A Perspective for the Future

by John Jeavons

in the book How to Grow More Vegetables than you ever thought possible on less land than you can imagine.

"We 'farm' as we eat. For example, if we consume food that has been grown using methods that inadvertently deplete the soil in the growing process, then we are responsible for depleting the soil. If, instead, we raise or request food grown in ways that heal the Earth, then we are healing the Earth and its soils. Our daily food choices will make the difference. We can choose to sustain ourselves while increasing the planet's vitality. In the bargain we preserve resources, breath cleaner air, enjoy good exercise, and eat pure food.

"It has been estimated that about 1/3 of the health care costs in the United States could be eliminated through an increase in exercise and by eating a nutritious diet. Gardening and mini-farming provide both of these, resulting in a win-win proposition. By doing something that is wondrous and fun--growing food--each individual becomes important again in the face of an otherwise overwhelming global environmental challenge. The Earth, the soils, and each individual will be better as a result of these efforts."

Aspartame

"Propaganda: The American Diabetic Association recommends the use of aspartame to lower blood sugar. Consuming aspartame, as opposed to sugar, can reduce body weight.

Reality: Aspartame is linked to many nervous system disorders, as well as to brain cancer, and can exacerbate some symptoms of diabetes. The American Cancer Society has noted that those who use artificial sweeteners gain more weight than those who don't and there is evidence that aspartame is addictive.

Tips: If you suffer from migraines or fibromyalgia symptoms, try eliminating all aspartame and MSG from your diet.

Since nearly all 'diet' or 'sugar free' products contain a harmful sugar substitute, opt for raw honey, maple syrup, molasses, or stevia."

- Politically Incorrect Nutrition: Finding Reality In the Mire of Food Industry Propaganda by Michael Barbee. Available through KC Library system or purchase on-line through Amazon.

Click here to order this book from Amazon.com.

Food, Inc.--The Movie

I just watched Food, Inc. for the second time. I think it should be required viewing for everyone who eats food. It discusses several topics you have seen on this blog: meat processing, GMO foods, the real cost of food, and much more.

The first time I saw this film, I was appalled at the mess that is our food system. This time, though, I felt more empowered to do something about it. The movie ends with a silent series of sentences. Maybe you too will find some ideas of what you can do to effect change.

"You can vote to change this system...Three times a day."

"Buy from companies that treat workers, animals, and the environment with respect."

"When you go to the supermarket, choose foods that are in season. Buy foods that are organic. Know what's in your food. Read labels."

"Know what you buy. The average meal travels 1500 miles from the farm to the supermarket. Buy foods that are grown locally. Shop at farmers' markets. Plant a garden. (Even a small one.)"

"Cook a meal with your family and eat together."

"Everyone has a right to healthy food. Make sure your farmers' market takes food stamps. Ask your school board to provide healthy school lunches."

"The FDA and USDA are supposed to protect you and your family. Tell Congress to enforce food safety standards and re-introduce Kevin's Law."

"If you say grace, ask for food that will keep us and the planet healthy."

"You can change the world with every bite. Hungry for change? Go to takepart.com/foodinc."

Click here to buy this DVD from Amazon.com.

Soy: No Wonder Food

"Propaganda: Soy protects against breast cancer and osteoporosis---so like the Asians, we should eat more tofu and other soy products.

Reality: The Asian diet is not soy based. Unfermented soy products are not digestible. Soy is not a complete protein, and a pesticide-laden, soy-based diet can lead to severe nutritional deficiencies and hormonal imbalances.

Tips: Use fermented soy products like tempeh, tamari, miso and notto. These may have anticancerous effects. (They can be found at whole food stores or Freddies Health Food section). Avoid soy milk, soy energy bars, hydrolyzed vegetable protein, and regular consumption of tofu."

Of all the Soy beans in the World, 90% of them are GMO's.

- Read more on Soy in Politically Incorrect Nutrition: Finding Reality in the Mire of Food Industry Propaganda by Michael Barbee. This book is available through the King County Library system or can be purchased through Amazon.

Click here to order this book from Amazon.com.

Things to Ask Your Farmer

FOOD, Inc. is now a book. (In a very untraditional manner, the book followed the film.) This book has many interesting articles, including a chapter called "Questions for a Farmer" which is a great source of things you might want to ask your local grower about his or her farming practices. The article is arranged according to types of food. For instance:

Questions for a Farmer: Beef

1. Was the animal raised on pasture?

2. Was the animal fed anything else besides grass (supplements, byproducts, additional feed)?

3. How was the animal finished?

4. Was the animal ever given antibiotics?

5. Were hormones, steroids, or growth promoters ever given to the cow?

Questions for a Farmer: Eggs

1. How was the animal raised? On pasture, indoors, confined? Was it caged?

2. How much time do the hens spend outdoors each day?

3. Was the hen force molted?

4. What was the hen fed?

5. Was the hen fed antibiotics?

Each question also has additional explanations as to why that issue is important. This article was put together by the group Sustainable Table. You can find more questions on their website or in the book Food, Inc.

Food, Inc.

Radical changes in how we eat have taken place over the past 50 years as opposed to the past 2,000 years. It's time to know what we eat, where it comes from, and why it is cheap. Factory farmed food, cheap to the consumer, has a high potential for disease. Chemically engineered food removes nutrients while restructuring our and animal DNA. Find out what's behind sanitation and additives to make food appealing.

Becoming aware of what we eat allows us to make different choices and create positive solutions.

"Everyone should see Food, Inc." says The Washington Post.
Food, Inc. DVD can be borrowed from the King County Library at Muckelshoot (over 700 holds), rented from Netflix, or purchased at Amazon for $10.
Click here to order Food, Inc. from Amazon.com

Eggs

"Propaganda: Eating eggs leads to heart disease: throw out the yolks!

Reality: In reality, eggs are high in choline and B6, both of which are used to combat hardening of the arteries. Eggs are nutrient-dense and contain all the amino acids, a vast array of minerals and vitamins, and antioxidants.

Tips:
Good sources of the antioxidants lutein and zeaxamthin: eggs, broccoli, spinach.

Drinking plenty of water (five or more glasses a day) can protect the heart. Try replacing other drinks with pure, filtered or natural spring water flavored with a twist of lemon or lime.

To get the greatest benefit from eating eggs, purchase organic eggs from free-range chickens. They are higher in omega 3's, vitamins A, D, and E; and do not contain the potentially dangerous traces of antibiotics and pesticides that regular supermarket eggs do."

- Michael Barbee, C. D. C.
Politically Incorrect Nutrition: Finding Reality in the Mire of Food Industry Propaganda

Click here to order this book from Amazon.com.

In Defense of Food...

“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

“That, more or less, is the short answer to the supposedly incredibly complicated and confusing question of what we humans should eat in order to be maximally healthy.

“…it does seem to me a symptom of our present confusion about food that people would feel the need to consult a journalist, or for that matter a nutritionist or doctor or government food pyramid, on so basic a question about the conduct of our everyday lives as humans. I mean, what other animal needs professional help in deciding what it should eat? True, as omnivores—creatures that can eat just about anything nature has to offer and that in fact need to eat a wide variety of different things in order to be healthy—the 'What to eat' question is somewhat more complicated for us than it is for, say, cows. Yet for most of human history, humans have navigated the question without expert advice. To guide us we had, instead, Culture, which, at least when it comes to food, is really just a fancy word for your mother. What to eat, how much of it to eat, what order in which to eat it, with what and when and with whom have for most of human history been a set of questions long settled and passed down from parents to children without a lot of controversy or fuss.”

So begins Michael Pollan’s book In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto. In it, he defines what food IS (not quite as simple as you’d think, in today’s world), and how to eat for enjoyment and for good health instead of just for the nutrients.

Click here to order this book from Amazon.com

Polyface Farm

Polyface, farmed by Joel Salatin in Virginia, is one of the most productive and influential alternative farms in America. This description by Michael Pollan is a fantastic example of what sustainable agriculture is all about.

"Though it was only the third week of June, the pasture beneath me had already seen several rotational turns. Before being cut earlier in the week for the hay that would feed the farm's animals through the winter, it had been grazed twice by beef cattle, which after each day-long stay had been succeeded by several hundred laying hens. They'd arrived by Eggmobile, a ramshackle portable henhouse designed and built by Salatin. Why chickens? 'Because that's how it works in nature,' Salatin explained. 'Birds follow and clean up after herbivores.' and so during their turn in the pasture, the hens had performed several ecological services for the cattle as well as the grass: They'd picked the tasty grubs and fly larvae out of the cowpats, in the process spreading the manure and eliminating parasites. (This is what Joel has in mind when he says the animals do the work around here; the hens are his 'sanitation crew,' the reason his cattle have no need of chemical parasiticides.) And while they were at it, nibbling on the short cattle-clipped grasses they like best, the chickens applied a few thousand pounds of nitrogen to the pasture--and produced several thousand uncommonly rich and tasty eggs. After a few weeks' rest, the pasture will be grazed again, each steer turning these lush grasses into beef at the rate of two or three pounds a day.

"...Salatin's audacious bet is that feeding ourselves from nature need not be a zero-sum proposition, one in which if there is more for us at the end of the season then there must be less for nature--less topsoil, less fertility, less life. He's betting, in other words, on a very different proposition, one that looks an awful lot like the proverbially unattainable free lunch."

(from The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan)
Click here to order The Omnivore's Dilemma from Amazon.com

Vegetable Harvest

Almost every non-animal food we eat comes from a flowering plant, and such plants have predictable life cycles. Thus, so does our food grow in predictable cycles (though some of it is almost year-round, thanks to our moderate Enumclaw climate).

First come the leaves--spinach, kale, lettuce, and chard (beginning in May)

Then come more mature heads of leaves and flower heads—cabbage, romaine, broccoli, and cauliflower (late June).

Next are tender young fruits—peas, baby squash, cucumbers (July), followed by green beans and small tomatoes (late July).

Next, more mature, colorfully ripened fruits—large tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, summer squash (August to September)

Finally, the large, hard-shelled fruits with developed seeds inside—pumpkins and other winter squash (October)

The root crops—beets, carrots, onions, potatoes—are protected in the ground and can be harvested through the summer and into the winter months (June through February)

Adapted from Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver
Click here to order this book from Amazon.com.

Barcode Food

“When you think about it, it is odd that something as important to our health and general well-being as food is so often sold strictly on the basis of price. The value of relationship marketing [people buying directly from farmers they know] is that it allows many kinds of information besides price to travel up and down the food chain: stories as well as numbers, qualities as well as quantities, values rather than ‘value.’ And as soon as that happens, people begin to make different kinds of buying decisions, motivated by criteria other than price. But instead of stories about how it was produced accompanying our food, we get bar codes—as inscrutable as the industrial food chain itself, and a fair symbol of its almost total opacity.

"...Our food system depends on consumers' not knowing much about it beyond the price disclosed by the checkout scanner. Cheapness and ignorance are mutually reinforcing. And it's a short way from not knowing who's at the other end of your food chain to not caring--to the carelessness of both producers and consumers."

from The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan
Click here to order this book from Amazon.com

"Unsafe Meat"

Bacteria
"Animals are not sterile, and neither are we. They carry many different kinds of bacteria in unimaginably large numbers (we do too). Fortunately, most bacteria are harmless, but some, like that especially nasty form of E.coli, are deadly. Toxic bacteria often do not make the animals sick, but they can make you sick---and sometimes kill you---if you eat meat from animals that carry them.

"How bacteria of any kind get into the meat you buy in supermarkets is not a pretty story. Like all animals, food animals excrete bacteria in their wastes, and these bacteria spread quickly under the crowded conditions in feedlots, batteries, and slaughterhouses. Bacteria also spread from one animal to another during slaughter and when meat is cut and ground. Bacteria usually only contaminate the other surfaces of whole cuts of meat like roasts, steaks, or chops; if you sear pieces of meat like these, you kill the bacteria on their surfaces. Bacteria cannot easily get into the inside of a steak, for example, unless it has been pierced, cut, or ground. That is why hamburger poses safety problems; once ground, the bacteria on its surface can mix into its interior. Meat packers make commercial hamburger from the parts of a large number (sometimes hundreds) of beef cattle, so if just one animal is contaminated with harmful bacteria, the entire batch of hamburger can make people ill. This is also why it makes sense to cook commercial hamburger thoroughly, so you kill bacteria throughout the mix. Meat will never be completely free of bacteria, but you have every right to wonder why producers are not doing a better job of keeping their meats free of harmful ones."

from What to Eat by Marion Nestle
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Saving the Family Farm

Victor Davis Hanson, in his book Fields Without Dreams, suggests that food distributors, food processors, and food brokers should not be able to own farmland. The government prohibits monopolies in other markets, so why not food?

“ Nothing in the last century has been more lethal to the American farmer than the accepted practice of processing and selling food. No other industry in America—not financial services, not used-car sales, not investment banking—has had such a sustained record of price gouging and outright theft, without regulation, without accountability or honesty to the farmers who make it all possible.” (p. 279)

The above proposal is part of Hanson’s three-step “utopian scheme” to save the family farm in America. The other steps are--

* Eliminate all government regulation and “support” of agriculture other than statutes governing food quality and safety. A benign government agricultural entity is impossible, because corporate agriculturists give to politicians and enjoy federal protection in return.

* Pass legislation to discourage possession of vast acreage and absentee ownership of farms. Rewrite federal reclamation laws so that such owners are not eligible for federally subsidized water. Make it so property and irrigation taxes are indexed based on the size of the farm and the presence of residents.

What do you think?

Click here to order Fields Without Dreams from Amazon.com

Fertilizer Facts

"[A] key turning point in the industrialization of our food can be dated with some precision to the day in 1947 when the huge munitions plant at Muscle Shoals, Alabama, switched over to making chemical fertilizer.

"After the war the government had found itself with a tremendous surplus of ammonium nitrate, the principal ingredient in the making of explosives. Ammonium nitrate also happens to be an excellent source of nitrogen for plants. Serious thought was given to spraying America’s forests with the surplus chemical, to help out the timber industry. But agronomists in the Department of Agriculture had a better idea: Spread the ammonium nitrate on farmland as fertilizer. The chemical fertilizer industry (along with that of pesticides, which are based on poison gases developed for the war) is the product of the government’s effort to convert its war machine to peacetime purposes."

(by Michael Pollan in The Ominvore’s Dilemma)
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What is "Sustainable"?

I always thought of sustainable agriculture as taking care of the land so that the soil and living organisms are preserved. But Victor Hanson, in his book Fields Without Dreams, gives “sustainable” a different meaning, one that includes taking care of the farmers so that they can actually make a living as they work to feed the rest of us:

“[T]he final verdict on the future of the American farm lies no longer with the farmer,…but rather with the American people themselves—and they have now passed judgment.

“They no longer care where or how they get their food, as long as it is firm, fresh, and cheap. They have no interest in preventing the urbanization of their farmland as long as parks, Little League fields, and an occasional bike lane are left amid the concrete, stucco, and asphalt….

“You see, we in America have been running away from the isolation, uncertainty, boredom, toil, and drudgery of the farm for a century and more now, and in our lifetime have finally escaped it entirely….We desire the security of the corporation and bureaucracy even as we hate what we become, and so we run from the farm only to dream that it might save us all yet.” (p. 270)

If that sounds pessimistic, it’s because the story it tells IS depressing—a story we have seen played out right here on the Enumclaw Plateau. Witness, for example, the Courier-Herald article of June 3, 2009, titled “Dairies Continue Disappearing Act.”

What does the future hold for a region that doesn’t sustain its farmers and farmland?

Click here to order Fields Without Dreams from Amazon.com

"Oily Food"

"Americans put almost as much fossil fuel into our refrigerators as our cars. We're consuming about 400 gallons of oil a year per citizen--about 17 percent of our nation's energy use--for agriculture, a close second to our vehicular use. Tractors, combines, harvesters, irrigation, sprayers, tillers, balers, and other equipment all use petroleum. Even bigger gas guzzlers on the farm are not the machines, but so-called inputs. Synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides use oil and natural gas as their starting materials and in their manufacturing. More than a quarter of all farming energy goes into synthetic fertilizers.

"But getting the crop from seed to harvest takes only one-fifth of the total oil used for our food. The lion's share is consumed during the trip from the farm to your plate. Each food item in a typical U.S. meal has traveled an average of 1,500 miles. In addition to direct transport, other fuel-thirsty steps include processing (drying, milling, cutting, sorting, baking), packaging, warehousing, and refrigeration. Energy calories consumed by production, packaging, and shipping far outweigh the energy calories we receive from the food."

by Steven L. Hopp in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, p. 5
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Farmers' Market Sales

Research shows that the presence of a thriving, seasonal farmers' market increases business in the rest of the community--even at nearby grocery stores or others perceived as competitors.

"In national surveys, customers spend on average $17.30 per week with 66,700 farmers at markets, for a reported retail sales total of $888 million . . . . About half the customers spend that much again ($22) per person to shop and eat at downtown businesses on market days."

(USDA, "U.S. Farmers Markets--2000" quoted in The Farmers' Market Book: Growing Food, Cultivating Community by Jennifer Meta Robinson and J.A. Hartenfeld.)
Click here to order this book from Amazon.com.

Looking for Locavores

Locavore? That’s the name for someone who eats food grown or produced locally. It is a word coined by Jessica Prentice, professional chef, food activist, and author of Full Moon Feast—a fascinating book (and cookbook) about eating foods in season. In 2007, the New Oxford American Dictionary chose locavore (or localvore) as its word of the year. Since many of us are staying close to home, trying to save on gas costs, maybe now is the time to give local foods a closer look.

Recently I’ve noticed articles about people who have vowed to eat only food purchased (or even foraged!) locally. Barbara Kingsolver’s popular book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle chronicles her family’s challenge to be locavores for a whole year. I’ve wondered if I could ever do such a thing.

But Kingsolver inspires me. Like her family, mine has grown a vegetable garden and fruit trees for many years. We live in downtown Enumclaw, so we don’t grow food on the same scale she does. But we grow enough to supply us with produce for several months. What we can’t grow (we’ve never done well with peaches and apricots, for instance) I buy from Yakima via local produce “stands.” Produce tastes so good when it’s really ripe; it spoils me for those pale imposters that show up in grocery stores out of season.

So what does a locavore do during the winter? Some produce, including carrots, Brussels sprouts, and broccoli, is still in season then. But I try to bypass the other stuff. As Kingsolver says, “Bizarre as it seems, we’ve accepted a tradeoff that amounts to: ‘Give me every vegetable in every season, even if it tastes like a cardboard picture of its former self.’ You’d think we cared more about the idea of what we’re eating than about what we’re eating.” So I practice patience, and forgo the grapes from Chile. I’ll go home and have the grape juice I bottled last September, instead.

Eating local doesn’t end with produce, though. My family has been eating local meat for awhile. Some friends here in Enumclaw have cows, and we eat the grass-fed beef. I know the cattle are grass-fed because I can go to Elmer’s house any time and see them out in the pasture. I pick up the packaged beef from the butcher and I ask about his work. Since I like what I see at the butcher’s store, I go there for other meats. We don’t eat a lot of meat at our house, but I feel confident that what we are eating is well-cared for and humanely slaughtered.

We buy milk from another local farmer. I don’t have to worry about how carefully Tom processes the milk. I can talk to him in person and ask—about his procedures, about recipes, or even about the names of the newborn calves.

We are uniquely blessed here on the Plateau, surrounded by farmers and by outlets for local foods. Our area boasts several seasonal produce stands, our Enumclaw Plateau Farmers' Market opening in 2010, and numerous u-pick farms and CSA’s (Community Supported Agriculture farms). Many youth participate in 4-H and FFA, learning to become tomorrow’s farmers. The annual Puget Sound Fresh-sponsored tours highlight farms all around us. Keep your eyes open, and you’ll find our local food options are continually increasing. Ask the produce manager of your grocery store to stock more local foods. Email your state legislator about your support for laws that help local farms.

The following statement by Steven L. Hopp (in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle) is enlightening: “If every U.S. citizen ate just one meal a week (any meal) composed of locally and organically raised meats and produce, we would reduce our country’s oil consumption by over 1.1 million barrels of oil every week. That’s not gallons, but barrels. Small changes in buying habits can make big differences.”

Well I CAN do that much—or better. I am encouraged to keep expanding my repertoire of local foods. I’m committed to eating more of what’s in season (trying out some new recipes from the afore-mentioned books) and less of what comes from far away. Maybe I’m a food activist too.

(This article was originally published in the Fall, 2008 issue of Mindful Intent magazine.)
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