by Guadamour
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
Guadamour’s blog post
March 09, 2009
Agriculture in the US is directly contributing to chronic disease by providing quantities of low-quality food to the public.
Agriculture expert Professor Michel Pollan recently wrote in an article in the New York Times, “Agriculture has been turned into a hugely profitable ‘agribusiness-‘ one that has completely lost its focus on providing nutritionally healthy food.”
The US agribusiness industry accounts for nearly one-fifth of the nation’s gross national product and employs almost 25% of it’s labor force (there are even more people involved if one accounts for everyone involved in the transportation of the alleged food products). Two percent of that work force grows the food. The other 23% is busy refining, processing, chemically treating and packaging the alleged food product.
As early as the 1930s studies by the USDA showed that the quality of crops produced was deteriorating because of the depletion of the mineral content of the soil. Nothing has been done to restore this exhausted mineral content since that time.
Large amounts of wheat, soy and rice are grown solely for the purpose of turning them into fast and easy foods filled with empty (oftentimes negative detrimental) calories. The US Federal, poorly administered and bought and paid for, government subsidizes these crops to keep the prices appetizingly and unhealthily low.
When the government (of We The Corporation) subsidizes the corn industry, and the prices stay low, it’s much cheaper to create unhealthy food ingredients like high fructose corn syrup. Numerous studies have shown that high fructose corn syrup contributes directly and greatly to the obesity and diabetes epidemics that threaten to swamp the nation’s healthcare system.
Cheap corn is used in sodas, fast foods and feed for industrially raised animals. Inexpensive soy is turned into hydrogenated soy oil-loaded with health destroying trans fat used to fry fast foods (poisons). Trans fats are well-known factors in both heart disease and cancer and significantly contribute to a number of other diseases.
Historically the United States of America has been known as a nation of farmers. It is sadly ironic that a large portion of the food crops produced in this once great country are now nutritionally hollow.
This all came about after WWII. After that war huge amounts of illegal nerve gas were left over. The government needed a profitable way to dispose of it. The surplus gas was modified into insecticides and promoted to farmers.
The foods produced after this time have largely been covered in chemicals! Many if not most of these poisons have been found to deadly dangerous after decades of use.
After the introduction of insecticides, modern “agribusiness” unleashed the concept of “Monoculture.” Monoculture agriculture flies in the face of history of domestic agriculture up to that time. Monoculture-the planting of a single crop year in and year out-allowed for higher crop yields, increased production and easier availability of cheaper, unhealthy foods on already depleted soil.
Monoculture created an ecological vacuum in which insects and disease could flourish as they adapted to a single crop. This meant spraying more and more petroleum-based insecticides every year to defeat the more adaptive pests, as well as more and more inorganic fertilizers to force production from the impoverished soil.
Of course, GIANT Agriculture firms benefited from this.
Over the years, farmers battled with this vicious cycle of planting a single crop and over spraying and fertilizing their fields. To show a profit, the market demanded huge yields, forcing farmers to become more and more dependent on the all-encompassing agriculture industry to keep their farms afloat.
The agricultural companies control everything-the seed market, the transport process, the processing factories, et cetera.
As struggling farmers made less and less, agricultural firms made more and more.
Monsanto (largely controlled by Rockefeller interests), a giant seed and chemical company, developed the insecticide Roundup which is used in large quantities on farms. Roundup killed the bugs, but it also killed the farmers’ seeds. In response, Monsanto developed genetically engineered “Roundup-Ready” seeds that are resistant to the Roundup poison, thus marketing a solution to a problem they created.
In the 1990s Monsanto spent roughly $8 billion buying up other seed companies, including over 11,000 patents. Monsanto understood whoever controls the seeds controls food supply. They have patented their seeds and have aggressively pursued prosecution of anyone not paying for the use of their seeds. This has happened worldwide and prevents farmers from holding back some of their crop to be used as seed for the coming years’ crop. It has led to the suicide of thousands of indebted farmers in India and elsewhere.
The average US citizen, and citizens throughout the world, eat insecticide-laden, genetically-altered produce and bags and boxes of processed and chemically treated alleged foods. Welcome to the Agribusinesses Adulterated Food Industry.
Part of the agribusiness model is to grow and process foods in centralized locations and then ship across the country in 18-wheelers. This consumes huge quantities of rapidly disappearing fossil fuels. Growing food locally would save an immense quantities of precious natural resources.
Additionally, almost all fertilizers and pesticides used on monoculture crops are petroleum based. Millions and millions of gallons of petroleum are needed to grind down and process these nutritionally deficient foods.
The US agriculture industry uses 10 calories of fossil fuel for every calories of food they produce and transport! This defies logic and shows the unsustainable nature of the current situation.
Furthermore, with a centralized location and production system, a single incident of contamination can affect millions and millions of people.
The recent “Farm Bill” sounds great, like its giving a helping-hand to hard-working farmers. The reality is that the “Farm Bill” is loaded with goodies that benefit agribusiness corporations-the same subsidized ones producing nutritionally gutted foods and who only care about their own profits.
The agricultural industry uses its political influence to get their people in place. They use their political ties to keep prices down and profits up for the likes of Coca-Cola and McDonalds while contributing to the declining health of the country’s citizens.
As long as the propagandized public demands “fake foods,” this unhealthy trend will continue and the nation’s health will continue to deteriorate.
One out of every three children in the USA, on an average, eats at a fast food restaurant everyday!
One can buck this horrible trend by putting in a garden and growing their own food, and encouraging their communities to set aside growing plots for its citizens
Additionally, it never hurts to write your representative and senators and let them know how you think, stating that you will actively campaign against them if they don’t get on the bandwagon to do something about this deplorable situation.
see
www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h875/ (H.R. 875)
www.opencongress.org/bill/111-s425/ (S. 425)
Raids on Seeds (LIFE, itself) … by Monsanto By Linn Cohen-Cole
The World According to Monsanto – A documentary that Americans won’t ever see (video)
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Filed under: Action Alert, Business, Corporations, Corporations Really Suck, Dandelion Salad Featured Writers, Dandelion Salad Posts News Politics and-or Videos 2, Food, Health, Monsanto, Politics Tagged: | Activism - Protests - Boycotts, Food on Dandelion Salad, Guadamour
[...] Nutritionally Depleted Food Robs The Public of Its Health by Guadamour [...]
[...] Nutritionally Depleted Food Robs The Public of Its Health by Guadamour [...]
[...] Nutritionally Depleted Food Robs The Public of Its Health by Guadamour [...]
[...] Nutritionally Depleted Food Robs The Public of Its Health by Guadamour [...]
And now they’re trying to say that vitamin supplements are “nutritionally worthless”?
P.S. – Sorry, forgot to tell you great post!
Thanks, Catseye!
Very informative article. It is sad that the country is allowing its agricultural resources and food nutrition to decline. No one in government seems to be even aware of the possibly very severe future problems in store if we allow our soil to continue to be depleted on such a large scale. I only eat organic, as it makes no sense to allow the quality of one’s diet to be diminished like this.
And now they’re trying to say that vitamin supplements are “nutritionally worthless”?
That doesn’t make sense at all, does it? Vitamin supplements are probably what is most needed in our poor quality food that we consume.
[...] Nutritionally Depleted Food Robs The Public of Its Health by Guadamour [...]
[...] Nutritionally Depleted Food Robs The Public of Its Health by Guadamour [...]