Exporting our Flawed Food System

NPR shared two significant stories about our food system today. One story told of an industrial farm community's lack of good food, and the other told of a plan to boost industrial farm aid to poor nations.

From the ongoing series Hidden Kitchens by the Kitchen Sisters came Central Valley Disconnect: Rich Land, Poor Nutrition. The story details how California's Central Valley, one of the largest producers of fruits and vegetables, has very little healthy food to eat. "... the children of this valley rarely taste those fruits and vegetables." The poverty of these farming communities creates major health disparities. Residents and public health workers are trying to overcome the obesogenic environment through walking clubs and farm stands at schools and farmer's markets.

And from the news: the G8 meeting pledged 20 billion dollars in food aid for Africa. President Obama said, "There's no reason why Africa shouldn't be able to feed itself." NPR's Planet Money blog seemed to laud the decision in the post G8's New Approach to Hunger.

"Today's G8 announcement of $20 billion for food aid actually takes a fairly revolutionary step. Instead of just delivering food, G8 countries are going to help poor countries develop their agriculture industries. It's almost like a farming stimulus, only provided by outside countries rather than local governments. The American share of that pledge is about $3.5 billion, which would be a doubling of previous hunger spending."

It sound great- right? "Teach a man how to fish..." But here's the problem- the biotech industry in behind this aid push and the biotech industry doesn't have a good track record in helping to feed the world's poor. Environmental, economic, and human woes have been the primary outcomes of the biotech agenda. Basically, with biotech, instead of growing food to feed themselves, the small farmers grow food for the world market The industrial farming techniques bankrupt the soil and the farmers. Instead of saving seed, like farmer's have done since the dawn of agriculture, farmer's must buy patented GMO seed and fertilizer and pesticides, year after year, form giant corporations like Monsanto, then they are subject to world market forces larger than themselves, ultimately reaping prices for their crops that can't sustain them. They go hungry while biotech gets rich. In India- the disastrous result has been horrific epidemics of farmer suicides and food riots.

Civil Eats explored this topic back in June in the article, All That Glitters is Not Gold: Biotechnology Has Failed Us, So Why Promote It Abroad? In the post, Paula Crossfield connects some of the dots between big ag and food insecurity. "Meanwhile, here in the US, 36 million people are food insecure, and yet we are one of the biggest agricultural producers in the world." In her interview with global food policy expert and Stuffed and Starved author Raj Patel, he says, "Everyone agrees that African farmers need support. But this story is like the vacuum cleaner salesman who dumps dirt on your floor to show you how his product can pick some of it up."

While food policy folks have been arguing for years to solve the problem of hunger by increasing aid for agriculture, this move by the G8 seems more like aid to biotech. Industrial ag can not feed people without lots of oil and water and profits for big ag companies. Real agro-ecological alternatives that respect a culture's food traditions are the only long term solution.

Sustainable Nutrition Bottomline:

Industrial ag does not solve world hunger, in many cases it perpetuates it as it keeps control of resources in the hands of the few. If millions of people across the United States are going hungry each day and millions of people are overweight while undernourished-why would we export our flawed food system? Feeding people nourishing food requires a transformation in the way we grow and think about food.

Placing good food within reach

With our summer solstice dinner featuring spinach, mache, lettuces, mustard, snow peas, strawberries, garlic scapes, and herbs, from the garden, it was easy to believe for an evening that good food is within easy reach. Though this backyard garden harvest was not truly easy, per se, as many hours go into planting, tending, harvesting, cleaning, preparing food from the garden- the unfortunate reality is that the food within easy reach for most Americans is bad food. The food that is most easily accessible, both financially and most convienently, is processed food that offers little nutrition- in schools, in the corner stores, and in the fast food outlets that litter our streets. So how can we design our lives, individually and collectively, so that our food actually nourishes us?

What we must consider in order to create a functional food system is a fundamental shift in the way we go about procuring our food. Eating real good food takes some thought. On a personal level, this means spending more time on food preparation and planning- planting, visting farms and markets, cooking, preserving...or spending money for someone to do this for you. On a community level it can mean making land available for urban gardens, supporting neighborhood programs to teach kids and adults to grow and cook food, changing ordinances to allow composting and hen keeping and opening community kitchens. On a national level it means reprioritizing nutrition and changing our industrial-get-big-or-get-out-cheap-food farm policies.

And certainly, we must first acknowledge that our food system is dysfunctional. Not only has the quality and safety of our food system suffered by making production so large, energy intensive, and cheap, it has hidden environmental, health, and financial (in current subsidy system) costs that disproportionately harm people with little incomes or social safety nets.

In an exciting development in the movement to change our food system, the new food movie, FOOD Inc, promises to "lift the veil on our nation's food industry" and offer up some solutions. Watch the trailer here and visit the website to learn more.



Sustainable Nutrition Bottomline:
Learn about your food, share what you learn, and act on it- work to get more good food within reach. Spend more time planning and making your meals- for the week, for the season, and for the years to come. Weekly plans can include visiting a farmers market, cooking dinners, and bringing your lunch to work. Season plans can include getting a CSA share, farm trips, preserving food and growing a garden. And long term plans can include planting perennials or fruit trees, moving to a location that allows for more food production, or investing in local farms.

Industrial Nutrition

Good food guru Michael Pollan was recently interviewed on Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now show. You can watch, listen, or read the transcription on the Democracy Now website. In the interview, he mentions having to revise the rules he urged readers to consider when choosing real food (as opposes to edible-food-like-substances- think yogurt vs. gogurt.) in his book “In Defense of Food- An Eater’s Manifesto.” Apparently, food industry marketers read his book too: in response to Pollan's rules urging folks not to eat any food with more than 5 ingredients and to avoid high fructose corn syrup, the ever clever marketers have come out with products that co-opt these ideas: he names Hagen-Daz "5", and the “real sugar” (not HFCS) campaigns of Snapple and soon Coke. What this all means is “business as usual”: bad products still get sold and our real underlying problems don't get addressed.

While the food industry continues to deliver new and improved products that promise to bring consumers health and happiness with some even claiming to be "green", this status quo approach does little to address the underlying problems related to the general public's food illiteracy or our environmental woes. Most people have little understanding of where food comes from or how our food system impacts the planet, let alone their own health. As a registered dietitian, I've taken it upon myself to add this type of basic food system education to my job description as a nutrition educator. By exploring the very foundations of our industrial food system, we all can better understand all the ways in which this system fails to deliver healthy, sustainable, and delicious food for everyone. When health professionals learn the basics of the food system, they can more effectively address the compound issues their clients and communities are facing. What follows is an explanation of certain key issues related to health and the food system and resources for further information.

Industrial Nutrition 101: A system both inefficient & unsustainable

Our modern, industrial food system has become increasingly complex since the industrial revolution. This energy intensive, heavy input system creates huge amount of waste—each step in the elongated process of getting food to mouths requires the use of fossil fuels, fertilizers, and/or chemicals and ends up creating waste problems in the form of CO2, trash, chemical run-off, and animal manure. One problem that exemplifies this system’s inefficiencies is the problems that result when manure becomes a waste product instead of valuable farm input. In an almost ironic twist, the nitrogen that makes manure such a great fertilizer makes it absolutely devastating to rivers, lakes, and streams when large amounts of untreated animal waste from factory farms is allowed to seep into our waterways. But at each step, this system operates without regard to climate change and as if the earth’s resources are inexhaustible—which they most certainly are not.

Not only is the industrial food system energy intensive, wasteful, and convoluted- it is inefficient at it's very core. The US food system uses more energy than it creates. Over 7 times more—meaning that when you eat food produced in the industrial food system, for every kilocalorie of food you eat, 7 kilocalories (or equivalent) have been used up to produce and transport that food to you. See the University of Michigan’s Center for Sustainable Systems Fact Sheet, “US Food System” for further details on this and for references.

These ineffieciencies can’t go on forever. The twin problems of climate change and peak oil force us to change strategies. You know about climate change certainly, even the most skeptical scientists will acknowledge its existence, if not it's cause. But what is this epic problem "peak oil," you might ask. It’s simply the peak amount of oil we can produce within nature and humankind's limit. Peak oil is an un-debatable physical phenomenon- the only piece of this reality that can be debated if when its going to happen and who it will hurt first. Some peak oil experts say the peak of our ability to produce oil has already occurred, others forecast it in the next few years. The end of our oil based economy doesn’t just mean we have to wean ourselves off big cars- it means we have to change the way we farm, produce, and procure our food- or many more people in the world go hungry. It means that we will have to change the way we go about our lives- from buying presents to building homes to accessing healthcare.

Industrial Nutrition: Public health takes note

The world of public health is beginning to take peak oil seriously- not only for concerns surrounding food security and hunger, but also healthcare delivery. This past March, the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health hosted a conference on Peak Oil and Health. Speaker’s included a congressman, the director of the CDC’s National Center for Environmental Health, economists, and public health officials. The conference aimed to connect the dots between peak oil, climate change, the built environment, and declining ecosystems, to describe the potential impacts of peak oil on the public health sector, and to explore solutions. Presentation slides are available online.

Industrial Nutrition: Resources & Solutions

Interested in learning more about peak oil? Check out the Oil Drum- an important resource for peak oil activist's whose opinion I hold in high esteem. This will link you to an Oil Drum article on Ecological Economics and the Food System. For communities and people interested in building resilience and finding solutions; Transition Town offers a construct to help people, neighborhoods, cities, and so on to work together to address issues relating to transitioning to a more sustainable human-scaled economy.

Sustainable Nutrition Bottom Line: The industrial food system has little to offer in the way of real solutions to our health and planetary problems. It is essential we begin working to drastically change the dynamics of our food system. What can you do? Learn. Build your local, sustainable food economy by supporting local farmers using low energy intensive growing methods. Plant food. Connect with others in your community and work collectively to find creative ways to address climate change, peak oil, and health.

Planting the Seeds of Hope

Gardeners across the country are giddy with spring: watching life sprout from seeds always fills one with hope.

This must be one of the reasons why so many people are returning to gardening this year: record seed sales, garden initiatives, organized seed swaps, and a much hoped for kitchen garden on the "First Lawn"! On April 9th, the Michelle Obama planted the first seedlings. The vegetables grown are meant to be eaten in the White House and shared with a local meal site for the homeless. On the garden, Mrs Obama said "In many countries they really believe in the importance of planting and growing their own food." She also emphasized the economic benefit of kitchen gardening. You can see a map of the garden by clicking here.

A kitchen garden is one of the most healthful, economical, and ecological options for filling your plate.

For your own edible landscape project check out the Kitchen Gardeners International.

Locally, in Milwaukee, the Victory Garden Initiative is growing. Check it out for resources, updates on the Memorial Day Gardening Blitz, and to learn how you can get involved.

Renewing Food Traditions

Kanin Rouston teaching apple grafting. Photo by Mark Dohm

Renewing America's Food Traditions (RAFT) alliance is a network of people and organizations dedicated to identifying and restoring food and food traditions that are in danger of being lost...

From a nutrition professional's perspective, this loss of food traditions in inseparable from the decline in our collective health: the rise in type 2 diabetes, heart disease, obesity, and certain cancers can be traced to our change in food ways.  Not only have the foods we eat changed, but the way we go about procuring food and eating food has changed dramatically in the past several decades.  RAFT initiatives help restore some of our important traditional foodways to our landscapes and our plates.  

RAFT has become a true force for good under the watch of author, ethno-botanist, and advocate Gary Nabhan.  Founding members of the RAFT alliance include the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, the Center for Sustainable Environments, Chefs Collaborative,Cultural Convervancy, Native Seeds/SEARCH, Seeds Savers Exchange, and Slow Food USA.  Each organization contributes in their own area of expertise.  An example of this synergistic work is the Ark of Taste: Slow Food USA's catalogue of delicious foods in danger of extinction.  Slow Food facilitates the Ark of Taste program, Seeds Savers Exchange offers Ark of Taste heirloom seeds to their customers, and Chefs Collaborative encourages chefs to use Ark of Taste foods on their menus.

Recently, I was privelaged to attend several RAFT events in Madison, WI, focusing on heritage apples.  What follows is my excerpt from the Slow Food Wisconsin Southeast spring newsletter.

While perhaps the most beloved of American fruits, our dear apple’s diversity is in decline.

“The diversity of heirloom apples historically found in American orchards, backyards and hedgerows—upwards of 16,000 distinct named varieties—is greater than the diversity found in any other crop domesticated here or introduced to this continent. Now, the bad news: the number of apple varieties considered to be at risk of being lost from American landscapes and tables is also greater than that for any other kind of food— fruit, vegetable, livestock breed, fish or game.”

- From the Renewing America’s Food Tradition Forgotten Fruits Manual & Manifesto

But recently, apple advocates gathered at the UW-Arboretum in Madison to collaborate on ways to restore biodiversity to our orchards, markets, and plates. The Renewing America’s Food Traditions (RAFT) alliance, Slow Food USA, and Slow Food Madison coordinated a series of events dedicated to this fair pomme. A Forgotten Fruits Summit, a Heritage Orchard Restoration Workshop, an artisanal cider tasting, and a Great Lakes Food at Risk Workshop all took place in late March.

Of the Forgotten Fruits Summit, Slow Food Madison’s Heidi Busse said, “It was a truly historic event and the first (and possibly only) time that this group of fruit experts come together. Had it not been for the gathering that Dr. Gary Nabhan organized, this fruit knowledge may have been entirely lost and forgotten. This was a national gathering of apple growers, historians, authors and advocates who came together to talk about threatened apple varieties and discuss strategies for restoring apples in the landscape (and how to train a new generation of orchardists).”

At the Heritage Orchard Restoration Workshop, beginning growers learned from apple experts. A visit to Dan Bussey’s orchard (with over 200 varieties of apple trees) and an abandoned homestead orchard gave participants some field experience in grafting and tending trees.

The cider tasting featured delightful cider and cheese pairings, including an artisan cider made by Aeppeltreow, a winery located within Brightenwoods Orchard here in SE Wisconsin. http://www.aeppeltreow.com/ The tasting was preceded by inspirational readings by RAFT’s Gary Nabhan, Ark of Taste co-chair Ben Watson, and Aldo Leopold land conservationist Curt Meine.

The Great Lakes Region’s Food at risk workshop brought together wild food experts, fisherman, farmers, orchardists, health professionals, educators, and chefs to review, edit, and add to a list of all foods at risk in the region. A draft version of the list can be found on Slow Food USA’s website.  A publication of Renewing the Food Traditions of the Great Lakes is due to come out later this year.

To learn more about RAFT and the Ark of Taste, visit Slow Food USA’s program pages at slowfoodusa.org. 

Industrial Grade Sweeteners

The Corn Refiners Association was recently dismayed by a study finding detectable mercury in 31% of sampled products sweetened with High Fructose Corn Syrup.   After a multi million dollar industry ad campaign to promote HFCS's safety "in moderation... just like any sugar", written about here last year,  the CRA is now hard pressed to to make the "just like any sugar" case when their product has a secret ingredient most people don't want to ingest.   

Tom Philpott has written an excellent article outlining the peer-reviewed report published by the journal of Environmental Health on Gristmill.  

The CRA of course finds fault with the study, you can read their outraged press release here. 

One might ask at this point, how does mercury get into HFCS in the first place.  The CRA would tell you that the mercury found could have come from anywhere and furthermore, "the amounts of mercury the authors and the IATP purport to have found in food products containing HFCS are far below levels of concern set by the U.S> FDA and the EPA."   But the fact of the matter is that this highly toxic chemical can be traced to two of the many chemicals used to create HFCS.  And the millions of parents with HFCS-guzzling children may want to rethink how "natural" this sweetener made from corn truly is...

Now the American Dietetic Association, which is in part bankrolled by food industry moguls such as Coca Cola, stands by the assertion that HFCS is "nutritionally equivalent to sucrose."  And this is true, strictly speaking, when talking about weight or blood sugar control.  But when are we as a profession, going to admit that food is more than the sum of its parts?  While calorically similar, HFCS is a product of the industrialized agricultural and food system.  The ADA states in a white paper on the subject, "HFCS is a controversial topic and although not all nutrition professionals will readily accept the scientific evidence, this paper represents an evidenced-based, balanced perspective."  Well- this nutrition professional believes this is a very narrow view of one of the quintessential controversies of our time.  

Bottom line:  

While HFCS is calorically equivalent to other sweeteners, it may contain traces of mercury and stems from an industrial food system that does not support health and wellness of people or places.  Choose more sustainable options such as honey, maple syrup, and organic, fair-trade sugar to sweeten your day, in moderation of course ;)

50% less Meat

The next twenty minutes you have free, you should watch this online video of food writer Mark Bittman on TED. Bittman’s work has been featured in an earlier blog post: “Meat’s Deep Eco-Footprint”.

The Center for a Livable Future explains:

He calls attention to the lop-sided USDA food pyramid, the contribution of
industrial food animal production to climate change, and gives a pretty good
recap of how the American diet has changed in the last century.

Many gems can be found in this short segment. He connects the hyperconsumption of animal products and junk food to our health and climate crisis as well as the “death of the real community.” On the subject of nutritionism he says, “Its not the beta-carotene, it’s the carrot.”
He also proposes American’s cut their meat consumption in half and that we stop raising animals industrially and "stop eating them thoughtlessly". Bravo!

We all need to act individually and collectively if we want to improve the world we live in. Eating less meat and more plants is an individual action that, collectively, can have major impact.

Animal products are not needed for health, but they can be a part of a healthy diet. Animals raised right, such as grass fed beef and bison, can actually improve an ecosystem. But our planet cannot support our current (and growing)meat habit.

Sustainable Nutrition Recommendation:

If you eat animal products, choose small amounts of appropriately raised meat- grass fed beef and bison, organic pastured chicken and eggs, heritage pigs fed a varied diet, and wild fish not at risk of extinction.

Gardens for Change

A Victory Garden on the White House lawn seems a no brainer to me:

the most influential house in the nation + edible garden

= inspiration for more gardens

President-elect Barack Obama has pledged to "open the doors of government" and asks us "to be involved in your own democracy again" on his change.org site. To speed this along, staffers have created an open forum to propose and vote on ideas for change. The 10 ideas with the most votes will be presented to the Obama on Jan 16th. Ideas for change range from "Free Single payer Healthcare" to "End the War in Iraq" to "Make the grid green in 10 years" to "Forgive student loans" and many ideas in between.

I cast my first vote for "Victory Gardens 2.0"- not because the other ideas aren't important, they are, but because in a time when a we are facing several major crises, simple, practical, and beautiful solutions should be considered. Gardening for change addresses health, environmental stewardship, resource conservation, hunger and economics. As a dietitian, I like to start health promotion and disease prevention from the ground up.

Voting ends on January 15th. Vote now.

Celebrate the Seasons with Local Flavors

My contribution to the December Slow Food WiSE newsletter...

Imagine what it must have been like, a century ago, for a Wisconsin boy or girl to get an orange in their Christmas stocking. The exotic scent of citrus, the hint of sun, the golden juice... In a time when oranges are ubiquitous year-round, it might be hard to understand how special a short seasoned, far flung fruit might have been for a child. Eating locally and seasonally, for the great majority of history, has been the only option. The truth is that so many of our familial, food, and holiday traditions have gone by the wayside in lieu of bigger portions, faster foods, more gifts... The food traditions of the holiday season have long been connected to the ecology of the immediate world around us- and if we keep this in mind when choosing our celebratory foods, we might gain a deeper appreciation of the place we call home.

Winter in Wisconsin (with nary a ripe tomato to be found) is home to many lovely cold weather, and year round foods. Highlighting some of our region's special foods for menus and gifts at holiday gatherings promotes community and often inspires story telling. Nationwide, Slow food USA's Ark of Taste and Renewing Americas Food Traditions Alliance are two important programs that are aimed at saving endangered foods and preserving America's Food Traditions. Many Ark of Taste products, such as Sorghum Syrup, are grown, raised, or produced in the Mid-west. To learn more, go to the national website: www.slowfoodusa.org.

Consider the following Wisconsin foods for your winter gatherings:
* Cheeses
* Jams, Jellies and Preserves
* Storage Fruits & Vegetables
* Grains
* Maple syrup and honey
* Meat, Fish, and Fowl

Resources for finding local Wisconsin foods:
Farm Fresh Atlas of Southeastern Wisconsin
Local Harvest
Savor Wisconsin
Eat Wild
Milwaukee Community Supported Agriculture Initiative

Sickeningly Sweet

Two of this year's food marketing campaigns have captured my attention for their sheer audacity. 

The first, a "documentary" style ad portraying the introduction of Burger King's Whopper to people around the world unfamiliar with fast food.  The second, a series of industry ads to promote high fructose corn syrup.

The premise of the Whopper Virgins piece is a team (including an "independent researcher") traveling the world to find people who have never tried a hamburger (aka; the virgins) for a Whopper vs Big Mac taste test.  The Hmong, Inuit, and Romanian taste testers seemed to prefer the Whopper enough to warrant helicopter-ing in an authentic Burger King flame broiler for a town wide Whopper party in each taster's community.   The ad shows people trying and liking the burgers so much they offer gifts and extend invitations for many happy returns. What it doesn't show us is the long term affect of eating poor quality, factory farmed beef on a refined flour bun on a regular basis.  

History shows us that the colonization of peoples' traditional diet with the western diet of highly processed, refined foods leads to chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, and certain cancers.  Time and time again, the transition of people from their tried and true traditional diets of naturally lean meats, whole grains, fruits, and vegetables to our fast food culture has been detrimental to their health.  No story seems more drastic to me than that of the Pima Indians of the Southwest United States- a people with almost no recorded Type 2 Diabetes at the turn of the 20th century now have the highest rates of Type 2 Diabetes in the world.  As their traditional farming and gathering practices diminished due to governmental policies and their reliance upon commodities of white flour, sugar, and lard increased, their rates of chronic diseases skyrocketed. 

Over two thirds of American adults and one third of American children are overweight or obese. The CIA World Fact Book estimates that in 2008, the U.S. ranks 46th for life expectancy world wide.  Our diet related chronic diseases continue to rise to epidemic proportions.  These are all issues that warrant consideration as we continue exporting our food ways to the rest of the world.

In a slightly different vein, the promotional ads for High Fructose Corn Syrup  brought to us by the Corn Refiner's Association are designed to counter the negative press HFCS has been getting over the past several years by deflecting and confusing the audience.

 

In one unsettling piece, a concerned mother confronts the hostess mom serving HFCS sweetened juice drink to children at a party.  The concerned mom lacks any data to explain her concern and the host mom smugly explains that HFCS is made from corn, doesn't have artificial ingredients, and, just like any other sugar; is fine in moderation.   

The problem with this is that of course, high fructose corn syrup is not enjoyed in moderation-Americans consumed over 60 pounds of it per person in 2004.  As the preferred cheap sweetener of food manufacturers, HFCS has made it's way into most of our convenience foods and sweetened beverages.  There is a huge amount of  controversy over HFCS in both political and scientific realms.  Some say we can blame our skyrocketing obesity rates on HFCS's easy accessibility while others stick to the refrain that a calorie is a calorie whether its cane sugar, honey, or syrup...  

While it can be debatable that HFCS accounts for our nation's excess pounds, what is definitely true is that our governmental policies promote the manufacturing and use of HFCS.  Both our corn subsidies which provide the bankroll for monocrops of corn and our tariffs on imported cane sugar keep HFCS cheap and easy.  Not only is this a problem from a nutritional perspective (we should be subsidizing fruits and vegetables if we want people to eat better) this creates a huge environmental impact.  Energy intensive, pesticide laden, genetically modified corn planted fence row to fence row is eroding our topsoil, polluting our water, and spewing carbon into the atmosphere.  While scientists continue to debate whether HFCS promotes excess calorie consumption, insulin resistance, and harmful carbonyls compounds in our bodies we must broaden the conversation to include the harmful impact the over consumption of this sweetener has on our planet.

In response to the Corn Refiner's ads, several parodies have been posted, including one that seems to compare HFCS to the Nazi scoundrels from an Indiana Jones movie.

Petition for Change

The nation's next president is expected to soon decide on his Secretary of Agriculture.  This important role impacts food, nutrition programs, jobs, and the environment.  A petition to request that Obama consider certain  key candidates outside the fold of the industrial ag lobby is circulating on the web.  Brought to us by many of the same folks who drafted the Food Declaration, I urge everyone who cares about good, clean, and fair food to sign the Food Democracy Now petition.  

Pollan on PBS

This evening on PBS, Bill Moyers conducted a captivating interview with sustainable food guru Michael Pollan on his weekly show. The lively discussion highlighted the effects our food system has on our health, the economy, the environment, and global food security. As solutions to our failing food policies, Pollan recommended (as he has done in his articles and books) that by engaging in the simple, yet powerful acts of gardening and cooking, "you declare your independence from the culture of fast food."

To read the transcript, listen to the podcast, view the vodcast, and find links visit the show's website.

Thankfully

Heritage turkeys from Top o' the Hill Farm in Northwestern Illinois.

This Thanksgiving, I am most thankful to share good, clean, and fair food with loved ones.

Thankfully there is healthy soil, sun, air, and water for food.

Thankfully there are mindful people to raise the plants and animals that ended up gracing our plates...

I am especially thankful for these things because they are at risk: our topsoil is quickly disappearing, our climate is changing, our air and water has become unsafe in communities all over the world. The irony is that the very food system dependent upon these natural resources is ruining them.

While our holiday table bounded with roots and vegetables from our garden and our farmer friends' fields, possibly our biggest, or maybe our newest, adventure was finding the locally raised, organic, heritage Bourbon Red turkey we feasted on. After seeking out this treasure, it was comforting to see the farm our turkey was raised on and to know that the way it was raised led to healthy meat. Grass fed, foraged birds, that are supplemented with organic feed, and who have access to plenty of fresh air while roaming the wide out of doors are naturally better for the eaters.

Heritage breeds preserve tradition and flavor and our health. Find out more about heritage animals from the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy which works to promote the preservation of these endangered breeds. Heritage turkeys can be purchased through Local Harvest or Slow Food Chicago's Turkey project.

Seeds of Hope

The seeds of hope have been planted with Obama's election to the presidency. Now the world is watching to see if these seeds will grow and the sustainable food community is abuzz with the recipes for growth (literally). Politics determine the policies that determine the health and wellness of our society. Whether Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Green, Independent, or Other, the next president of the United States will have an impact on your world.

A number of recent articles & weblogs celebrate Obama's position on food while others urge reform and offer recommendations to the new administration for promoting food justice, public health, and sustainable agriculture.

• From Slow Food USA: Yes We Can: Change Our Broken Food System
• From Grist: Michael Pollan and other food authors and activists offer their elevator pitches for Obama
• From FamilyFarmed.org: Obama to Support Local and Organic Food
• From FarmAid: Willie Nelson's Open Letter to Obama
• From Marion Nestle's What To Eat Blog: Who Will Obama Appoint?

Food & Politics

Michael Pollan's open letter to the next president "Farmer in Chief" is required reading for anyone intersted in how our food system plays into the healthcare crisis, the energy crisis, and the climate crisis. My hope is that the candidates are interested enough in the topic to read it...

The above picture parody comes from a recent article posted on Grist "Politics and the Dinner Table-Weighing Obama's and McCain's stances on food and farm policy".

The Practicality of Local Foods

As part of the Live Local Milwaukee initiative, yesterday the Paths to a Sustainable Future Group held a free Sustainable Living conference at the Urban Ecology Center. I participated in a panel discussion titled “Are Local Foods Really Practical? For Me? In SE WI?” along with Young Kim of the Fondy Food Market, Jay Salinas of Growing Power and the Wormfarm Institute, David Kozlowski of Pinehold Gardens and the CSA Initiative and moderated by Martha Davis Kipcak of Slow Food WiSE & the Kitchen Table Project.

I answered the question put to the panel by saying, “From a time & money perspective; no, local foods are not practical. However, it is impractical to continue business as usual.”

Business as usual when it comes to our foodways will only sink us deeper into the mire of climate change, land loss, water pollution, malnutrition, chronic disease, depletion of our precious topsoil, devastating loss of biodiversity and cultural diversity. We have gotten too big for our britches and we can’t expect to continue a food system that is propped up by cheap oil.

Re-localization of food systems is our only hope.

Our panel discussed many of the challenges facing us in terms of local food systems; capacity, land preservation, training farmers, creating distribution systems & small processing facilities, time, money, and general resistance to doing things differently. One of the themes that surfaced was our social value system- currently speedy, efficient, cheap foods allow us to get on with our hectic schedules of multitasking until we collapse in front of the tv where we are blasted with ads for more speedy, efficient, cheap stuff.... Its time for a makeover.

Here are some further thoughts on the matter:

Cost:
The hidden costs of industrial agriculture and fast food are unbearable. We spend less percentage of our income on food now than ever in history. Only we end up paying for it in the end with healthcare costs, environmental costs, as well as the direct cost of subsidies for the tax payer.

Public Health:
We have an epidemic of chronic diseases that are directly tied to our food system. Diabetes, heart disease, obesity are all related to the way we eat.

In my day job, I work with people with chronic diseases to help them make healthy lifestyle changes to improve their health outcomes. The picture seems to me quite grim. I can tell you that it is almost impossible to improve your health when your community foodways have been replaced by fast food outlets, convenience stores or liquor stores, and commodity distributors.

Our species are not immune to the laws of nature. When you have bad food available, people will, most often, eat it. You can study genetics and hormones and such, but it all comes down to the fact that we are wired to eat. We need gardens, farmers markets, co-ops in every neighborhood. And people need to relearn what to do with real food. We need to build skills around growing, buying, cooking, and eating. These are essential tools for health promotion and disease prevention.

Nutrition:
We have well over 3000 calories available to each of us in this country. Most of that comes from substances formerly known as corn. This breakdown of calories does not support the dietary guidelines. Local foods tend to be less processed, more wholesome, and more pleasurable on every level.

In Wisconsin, It is possible for those dedicated locavores to have a well balanced diet by eating 100% local foods (the only true exception is salt) year round. All of our food groups are represented: grains & starches, fruits, vegetables, dairy, meat, beans, nuts, fats, sweeteners, even beer, wine, liquor! We live in a land of plenty and yet our commodity food comes from and creates lands of scarcity around the world.

Global Warming:
Our food system is a major contributor to global warming in the fertilization and chemical application of crops as well as the transportion of food stuffs around the globe. The average meal travels 1500 miles to from farnm to fork. When it come sto the standard American plate of meat and potatoes, I’ve seen figures as high as 22,000 miles. Purchasing foods from your region can reduce your carbon footprint.

Peak Oil:
Industrial agriculture relies on oil to make its engine go. Oil is a finite resource and many experts believe world wide production has peaked or is near peak levels. Re-learning how to grow and process food without major oil & petroleum inputs will ensure a smoother transition into a post carbon future.

Biodiversity:
Poly-culture can ensure good nutrition, support wildlife and soil conservation, and it can also put out a lot more food stuff than the monocrops of high yield corn that seem to be planted fence post to fence post around farming communities.

Elitism:
Do not let people tell you that local, good, clean, and fair foods are bourgeois. These are the foods of the people. Our globalized food system strips people around the world of their food sovereignty. The cheap processed fast food costs a lot for the folks who no longer subsistence farm, for the folks with clogged arteries and pending diabetes, for the planet and for future generations. 35 million Americans are at risk of food insecurity- this in the wealthiest nation in the world with an excess of food.

We need to be valuing our food and this means making good food more accessible to everyone. One of the first practical steps to make this inevitability equitable would be to subsidize the good food. A current practice example is the Senior Farmer’s Market Nutrition Program- which doesn’t give much to individual seniors to use at farmer's markets, but it’s a step in the right direction.

We can make a better food system by creating and supporting action & policies:

• Conserve land.
• Teach people to farm & garden.
• Make it affordable for young farmers to get started.
• Promote gardens in schools, churches, front lawns, neighborhoods, porches, and rooftops.
• Allow chickens & bees in urban areas.
• Farm Bill: Improve upon the newly enacted bill with increased local foods initiatives and nutrition programs..
• Demand that your local and national policy makers to make sustainable food a priority.

How a person can eat locally:

• Redesign your life. Make time for food.
• Ask for local foods at restaurants and stores.
• Pay more for food. Make it a much larger percentage of your income.
• Garden: get unplugged and dig in. This is good exercise too.
• Learn to cook and preserve foods.

Think|Taste|Trust

Think about where your food comes from and the power that lies within your choices.
Taste the difference of delicious, locally grown, & sustainably produced foods & beverages.
Trust the source of your food by meeting the people that grow and produce fresh, local foods.

These are some of the founding principles behind the local foods movement. And while the food system challenges we face are drastic and complex, it is important to remember that there are solutions and that they should be celebrated...

This Saturday in Milwaukee, we will be celebrating local flavors, farmers, chefs, producers, retailers, and food activists who are working together for a more sustainable food system at a local food festival.

Declaration for Healthy Food and Agriculture

An important effort in the world of sustainable food political activism was unveiled last week at Slow Food Nation: the Declaration for Heathly Food & Agriculture. You can read it, leave comments, and sign it online...

Draft Declaration

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Midsummer's Bounty

It’s mid summer and I dream of pickles….

These days, my spare hours are devoted to finding ways to cook, preserve, and eat our garden’s bounty. Freezing, canning, pickling, drying, have joined chopping, sautéing, roasting, grilling, and baking to become frequent visitors to my partner's and my routine.

This blog was started to explore issues surrounding eco-nutrition, but for the moment at least, I will change course to share a few visuals from my own eco eating adventure.

This season, I have neglected not only blogs, but hobbies, errands, travels, dear friends and favorite family members for a garden, an orchard, 4 chickens, and a couple of borrowed sheep…

The Incredible Edible Economical Ecological Egg

This spring of 2008 is full of important issues to blog about... the farm bill, food riots, high gas prices, colony collapse disorder, emergency food aid, food safety... but I must admit (to myself and my readers) that I haven't got time to post about all of those prescient issues because I'm focusing on what's going on in my own backyard.

I've been preoccupied with the health, happiness, and habits of our new hens- four sweet old rhode island red crosses who persist in providing us with fresh eggs each day while whistling a low trill to the apple blossoms above. Yes it is spring; and I'm living in wonderland. A once in a lifetime opportunity has brought my partner and I to a place where we can grow a large garden, keep a few animals, thank goodness for our good fortune, and reflect on the nature of eggs.

Eggs are amazing, nutrient rich, culinary stars. They play an undisputed starring role in omelets, frittatas, scrambles, scones, cakes, cookies, ice creams, souffles, tortes, meringues, custards, puddings, mayonnaises, bearnaises, crepes, and more.

Of course there is a bit of controversy about their contribution to our overall health picture- much demonized for their cholesterol content, heart healthy nutrition recommendations often recommend limiting egg yolk consumption to 3 yolks per week, with unlimited whites. I often see patients who have given up eggs due to there fear of cholesterol. To this I say- there is no correlation between dietary cholesterol and increased serum lipo-proteins. Studies show no increased risk of heart disease associated with egg consumption!

Eggs are low in saturated fat, trans fat, (the real drivers behind high cholesterol) total calories, and sodium. They are a good source of high biological value protein, and the yolks contain Vitamin D, lutein, beta-carotene, folic acid, choline, and possibly omega three fatty acids*. (*The composition of the egg is dependent upon what the chickens eat.) If the layers are free range, eat some grass and some grubs and are supplemented with good feed, the egg will be of significantly more nutritive value than the factory farmed look alikes.

Eggs are affordable and to avoid them or waste their nutritious yolks seems to me an extreme (and decidedly American style) reaction to an age old source of important nourishment and gastronomic pleasure. The egg replacements which have been the darlings of the specialized nutrition food product world are an industrialized alternative to the simple whole foods beauty of a free range, farm fresh egg. Give me yolks of a deep orange hue any day over the homogenized egg whites mixed with "natural flavorings" and stabilized with xantham gums that taste like the card board container they come out of...

If you are a health professional and have been spouting the American Heart Association's attitude you should give people the whole story (i.e., the AHA recommends no more than 3 yolks per week, but research shows no correlation between egg consumption and heart disease) instead of distilling it down because you think the whole story might be too complicated for "lay-people" to understand.

The Bottom Line:
In a time of increasing food insecurity, the egg is an affordable, healthy food option that can be produced sustainably fairly easily. Purchase eggs from local farmers. Keep your own hens. Many cities are allowing citizens to keep laying hens in their own backyards- treat your chickens well and you may have all the quiche you can eat.

I should be very clear that I do not recommend unlimited consumption of factory farmed eggs. The ecological footprint is large, the lives of the chickens are bleak, and the nutrition sub-par. Seek out and support the good stuff.

Find good eggs at http://www.eatwellguide.org. Let me know if you want to learn more about raising your own.