We as a human race and as a society have evolved and grown over time, so changes happening dramatically and some happening slowly. Every facet of human life has changed since the dawn of time. The food we eat know is much different than what our forefathers ate for the past hundreds and thousands of years, what’s startling is that “the way we eat has changed more in the last 50 years than in the previous 10,000”(Food Inc.). As a result of this the human body is struggling to adapt to the rapidly changing diet. Subsequently, humans are paying a high toll and the government does not seem to be doing anything to fix this.

Often times the journey that our food takes may seem simple taking it from the farm to our table, it is much more complex than that. The food arrives to our tables after it makes its way through a complex network of farms, slaughterhouses, transport systems, processing plants, and then finally to the grocery stores where we buy our food. In addition to all of this there is also a bureaucratic environment that complicates the process of getting the food from the farm to our tables even more difficult.

Being that the process of getting the food from the farm to the table involves so many different people, organizations, and processes there is a litany of experts on the topic. Each expert has their own knowledge on their individual area of expertise in the process. As a result of this, every expert has their own story to tell, or a set list of responses they can reply to interview questions that their company permits them to say. Subsequently these responses paint two polar opposite pictures of what actually goes on during the process of getting the food from the farm to the kitchen table. As a result of this, the journey is shrouded in secrecy that often results in the deceit of the customer, that could either leaving them feeling satisfied with their meal or feeling ill from the results of negligently handled food.

While the text argues that there needs to be more government regulations in regards to the handling of the food we eat, my own view is that the government does not have enough resources to do so, nor the power to do so because of the lobbying done by the industrial food complex. The United States government relies upon two agencies to thoroughly inspect the food that we as consumers eat. These two agencies are the United States Department of Agriculture(USDA) and the Food and Drug Administration(FDA). The USDA is tasked with inspecting and regulating the meats being processed at the slaughterhouses, the carcasses of animals, as well as poultry. Whereas the FDA is responsible for regulating drugs consumed by both humans and animals, tobacco, the safe and responsible transportation of food, and the additives that are put into food. Though these two agencies have different responsibilities, they are faced with the same issue, a stunning lack of resources to effectively complete the task they are given. The federal government employs about “700 FDA inspectors [who] must oversee 30,000 food manufacturers and processors, 20,000 warehouses, 785,000 commercial and institutional food establishments, 128,000 grocery and convenience stores, and 1.5 million vending operations”(Nestle). Similarly to this account, the USDA “has 7,000 inspectors or so, and they oversee 6,000 meat, poultry, and egg establishments –and– that slaughter and process 89 million pigs, 37 million cattle, and 7 billion chickens and turkeys, not to mention the 25 billion pounds of beef and 7 billion pounds of ground beef produced each year”(Nestle). Due to the tremendous responsibility that these organizations are tasked with, food that is not fit for human consumption often slips through the proverbial cracks and onto the dinner table.

Throughout the process of getting the food from the farm to the table, it becomes exposed to certain substances that can cause detrimental effects on human health. One particular foodborne illness that is common is the E. Coli virus. E. Coli bacteria is found in the digestive tracts of livestock, it becomes exposed to the consumer when the bacteria laden manure is used to fertilize crops. Though there is no way to eradicate the E. Coli bacteria found in the digestive tract of livestock, there is a way to reduce the chance of having food tainted by the bacteria, and that is the growing system utilized by the farmer. According to Blake Hurst there are two farming systems, those being the conventional approach and the organic approach. The conventional approach involves the use of chemical pesticides and fertilizers in order to help the plant grow and remain healthy. On the other hand, the organic method does not use such strong pesticides and fertilizers in favor of organic alternatives. After detailing the differences between the different farming methods he then goes on to say “organic foods were considerably less likely than conventional foods to have pesticide residues, although organic foods were higher in e. coli”(Hurst).

The issue of food safety recently garnered national attention when the popular fast food restaurant Chipotle recently had an E. Coli outbreak in some of their locations. The Center for Disease Control found that there were two different outbreaks of E. Coli. The first outbreak was much larger than the second one and “55 people in 11 states”(NPR) whereas the second outbreak “infected 5 people in Oklahoma, Kansas, and North Dakota”(NPR). Another thing that contributes to the issue of food safety is the food that livestock consumes before being slaughtered. In a report published by Consumer Report it was found that “10 percent to 30 percent of feed can differ radically from what cows and poultry would eat in their natural habitat”(Consumer Report). The purpose of doing so is that a farmer can fatten up their livestock in the most rapid and cost effective manner. However, this does come at a price, the difference in dietary substanance often has adverse health effects on the animal which in turn leads to the increased of foodborne illness on the consumer’s end.

Due to the attention that this food safety crisis caused, there has been an increased call for the government to step in and introduce stricter regulations regarding the safety of the food that we consume. As previously the government already employs two food regulatory agencies, those being the FDA and the USDA, however, they do not have the resources to effectively protect the general public. Though the government has tried to increase its regulatory power, special interest groups and the large agricultural companies lobby and try to prevent the federal government from being able to enact harsher regulations and legislation. The 2008 documentary regarding the U.S. agricultural system, Food Inc., reveals that during the Bush administration several of his appointed leaders were part of the special interest groups who would have suffered had tougher regulations been enacted. For example, the head of the FDA during his presidency, Lester M. Crawford Jr. was the former executive vice president of the National Food Processors Association. In addition to this, the appointed chief of  USDA James F. Fitzgerald was the former chief lobbyist for the beef industry in Washington. Coinciding with this, in 1998 meat and poultry associations used their influence by suing the USDA into stripping them of their power to shut down food processing plants if they repeatedly failed microbial testing done by the USDA.

Clearly the journey our food takes from the farm to our table is far more complex than what it seems. The journey displays the complex relationship between the industrial food complex, government regulatory agencies, and the special interest groups who are trying to get their agenda pushed to the forefront of public attention.

Now after reading this you may find yourself asking if what you can do to try and solve the issue at hand. Though there are many things we as consumers can do, the most effective one will be what we choose to do with our money. By refusing to buy certain products or choosing to opt with a more organic choices we are able to show the major food corporations that control American agriculture that we demand change. Cutting into these companies’ bottom line will certainly attract their attention and garner change in their policies and actions.

Works Cited:

Nestle, Marian. “Resisting Food Safety.” (n.d.): 1-19. Print.

Hurst, Blake. “Organic Illusions – AEI.” AEI. N.p., 1 Oct. 2012. Web. 15 Feb. 2016.

Kennedy, Merrit. “E. Coli Outbreaks At Chipotle Restaurants ‘Appear To Be Over,’ CDC Says.” NPR. NPR, 01 Feb. 2016. Web. 21 Feb. 2016.

You Are What They Eat. Rep. N.p.: Consumer Report, n.d. Print.

Food, Inc. Movie One, 2008. DVD.

Reflection Questions:

1. The “Writer’s Project” essentially argues that the traditional way of interpreting a piece solely by its thesis isn’t exactly the best way of going about and doing that. It argues that a better way of doing so is to consider the aims, methods, and materials that the author used throughout their piece.. I was able to identify the text’s “project” by carefully annotating the text and discussing its findings with the rest of the class. By listening to the findings of my peers I was able to see another perspective on the same material. My “project” was to inform the audience about the dangers of the American agricultural and how governmental oversight is largely at the root of the problem.
2. I believe that the “Sorting it Out” workshop was highly beneficial towards helping me complete the project. By completing it I was able to organize my thought into a rudimentary draft before I went about doing the leg work of writing the preliminary draft. The section that helped me out the most was Section E. In this section I had to take the summary of the sources and then utilize them in the terms of my own project. Through doing this I had an even better idea on how I will formulate my piece and in what I order I will utilize all of the sources.

3.From what I understand, I believe that synthesis involves analyzing all the given pieces in order to determine what stance they have on a particular issue. This is crucial because if I wasn’t able to tie all of the sources together in a clear and logical manner, my argument would crumble and cause me to lose the reader’s attention. The synthesis process manifested in my final draft because I was able to connect all of my sources in a clear and concise manner in order to form a stronger argument in the piece that I wrote.

4. One accomplishment that I felt that I achieved during this unit was learning how to blend persuasive and research writing. Through the blog format of this piece it is crucial to attract the reader’s attention through persuasive means, in addition to providing them with carefully researched facts in order to reinforce the claims made throughout it. In addition to this, I also learned what a lede is, and how to construct one. This is an important skill to know because a lede allows for me to attract the reader into reading the piece that I have written.
5. At first I wasn’t entirely sure what the main idea of my piece would be. After doing some of the workshops in class I was able to come up three main ideas, they were “While it seems that Organic food is healthier for the consumer, it does come at an increased risk of foodborne illnesses.”, “Although Monsonto produces seeds that do grow faster and provide cheaper seeds, they unfairly target farmers who do not use their product”, and “While the text argues that there needs to be more government regulations in regards to the handling of the food we eat, my own view is that the government does not have enough resources to do so, nor the power to do so because of the lobbying done by the industrial food complex”. Throughout the drafting process and peer review I was able to get a stronger idea on what idea I wanted to use, I decided that I could write the stronger argument with the third main idea that I came up with. I can attribute the evolution of my main idea to the workshops that were done in class and through peer review.
6. In order to structure this article I wanted to be able to connect the “project” of each piece together in a logical and coherent manner. Earlier in the drafting process I didn’t have my interpretations of each piece in any order, I simply just took what each piece was arguing and explained it. After doing so I began to connect them with my interpretation of them and how they can be tied together and how they tie together with my version of the ‘Writers Project”
7. In order to make this piece flow I needed to synthesize all of the sources I used in a logical manner. In order to do so I had to first have a clear idea on how I can connect them all. I decided to write my paper on how foodborne illnesses are becoming increasingly dangerous to society due to the lack of government action. Since not all of the articles played a direct hand in contributing in this argument I had to pick out the pieces that did. For example Blake Hurst’s piece didn’t mention government oversight, however it did mention the prevalence of foodborne illness in the American farm system. This then evolved into me being able to tie all of the sources together in order to make my argument stronger, as demonstrated in the essay above.
8. After being introduced to the concept of a lede I wasn’t entirely sure how to create an effective one. The first draft of my lede was too lengthy and didn’t have any of attention grabbing features that were in the examples on the lede and synthesis workshop activity. After receiving some peer review I decided to introduce a quote in it from one of the sources that I found to be particularly interesting. To be fair my lede did become more lengthy than the average lede, I think that the extra wordage was necessary to attract the reader’s attention and summarize what they will be reading about in the piece.

9. In the next Unit projects I want to be able to write stronger and more effective ledes. Being that this unit was the first time I was introduced to ledes, I feel that with even more experience and practice I can grab the reader’s attention and motivate them to read my work.