KPBS today replayed the Fresh Air-Michael Pollan interview from October. This interview is an excellent primer on the process by which we’ve almost completely destroyed the traditional, elegant farm where animals and plants support each other and enrich the land and community.
To me, the key takeaways are:
* Most of what we call “food” is energy from fossil fuel which has been converted into non-edible corn or soy, and then processed into calories (usually sugars or starches) which are edible by humans.
* Almost of all of what is called “meat” is fossil fuel converted into inedible-to-humans corn and soy, and then fed to beings kept confined in their own filth. The resulting substance known as “meat” isn’t much like what our great-grandparents knew as meat. This change from meat to sort-of-meat is now happening more and more with fish, too.
* Both the monoculture corn/soy farm and the animal feedlot are destructive, while a well-managed integrated “polyculture” farm with animals and plants actually contributes to the environment.
We stopped growing food, and started growing food-like substances, as a direct result of numerous economic policies which made food-like substances insanely cheap on the grocery store shelves, while also making actual food more and more expensive (due to decreasing economies of scale for real farmers).
As this continued long enough, the opportunity to eat real food has become intertwined with issues of economic class, too. Because fake food — especially meat — is so much cheaper than real food, real food acquires the air of a luxury good, or even conspicuous consumption. It’s a ridiculous state of affairs, but undeniably true.
But, anyway, on a related note, as a snack today I ate my first can of local sustainably caught albacore from a local company* and loved it. I recommend American Tuna wholeheartedly!
* Thanks to Dennis for the correction.
American Tuna is a great group of people and most of them live here in San Diego! Just to be accurate though, it’s caught off the coasts of Oregon and Washington and brought to shore up there, so I wouldn’t call it local. I’d definitely eat it though!
Right, duh. They say that on their website, but I was thinking about where the people are from, not the fish. Anyway, it’s corrected now.