| I just want to say a little bit about the big issues that I'm following at the moment. I'm doing a better job with some than others because it's impossible to be fully committed to everything all at once. In short: Global Hunger, School Lunch, Free Trade, Competition Reform, the Farm Bill, Food Safety, Sewage Sludge, the Light Brown Apple Moth, Farmworker Rights, Industry Influence & PR, Farm Internships, and Seafood (particularly in the Gulf).
Please let me know: What should be on this list that I'm missing? Also, as I hope everyone is aware, everyone is encouraged to post on this blog. If there's a topic you are passionate about, PLEASE dig in and start writing about it. |
| Global Hunger: Over the past year, I've followed this one very closely. This was the reason for my trips to Cuba and Mexico and, if I can scrape together the cash, it's why I am going to Bolivia (I need about $3000 but even donating $20 helps - there's a Paypal button to the right of this post). Obviously, global hunger is significant because over 1 billion people are starving. But it's significant for other reasons too. This is a key link in exposing the myth that biotechnology and industrial agriculture are necessary to feed the world. You want an all-organic ecological food system? Well, we first need to prove that agroecology does a better job at feeding the world than industrial ag and that the talking points that biotechnology is the key to feeding the world are lies.
School Lunch: To state the obvious, fixing school lunch is a way to drive money into healthy food production, help kids eat well now and build healthy habits for the future, and help kids learn better. It's a matter of justice as well as a matter of our nation's future health care costs and even military readiness, since a significant portion of young people today are too physically unfit to serve. I've followed this issue ad nauseum and we might be done with it soon, sort of. When Congress returns, it might pass the current Child Nutrition bill (or it might not, thus dragging on this debate). And if it does that, a lot of major fixes will be signed into law, but school lunch will still be drastically underfunded and that means our kids still won't have good food. In other words, Congress will be done with school lunch for 5 years, but school lunch will still need work.
Free Trade: Our trade policies touch on so many different aspects of our food system, from unfair laws enforced on our own farmers in the name of the export markets, to food safety, to global hunger.
Competition Reform: This is big and quite overwhelming to me as I'm not an expert on the topic. It includes the Dept of Justice hearings on competition, the Dept of Justice investigation of Monsanto, and - very significantly - the GIPSA rule. I need to get up to speed on the GIPSA rule because while it's completely under the radar of mainstream America, the meatpacking industry is absolutely howling over it. And that's because it's true reform, and it will impact their abilities to unfairly outcompete small producers.
The 2012 Farm Bill: It's 2 years away and there are already hearings on it. I really haven't focused on it yet, but at some point, we all need to. We can't wait until 2012 when most of the bill is written to start organizing.
Food Safety: The Food Safety bill now in Congress looks like it's almost a done deal. Almost. Which means we've likely got one last push as it goes through the Senate, then it goes to Obama's desk and we're done. With that, at least. That won't mean we've got safe food or anything, but some reforms will become law. The next step will be following the FDA's implementation of the law. And finding new ways that food safety can be improved, which will likely have a lot to do with meat, regulated by the USDA and not affected by this bill.
Sewage Sludge: The sludge story just keeps going and going and going. I've been covering it, I'll keep covering it. In this case, I'm actually being paid to cover the story so I really can't drop the ball here. That said, I am maintaining my independence in what I write and I won't write anything that I don't believe to be true. I think the larger story to take away from sewage sludge is not just that we shouldn't fertilize food crops with sludge but we need to stop manufacturing, using, and releasing into the environment an awful lot of toxic chemicals that are a part of our every day lives.
The Light Brown Apple Moth (LBAM): This is one that I've been quietly following for a while now. Until last week, it was an issue mostly affecting other parts of California. Then it hit home. My own county is under quarantine all of a sudden - both by the CA state government and the USDA. This is actually a huge story because the government is NOT using good science and it is taking actions that are harmful to farmers in California and eaters all over the U.S. (Ever tried going a week without eating something from California?) And the quarantine is much more harmful to organic farms than it is to farms that use toxic pesticides. This story can be used to tell the larger story of why our entire agricultural system needs to shift its paradigm from what farmer Jim Goodman once called "Nature's in my way" to working WITH nature to produce food.
Farmworker Rights: I was concerned here before, but my recent trip to Mexico is just something that changed me forever. You can't unsee people who are starving, or unlearn about the way they and their families are exploited when they come to the U.S. to work on our farms. If I can get it together, I am going to get much more involved locally with farmworker issues.
Industry Influence & PR: There is nothing more fun than reading a lame-ass pack of lies published by industry or one of its astroturf groups and exposing it as the bullshit it is.
Farm Internships: The State of California is cracking down on internships on farms that pay less than minimum wage. Even if an internship provides training so that the intern learns how to be a farmer and receives room and board (or other compensation that is not a wage or amounts to less than the minimum wage), they still come down hard on the farm, often with huge fines. There is certainly an issue here that interns should be treated fairly and compensated fairly for their work, but on the other hand, we need more organic farmers and for those who wish to get some free training along with room and board, the government is really making their lives difficult right now.
Seafood: I don't have a fantastic understanding of everything going on in our oceans (since it's infinitely complex!) but I know enough to know that it's a huge mess. Overfishing, the climate crisis, and pollution are putting many, many species at risk of extinction. I'm particularly focused on the Gulf right now, because there's a lot of sympathy for fishermen who were put out of work (and they are now going back to work), but how safe is the seafood? And how wise is it to start killing fish in an ecosystem that's been absolutely devastated by the oil spill? Shrimping in particular was bad news BEFORE BP dumped more oil than 10 Exxon Valdezes into the Gulf. No one wants to see fishermen out of work and losing their homes, but I'd very much like to see them getting new jobs that don't involve killing fish. |
