The world is getting to me. Overwhelming me. I saw the movie Food Inc. last night and was revolted by what I saw. Because I'm retired and have a computer, some time and a natural curiosity, I've been aware of this stuff for years but I've always kept it in the back of my mind and tried to avoid thinking about it too much. And now, after watching the movie, I have to wonder why this story has never made the front pages. Where are the responsible journalists? Or is that an oxymoron? The scope of power that these corporations have is overwhelming. Multinational corporations; the kind of corporations that the Supreme Court now allows complete freedom to say whatever they want, as if they were 'people'. What irony; as I saw in the movie, the Food libel laws, also known as food disparagement laws and informally as veggie libel laws, are laws passed in 13 U.S. states that make it easier for food producers to sue their critics for libel. So now you can't even criticize the food you eat.
I live in an agricultural county and I have seen the power of the Ag community. Nothing happens in this county without their approval. And now I see that one of the Ag giants has taken over the rice dryers a few miles from here; they have their name painted up high on the face of the dryers. And I have to imagine that they now control all the rice production in the county. Could I be wrong? Sure, they just came to town to buy one little part of the food chain. Yes, indeed!
Is there any good news in this…yes, Polyface Farms and they don't care what you call them. They aren't afraid of the public's opinion of them. If only their farm was close by and not 3,000 miles away…if only.
See this from Wikipedia…
See this from Polyface Farms…
At Polyface they allow....even welcome people to see their farm. That cannot be said for the huge corporations that grow chickens, beef and pigs for the Western Diet. I, too, wish there was a Polyfarms within 100 miles where I could buy real food.
ReplyDeleteMaybe you'll get a Polyface farm...
ReplyDeleteHere in Toronto we have Rowe Farms (www.rowefarms.ca), a co-op of conscientious meat farmers who farm outside of Toronto and operate a small chain of butcher shops in the city. It was started by a veterinarian, Dr. Rowe. I'm hoping they'll be economically successful and be a model copied by other wannabe conscientious farmers.
The downside of course is it's expensive to buy high quality food, and that limits who has access to it.