a context of entrenched racism and inequality that determines who does and doesn’t experience food insecurity.

Why is it the case that in the United States, arguably the richest nation in the world, people with children are struggling to feed their families? Like air and water, food is absolutely essential to life. Surely it is one of the primary roles of government to ensure that everyone has enough to eat.  But something is woefully out of whack;  we should not have millions of people going without enough to eat when there is food in abundance on all sides.  Unequal access to nutritious food has long been a problem in America. Why has food insecurity persisted as our capacity to produce food at lower cost increases?   A recent article relating to hunger in the state of Minnesota highlights the incongruities in the nation’s highly efficient food-producing methods on the one hand and widespread food insecurity on the other.  In the Powderhorn neighborhood of Minneapolis, where George Floyd lived before he was killed by police, a large fraction of the residents live below the poverty line. The social unrest following his murder has made a bad situation there much worse. Volunteer organizations such as Second Harvest Heartland, which with others operate so-called pop-up grocery stores in the neighborhoods, are just about all that stand between most residents and daily hunger.  Second Harvest Heartland has been distributing about 350,000 lb of food daily. What a heartwarming tribute to the community’s sense of generosity!  But where is the government in this picture?  Billions in new agricultural subsidies have flown into the pockets of  rich landowners and corporations already protected by regular doles.  Why do congressmen shake their heads and say no when it comes to enlarging food subsidy programs for needy families? 

 

It’s ironic that food insecurity should be prevalent among agricultural workers.  Before the pandemic, there was already a lot of hunger among this group. In 2016, about 2.8 million, or 13% of America’s food workers were food insecure, relying on the government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), known as food stamps. That’s about 2.2 times higher than in other industries.  Now things have grown dire for many of those workers. Here’s an example, taken from Bloomberg: 

“Alicia Rojo Rocha is a farmworker in Idaho’s Canyon County, laboring in fields of carrots, onions, alfalfa, and potatoes. She gets paid $12 an hour, and the last time her wage went up was about two years ago. The pandemic led to layoffs.  Expenses started to pile up, Rocha was late with rent payments and fell behind with other bills. While out of work, she started visiting a local food bank, where she got bread, meat, beans, rice, and some produce. Now that she’s working again, she hasn’t returned to the food bank, because she says, other people need it more. …..There are days Rocha eats nothing more than an apple, or maybe a single tortilla with beans throughout her almost 10-hour, physically demanding workday. When she returns home, she might have some eggs or potatoes. She sometimes feels helpless “being in abundance and not being able to have it,” she said.” 

The food crisis sweeping the nation is not a question of inadequate food supplies. The country is in a time of historic abundance, with plentiful grains, meat and dairy, so much so that farmers have been plowing over excess crops and dumping milk. So what’s gone wrong? With the nation pitched in fierce debates over entrenched and systemic inequalities, the most basic divide—who eats well and who goes hungry—is becoming more acute every day.  It’s important to look at this in terms of politics. At the national level, state-by-state, congressional district by district, those of us who will be voting in November should ask candidates for office: Have you taken notice of the forgotten families, sitting in long food lines in their old trucks and cars, hoping there’ll be something left when their turn comes? Do you recognize that they exist?  What’s your plan for how to make things better for them? If you can’t speak with a candidate in person, leave your name and number along with your views. 

We’ve only begun to face the fights that must be fought; against big ag, which has exploited worker families in the furtherance of corporate profits; against politicians that do the bidding of the corporate giants; against federal agencies that set or roll back rules and procedures at the behest of corporate lobbyists. We need food to live. Shouldn’t that fact somehow be reflected in a special sense of responsibility on the part of food companies? But we can see that their goal is not to promote life, health, or happiness--it’s to make money for executives and shareholders. The United Nations declares that humans have a right to food:  “The right to adequate food is realized when every man, woman, and child, alone or in community with others, has physical and economic access at all times to adequate food or means for its procurement.”  But that’s not how unfettered capitalism works. The kind of capitalism we’ve come to take for granted turns food—a life essential—into a commodity, as unattached to moral and ethical values as furniture and vacation cruises.

 

The nature of the food supply system has been changing.  The four largest food-producing companies in the world are Nestle, PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, and Kraft Heinz Company.  And what do these behemoths produce?  Well, for starters, a tremendous amount of beverages, and a big flow of snack food to go with the drinks. The aisles on both sides in most grocery stores are loaded with prepared, heavily processed food: just heat’-n-eat. People have been taught to deem animal protein an essential component of their diet.  Huge beef, pork, and chicken production operations dominate.  

The industrialization of American farming, with its emphasis on just two crops—corn and soybeans—has led to a system in which there's little incentive to grow much else. The larger the operation, the more profitable, it seems. Practices commonly used in industrial agriculture degrade the soil, directly increase emissions of greenhouse gases, and cause pollution of natural waters.  By contrast, environmentally friendly practices like "no-till" farming and crop rotation lead to long-term storage of carbon in soils, making new soil and rejuvenating exhausted land. But with short-term profit as the reigning measure of success, the shift to regenerative agricultural practice is coming slowly. 

Though this all seems pretty discouraging, we should be hopeful.  Agriculture is in something of a crisis mode. Leaked stories from secret meetings show that the big players are facing up to the fact that global warming, and not just some playful teasing from Zeus, is exacting huge tolls in the form of flooded fields, punishing droughts, awful hurricanes, and now, something new and different: the derecho. One of those violent fast-moving thunderstorms recently moved through Iowa and damaged nearly half the state’s crops. That will likely lead to more government bailout money. How much in the way of gigantic government agricultural bailouts will voters stand for?  Public outcries over spoilage of towns and neighborhoods, over stink and bad water are forcing local authorities to take action. 

But people don’t need to wait for the ag industry to reform, nor for the government to act in the public interest.  Participants in home-grown, community-level initiatives understand that the big corporations are not likely to respond to peoples’ wishes for wholesome nutritious food grown in a sustainable manner on soil-rich land free of pesticides. Food cooperatives, community gardens, and other forms of community action are springing up and working successfully in many communities. This may seem a rather quixotic venture. After all, how much food can a few earnest gardeners produce in comparison with the needs of millions of people? But economies of scale work to the benefit of local efforts. Locally grown, locally sold, locally consumed.  In terms of health, sustainability, and community building, what could be a better formula?  

But there’s a lot more involved than just garden plots; it takes skill and understanding of how to grow food sustainably, how to care for the soil, how to distribute the food to those who need it. It's important to include as many people in the venture as can be accommodated. What better sense of accomplishment for people to know that they have laid hands on soil, or that they have supported those who have produced the conditions for good quality gardens?  Community gardens don't thrive in isolation; they must be integrated with other aspects of the community’s social structure. For example, children should be taught the qualities of healthful food, and given roles to play in the process of producing it. Community gardens should be educational centers. People with special skills working together are needed to make a true community garden an agricultural success. Here’s one example of what I mean. 

Columbia, MO located in the center of the state, has a population of about 12 5,000.  It’s the home of the University of Missouri and two good liberal arts colleges.  It’s a pleasant community, with outdoor amenities such as parks and trails.  On the debit side, there is a shortage of affordable housing, and the fraction of the population falling below the poverty level is higher than average. The Columbia Community Garden Coalition was founded in 1983 to help lower-income families meet their nutrition needs by growing food at a garden within range of their neighborhood. At present, the Coalition maintains about 12 gardens throughout the community at which individuals may apply for a garden plot.  In addition, the Coalition supports two dozen gardens associated with specific groups such as schools, churches and housing developments. The Coalition’s services are provided by volunteers;  support and community action is essential to the garden coalition’s broad outreach. 

The Coalition itself owns just one garden, purchased when a lot came up for sale in an extremely poor neighborhood.  The funds all came from volunteers. This is what one section of Claudell Lane Gardens looks like today: 

 

Stories such as the Columbia, MO example can be found all over the nation.  It takes the combined actions of many people with different talents and resources to bring them into being and to maintain them. The growth in the number of such initiatives and of the volunteers needed to operate them is itself an organic process.   

For the past several years I’ve been in community with a small group of like-minded friends who share common concerns for the health of the planet, and the environmental status of southwest Florida where we live.  We have founded a not-for-profit organization, The SWFL RESET Center,  in Fort Myers. Our core aim is to facilitate Restorative, Ecological, Social and Economic Transformation through cooperative initiatives.  Food gardens, farming practices, permaculture and educational activities related to regenerative agriculture will be among our initiatives. Our aims for agricultural transformation are captured in this photo. 

Imagine that these are your hands. You can smell the rich complexity of soil, see the worms wiggling, the tiny beetles scuttling.  You can feel life itself in your hands.  The little starter plant in the middle is the first entry in a growth sequence: 1, 2, 4… However it goes, it will grow larger.   Each enterprise of the food garden, tree planting, community-based education, may seem inconsequential.  When shared and disseminated to others, though, virtuous networks are extended and enlarged.  In time the many can overcome the mighty. 

 

Keep in touch with RESET via our facebook page, and -soon to come - our website.