Elizabeth Quezada

WRT 205

Professor Phillips

February 22nd 2016

Conversation on Food Politics & Safety: Choices

You can very easily go onto today’s favorite search engine and type in, “Are GMOs harmful?” or “Is organic food really that much better?” into the search bar and pull up some quick and dirty answers to those questions. Really though, you are just a concerned consumer being tossed into the large, messy bowl of food politics and safety. You’ll find a mesh of articles telling you what the author thinks and a healthy dose of statistics thrown your way if you’re lucky. Believe it or not,  food safety and politics does not just pertain to the consumers health based needs! Money, the environment are a huge portion of food safety and the political sphere represents delicious three course meal you can’t pull your eyes from. When it comes to food safety, I belong to the team that’s pro-labeling. I believe that despite the benefits of either side, consumers deserve the right to know what they choose to put in their system.

What do people have to say about this discourse?

Some individuals argue between the efficiency and benefits of either organic or conventional farming while others argues that consumers should have a choice within the food system. Food Inc., a documentary that argues against GMOs, questions the food system attacks the opaqueness of the system. “Do you know where your food comes from?” This documentary attempts to bring forth information for their audience to process while ultimately trying to get you on their side of the argument. The director of the film, Robert Kenner does a fantastic job at distributing information and using the medium of film to their advantage and he also really stretches out the conversation that finds its way to our dinner tables every night. While the film does give their viewers a mouthful of information, it is heavily biased in arguing more for one side instead of bringing out the facts and letting you decide what side you want to eat grass from. One of my favorite pieces to read in regards to the issues around food safety and politics,  “Organic Illusions,” written by a farmer, Blake Hurst, suggests that though the government cannot afford a form of organic agriculture, they can afford to provide a system with choices. However, he does not present his claim in a helpful or resourceful manner. Carrying a heavily sarcastic tone and providing a much more entertaining read that can be read throughout the masses, Hurst maintains a “Who cares about organic or conventional farming?” attitude and suggests without any real traceable sources, that what really matters in this complex food system is not a romanticized “version of agriculture”(Hurst) but “a food system that provides lots of choices,” (Hurst). Unfortunately, as entertaining as he may be, he does not provide enough credible information to really let his audience decide the importance of conventional agriculture versus organic agriculture. He attacks organic farming more than he complains about farming in general.

Although I do understand the benefits of either side, I think the two styles of agriculture can exist together but the government could afford to be a little more transparent, less sketchy when it came to interviews (Food Inc.) Truthfully, labeling the food at your local grocery store is more about allowing the consumer to be more aware and informed of their decisions. Nearly 50 nations worldwide require that all GE foods be labeled as such (Dahl), so what’s the big deal? California tried to pass the California Right to Know Genetically Engineered Food Act back in November of 2012 (Dahl) and had it been passed, California would have been the first state to require the labeling of food products. The bill sounds pretty until you know what it really does and then you wonder, what’s the point? The bill would have exempted “meat, dairy, and other products from animals that were themselves genetically engineered. It would have also exempted food sold in restaurants and alcohol,” (Dahl). Though it wouldn’t have proved as effective as it could have been, this was considered a step forwards in the food revolution. Consumers are getting more fed up as “food producers resist the attempts of government agencies to institute control measures, and major food industries oppose pathogen control measures by every means at their disposal,” (Nestle). Only 700 FDA inspectors must oversee 30,000 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). That number seems incredibly low for a population as large as the American population. The statistics speak for themselves here, how safe do you really think your food really is? Go ahead, type in E Coli and Salmonella outbreaks in your search bar and determine just how frequent they are. Consumer safety should always be the government’s priority but money allows illness and corruption to really slip through the cracks,  just ask your local farmer.

While many like Hurst believe that a romanticized version of farming would be too costly, I do agree that labeling for consumer health reasons proves to be a solution everyone could be happier with. There’s evidence according to Dahl and his source, Hansen,  to suggest a connection between GE Crops and allergenicity, which provides more than enough reason to label foods. Data from the Centers of Disease control and Prevention show an 18% increase in reported food allergy cases among children between 1997 and 2007 (Dahl), that alone proves to be alarming as a consumer myself. Hansen, a senior staff scientist at Consumers Union, suggests a theoretical example of how tracking health risks would work: “If you take a gene from the kiwifruit, put it into a tomato and the tomato gets turned into sauce for your pizza, and there’s an allergic reaction…this is not like [allergy concerns associated with] conventional foods because the problem is going to for one particular [bio-engineered modification]. How are you going to figure out unless it’s labeled? You can’t and that’s why so many countries have labeling,” (Hansen), except us of course. There should always be a choice presented for consumers, for health–for ethical reasons, our government after all is supposed to be for the people and we made that choice, didn’t we?

Sources:

• “You are what they eat,” Consumer Reports, 2005

• Hurst, Blake. “Organic Illusions – AEI.” AEI. The American, 1 Oct. 2012. Web. 03 Feb. 2016.

• Nestle, Marion. Safe Food: The Politics of Food Safety. Berkeley: U of California, 2010. Print.

• Food, Inc. Dir. Robert Kenner. Movie One, 2008.

• Dahl, Richard. “To Label or Not to Label: California Prepares to Vote on Genetically Engineered Foods.” Environ Health Perspect Environmental Health Perspectives 120.9 (2012). Jstor. Web. 18 Feb. 2016.

All issues related to and relevant to food safety are reflective of a three way power struggle between the industry, the government, and consumers. This matters because the industry is more powerful than the government in certain areas. Consumers should be concerned because they are increasingly at the mercy of the economic-interest of major food corporations. After reading the texts, there were several issues prevalent throughout all of the texts. The topic of government regulation over the food industry was touched upon briefly in almost every reading.

Each text observed and commented on the over the actions and lack of actions on behalf of organizations such as the FDA and the USDA. The Consumer Reports article You are What They Eat article inquiries into the lack of government monitoring of the food fed to the animals we eventually eat and the adverse effects thereafter.  It also provides the current narrative between industry and concerned officials. Highlighted in the article is the inclusion of waste and antibiotics in the feed of farm animals such as cows and chickens. The article states that the appropriate organizations do have oversight and final approval over feed ingredients. Yet even officials in the food industry are aware of the potential for the feed to still become contaminated in several parts of the process. The question Consumer Reports raises is whether the rules surrounding food supply are strong enough, and whether or not government enforcement is expansive enough. “Rules protecting the feed supply aren’t as strong as they should be and FDA enforcement has been more wishful thinking than reality” (Consumer Reports, 27) Another of the text’s observations was that certain health labels and claims on food are unverified, I wish to add that this is another power of the food industry over consumers. Consumers are disadvantage by not knowing where there food comes from or how it is prepared and must trust labeling.

As a readers and food consumers, we naturally wonder why the government would be so negligent in this area. The investigations conducted in the film Food Inc. does the work of providing some answers. The directors and producers perform investigative work into every aspect of food production in an attempt to pull back the veil over food industry practices. Eric Schlosser, the author and co-producer, explains that “For years during the Bush administration, the chief of staff at the USDA was the former chief lobbyist to the beef industry in Washington; the head of the F.D.A. was the former executive vice president of the National Food Processors Association. These regulatory agencies are being controlled by the very companies that they’re supposed to be scrutinizing”. (Food Inc.) This is possible because only a handful of companies control the food system. This is a significant trend because it illuminates how the amassing economic power of food corporations is being transformed into political power further tipping the balance of influence away from the government.

Marion Nestle in her article Resisting Food Safety argues that food safety rules and regulations are outdated.  Pulling from her experience as the senior nutrition policy advisor in the Department of Health and Human Services, she attempts to provide and authoritative insight into the inner workings of regulatory agencies.  She provides the facts and statistical details as to why the actions of regulatory agencies are so limited. She insists that there is more protection for producers than public, and explains why it is difficult to connect foodborne illness to production. “If anything the demands on the FDA are even more unreasonable…The FDA’s budget allocation for inspection purposes was…minuscule by any standard of federal expenditure”. (Nestle, 59) The arguments made by Nestle about the daunting tasks provided to food regulation organizations stood out to me. Extending the text’s observation that regulatory government agencies are more concerned about vying for resources and jurisdiction than public safety, I wish to add that the dilution of their responsibilities contributes to the dilution of their power. It is this environment that influences the behavior noted by Nestle.

One of the risks associated with lax government regulation is obviously foodborne illness. This issue is framed by power as well. As the current system is constructed all the texts seem to point to the fact that consumers, the industry and the government are all disadvantaged in their attempts to prevent foodborne illness, which is cause for concern. Food Inc. employs a strong emotional rhetoric when addressing the issue. The inclusion of Barb Kowalcky’s story regarding her son Kevin emphasizes the dangers of foodborne illness in a way that effectively hits home. On screen Ms. Kowalcky explains how her son developed hemolytic-uremic syndrome in reaction to contaminated hamburger meat. The most alarming part of the story for me is the legislation that followed. Kevin’s Law, passed after his 2001 death, gives the USDA the power to close down plants with contaminated meat. What was alarming to me was that the government didn’t already reserve this power and that it took death and years of lobbying for them to assume this power. Ms. Kowalcky explains ““It took us almost two or three years and hiring a private attorney to actually find out that we matched a meat recall”. The Kowalcky family was powerless to prevent their son from eating the tainted meat. The industry lacked significant power to identify and contain the contaminated food, and the until Kevin’s law the government lacked the power to shut down production of contaminated meat.

The Consumer Reports article is characterized by explaining the source and risk of two major foodborne illness. It cites how infectious prions in beef feed can lead to mad cow disease in humans and antibiotics in chicken feed can expose people to arsenic. Yet, even though the sources of the diseases are known preventative efforts are still hampered. “The FDA is aware of a handful of incidents worldwide in which salmonella infections in humans were linked to animal feed… connecting human illness to contaminated feed is difficult” (Consumer Reports, 28). Extending the text’s observation about the difficulty linking feed ingredients to foodborne illness, I wish to add that the dangerous aspect of this issue is that the industry again reigns superior and influence. If it is difficult to link the ingredients known to have potential for harm to actual outbreaks, it is easier to defend their inclusion.

Nestle’s article being more factual and educational in nature highlights the general difficulties of identifying the source of foodborne illness and why it poses such a threat. She notes “most episodes of food poisoning are not very serious… it is difficult to collect accurate information about the number of cases and their severity”. (Nestle, 37) She is also able to tangibly clarify what I have observed as prioritizing of economic interests over public safety.  Nestle provides data showing foodborne illness presents a multi-million dollar cost to the industry in the form of recalls and loss of reputation. I similarly hold one of the text’s position that consumers do share some of the responsibility in issues of food safety.  This was a perspective touched on in all articles in fact. Food Inc., tries through rhetorical exercise to emphasize the power consumers have by selective spending when it comes to food. Consumer Reports urges people to utilize their local means of political influence to affect change by signing petitions and such. Yet, as Nestle observes the blame and responsibility is shared equally between producers, consumers, and regulatory agencies. Although, revisiting these issues of food through the framework of power, it becomes clear that power is concentrated in the industry. Therefore, so should the responsibility and accountability for food safety.

America has a growing problem and a problem with growing. What’s growing? Food. The problem? How it’s being grown, who’s in charge of growing it, and how’s it’s getting into our stomachs. In 2008, Robert Kenner put out a film called Food Inc., featuring testimony from food and industry experts like Michael Pollan, Eric Schlosser, farmers, and representatives from the meat industry. Food Inc. sought to illuminate some of the atrocities that go on behind the scenes in the American and global food industry, from farm to table so to speak. The biggest problem that we face is that there are, as Pollan says in the film, only a handful of large corporations guiding how food is grown, packed, shipped, and marketed. Not only that, but there are government officials working in the USDA, FDA, congress, and other branches that are out to represent the desires of these faceless corporations and not the people that need the most protection; the average American. What’s worse is that what we do to our food in the US has a global impact. The bottom line is that corporate greed is undercutting food safety and the very concept of what food is, and this has started to snowball out of control.

Let’s think of your average cow, raised for slaughter. These cows, which can weight up to 2400 pounds, are confined in spaces where they often can’t even turn around if they can even stand up at all. Add to that the fact that they’re often standing ankle deep in pools of their own feces, and you’ve already got a good idea what kinds of problems are bound to happen once you get the beast to the slaughterhouse. Now, take the cows natural food source which it has evolved to consume — that’s grass, in case you didn’t know — and replace it with something they’d never have started eating unless humans were dishing it out. That something is corn. Cows are ruminants, meaning they’ve got stomachs designed to ferment the grass they’d naturally eat so that they can digest it. When that grass is replaced with something like corn, their stomachs are thrown for a loop and they start to produce E. coli. Now, you’ve got this cow hanging out in crap, growing E. coli in its gut, and it’s finally gotten fat enough to warrant killing.

The cow gets crammed onto a truck and brought to a plant where it’s systematically murdered and parted out. According to a Consumer Reports article, the meat from one cow can be spread out over eight tons of ground beef. Remember, that cow likely had E. coli, and now it’s getting spread into eight tons of beef. And that beef is spread all over the US, Canada, Mexico. The way that we, the consumers, have been taught to consume means that we’re constantly seeking the quickest, easiest, and cheapest sustenance we can most of the time. We’re a nation that can afford the Dollar Menu but not a head of broccoli and the time to prepare it. We’ve been duped into thinking that the stuff at the fast food drive-thru is a necessary evil, and we’re paying a toll with our lives. Not only is the food absurdly unhealthy, but the industry that produces it is abusing everyone in the chain from farm to table.

The human and societal costs of our current food system are too high to be sustainable. Michael Hurst, a well-meaning farmer, claims that a national switch to an all-organic food production system would actually tax our land and people even more so than the current model, one that relies on GMO’s and persistent chemical pesticides. He claims that there would be such a large amount of land needed that it would be impossible to feed the US on it’s available arable land. He also states that people would need to leave other industries to work in farming and food processing. Unfortunately, he doesn’t provide any evidence to support these claims. What he also doesn’t do is bother to mention the ill-effects of persistent chemical pesticides that are used in conventional farming. Pesticides can leach into the water table and affect the groundwater supply in areas surrounding farms. Run-off can reach rivers and lakes and negatively impact ecosystems of some of our other food sources (fish, for example).

The human element is addressed by Food Inc., Consumer Reports, and Marion Nestle, although not completely. Most of what is addressed by the authors and experts of these pieces are due to foodborne illness or other persistent dietary problems like diabetes or malnutrition. What’s missing is a discussion of the horrible mistreatment of food industry employees, from those picking our fruits and veggies, to the people packing and handling them in various factories and plants, and the people that are turning those products into something we want to eat; the foodservice employees. It’s no secret that there’s a huge gap in the pay of corporate owners of food conglomerates and the people out there picking, planting, raising, slaughtering, packing, and preparing. Farmers are often horribly underpaid, especially if they are undocumented or illegal migrant workers. Hours are long, and pickers are paid by the pound, not by the hour. When this is the case, a person may resort to relieving themselves right where they stand so as to be able to get back to work as quickly as possible.

The mistreatment of the worker goes all the way to the restaurants and fast food joints that most Americans rely on for many of their meals. Foodservice employees are only just starting to get justice, with many areas offering a living wage of $15 an hour. Having worked for years in the industry, I can’t say that there truly is a fair price for our labor. But $15 is a good start. When foodservice employees are working for current minimum wages, however, we’re often forced to go to work even when we’re exhausted, stressed, and sick. We can’t afford to take a day off to recuperate from the flu or a cold when we aren’t even earning enough to feed us while we work 40 hours a week. One can see how this adds up to a further unsafe and unhealthy food industry.

Corruption is a funny thing. Anyone or anything can become corrupt based on the actions the person or thing chooses to practice. In this case, the food system that is used to circulate the majority of the world’s food products to public markets has become corrupt. The interesting part about our corrupt food system is that most of the people who consume the products have no idea where these products came from or how they were prepared. In the food system we have today, four or five large corporations own the majority of all food products sold in grocery stores today. There are hundreds of different brands of meat, produce, snacks, or whatever types of food you can think of that are sold in a supermarket but, its really only a handful of corporations that own the greater part of all of them. In the film Food Inc., Michael Pollan, an American author, activist, and professor of journalism at UC Berkeley talks about how big business has run our American food industry into the ground. Pollan goes on to say, “The average grocery store has 47,000 products which makes it look like there is a large variety of choice – but it is an illusion – there are only a few major companies and a few major crops involved.” Pollan and the rest of the experts go on to talk about how big business runs the food industry and how their methods to grow bigger and better food have substituted the quality of our food for higher profits. That’s the problem, if people knew that large corporations were behind our food and that they were making our food in an unnatural, inhumane manner, they would probably have something to say about it. In an ideal world, the people who know the most about our food would be in charge of developing how our food system works. Unfortunately, we do not live in an ideal world.

The meat in our grocery stores is not prepared in a friendly, heartfelt way. The way most people want to believe that their meat is prepared is that the animal is born and raised on a farm where it was able to roam free and grow the way god intended it to live. They believe the animal was killed humanely by the farmers who raised it in a way that did not make the animal suffer. That would be nice if it were true. The fact of the matter is, in this corrupt food system we have today, animals are basically tortured in cramped quarters from birth up until the moment they are slaughtered. Eric Schlosser, another American author and journalist from Food Inc. discusses how the animals that are raised in these massive farms and slaughterhouses are inhumanely mistreated. Schlosser says, “Plus they are now feeding corn to animals like cows who, by evolution, are designed to eat grass and in some cases farmers are even teaching fish how to eat corn because it is so cheap.” Aside from not giving these animals the proper space and freedom to grow, these farms are feeding the animals feed that they cannot naturally digest. The farms use corn feed and growth hormones to fatten up these animals so we can harvest twice as much meat as these animals were supposed to carry. Several facts and statistics about how the chickens we eat every day are actually being grown are up on truthaboutchicken.org. Today, Chickens are being grown to twice the weight of chicken Sixty years ago in about half the time. An appalling fact found on this site included, “Many chickens lie in their own waste for much of their lives, with open sores and infections. These unhealthy conditions could potentially increase the risk of foodborne illnesses like salmonella.” The processes used in our food systems are horrific and mind-boggling but, the worst part is these corrupt practices are potentially life-threatening for humans. Because of the unethical methods used in today’s food industry, humans are contracting various foodborne illnesses from tainted meat that is sold every day in our local grocery stores. These illnesses are the result of the unsanitary facilities that are used to raise and prepare these animals for slaughter. The reason for this is that there is not any regulation governing over these facilities making sure these products are not contaminated. Government programs like the FDA, USDA, and CDC are supposed to watch over these facilities and make sure there aren’t any health code violations, unhygienic processing practices, or any other method that could lead to possible contamination of meat. Consumer Reports, You are what they eat, discussed a great deal about how our government and how our food regulation departments, like the FDA, aren’t really doing anything about the way our food is being processed. The members of Consumer Reports were able to talk to feed-company executives and they said, “Our investigation raises concern that the federal government isn’t doing enough to protect the feed supply and that as a result the food we eat may not be as safe as it could be.” Even the executives from these corporations agree that the production of their food is a potential risk to the health of their consumer. A major reason for this is that there are not enough FDA and USDA inspectors to consistently watch over the vast number of slaughterhouses and livestock farms that are in this country. The FDA has around 700 employees in charge of inspecting all the processing plants that produce meat, eggs and poultry; which results in each one of these places getting an inspection every one to five years. Even if there are certain health and safety violations that are found in these processing plants, usually if the farm is owned by one of the large corporations, the heads of the corporations always have a friend on the inside of the FDA to help them get out of it. The corruption that has overwhelmed our food industry starts and ends with big business. We cannot rely on greedy business owners to take proper care of our food. Large profits are not a reasonable compromise when it puts consumers at risk. We know what is going on behind the closed curtain of our food system; now its just about making an effort to do something about it.

While the food industry has become a highly standardized process, as shown in Food Inc., efficiency for the manufacturers may not be the key to satisfying the health and safety of consumers. Our consumers lack the power to ensure that the products they are buying are free from harmful bacteria and disease, this is due to the lack of power that we as consumers have on the regulation of our products. Our government agencies are also being controlled by the big manufacturers and their money, making it a difficult task to provide a more valid regulation process. The film Food Inc. provides the viewer with a vast array of evidence behind the numerous issues that are at stake in this debate. Food safety for consumers may be at the top of the list, but it is the issues of power, money, and lack of the consumers and even the government’s ability to regulate the food process.

Food Inc. puts the power of emotion to use by displaying some of these issues in the documentary. The film’s aim is to show what’s, “behind the veil of corporate farming,” and it does so by providing the viewer with powerful evidence that demonstrates the authority that the big food corporations possess over their farmers, workers, and also regulatory agencies.  Experts such as Michael Pollan, Eric Schlosser, an investigative writer, Barbara Kowalcyk, a food safety advocate, and Joel Salatin, an American holistic farmer all give the film high credibility. After viewing the film, I felt somewhat dumbfounded by the things that I saw. First, comprehending the grasp that the big companies like Tyson, and Purdue have on their farmers disgusted me. Carole Morrison, a former farmer for Purdue, has had enough of what she has deemed to be immoral farming. She is interviewed about the subject and states, “I understand why farmers don’t want to talk, because the company can do what it wants to do as far as pay goes because they control everything.” This quotation, and the interview, shows how one sided these contracts with the big food companies truly are. Her contract was terminated due to her lack of interest in changing her chicken coups to Purdue’s standards, and her disgust with the antibiotics and abnormal growth of her chickens. Not only do they control the farming portion of the meat packing industry, but the film unveils a far more concerning issue. It explains how many of the members of the FDA and USDA are former members of the beef industry. Notably, during the Bush administration, the chief of staff of the USDA, James F. Fitzgerald, was the former chief lobbyist for the beef industry, and also the head of the FDA, Lester M Crawford Jr., was the former executive VP of the National Food Processors Association.

This portion of the film leads into one of the most heartfelt pieces of evidence, children dying of a particular deadly pathogen in contaminated foods. Escherichia Coli 0157:H7 is the strand that killed Kevin Kowalyck, son of Barbara Kowalyck, whose story is shown throughout the film. Kevin is a victim of a foodborne illness. He was only two years and eight months old, and the illness killed him in just twelve days. Barbara struggles to enact change in the government as we watch her bring the case of her son to state and federal courts to dispute new regulations. This horrifying story is also very closely related to a piece by Marion Nestle called, “Resisting Food Safety.” Nestle has a Ph.D, M.P.H., and is a professor of nutrition, food studies, and public health at NYU. In her research about issues of foodborne illness she enlightens the reader about the politics and power behind food safety. The piece provides data from the past thirty years of the number of outbreaks and deaths of certain pathogens, and brings forward the statement that the food corporations and the government aren’t doing their part to ensure the safety of the consumers. In addition, Nestle also gives us some insight into it being an unreasonable task for the FDA and USDA to oversee the entire food production in the United States. Only 700 FDA inspectors are responsible for overseeing 30,000 manufacturers, 20,000 warehouses, 785,000 commercial establishments, 128,000 grocery stores, and 1.5 million vending operations. To me this seems like a nearly impossible task, and the USDA doesn’t do much better considering that they have twice as large of a budget than the FDA and ten times the workers, according to Nestle’s research. The USDA only regulates twenty percent of the food supply, and just fifteen percent of foodborne illness is reported under their jurisdiction in 2000! Marion Nestle’s aim of her piece is to provide stakeholders perspectives on the issues and how each parties’ goals are not aligned. The manufacturers claim that profit is maximizing shareholder wealth, but there has got to be a consensus to make safety the number one priority.

Consumer Reports, “You Are What They Eat,” provides evidence of the things that are being fed to our food and how it is affecting us. This piece is aimed at the health conscious and concerned consumers, so it displays a variety of input from experts of science and other areas of expertise. The article’s purpose is to expose the benefits and risks behind the processed feed that is being given to our livestock. David Fairfield, the director of feed services for the National Grain and Feed Association argues that, “animal protein products, meat and bone meal, and blood meat are nutritional feed ingredients.” However, according to the CDC (Centers for Disease and Control Prevention) these processed feed ingredients have far more potential for being contaminated. The biggest issue that we are facing is linking the contaminations with actual human illness. There is just not a big enough system to control and inspect where all of the contaminations are originating from. In 1997, a feed ban was enacted by the FDA to prevent infectious prions, or proteins that could lead to mad cow disease. However, the FDA’s enforcement of this ban has been very slim. They admitted that the results of their inspections were “severely flawed” due to a lack of compliance by the manufacturers. With this type of system that we have in place where these companies can skew and deflect attempts at inspections and regulation, we are not going to be able to enact change. Our government needs to take control of the situation and spend the necessary capital to regain control of the food industry and ultimately provide safety to our consumers.

While we would think government agencies has it in their best interest to protect us, consumers, humans and animals in what we eat; it is evident that this is not the case due to outdated policy and the overlooks in our food system. Although agencies such as the FDA and USDA have a set of jurisdictions, they do not exercise their authority in situations that matter the most. A huge flaw within the system starts with the FDA and their approval of corn, feathers, and antibiotics in animal feed.

This is a topic that concerns all consumers in the United States. We often overlook even such issues because we place our trust in the government and believe that they serve in our best interest because after all we did elect these officials. This article will take you behind the scenes of the food industry and the United States’ government oversight and outdated policy on the topic of food safety.

According to Marion Nestle, Paulette Goddard Professor of Nutrition, Food Studies and Public Health at NYU, prior to the late 1800’s, the U.S government took no responsibility for food safety. They were forced to do so by public demands that sparked from journalists frequent visits to slaughterhouses who shared their experiences. This outraged caused Congress to pass a Meat Inspection Act in 1890 that authorized inspection of salt pork, bacon, and pigs intended for export. A drastic blow to the food industry and the government came in 1906 when Upton Sinclair published his expose in the meat industry, specifically the Chicago stockyards. Following the confirmation of these alligations proposed by Sinclair, Congress immediately passed two separate pieces of legislation: the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act, both in 1906. Interesting how secret investigations have to be done and publicized to force our government to want to get its act together isn’t it? This is only the start of the problem.

The Food and Drug Administration formed in 1906, the same year Sinclair released his expose, is a federal agency responsible for protecting public health by assuring safety and security of human and animal drugs, biological products, medical services, OUR NATION’S FOOD SUPPLY (this includes food additives), cosmetics and products that admit radiation. Consumer Reports article, “You are what they eat,” does not hold back and immediately claims that the “federal government isn’t doing enough to protect the feed supply.” They even assert that some regulatory loopholes could allow mad cow infection. The article informs us that the FDA delegated much enforcement responsibility to the states, which conduct 70% of feed-company and renderer inspections. This means that the FDA hands over its responsibility to assure not only our safety but animal safety over to state legislatures. While 70 to 90% of cattle and chicken feed is plant based: corn and soybean meal, the remaining 10 to 30% remains questionable. Processed feathers and poultry litter are acceptable sources of protein in cattle feed according to the FDA. Farmed fish may be given rendered meat, bone and feather meal. The ultimate goal is to fatten animals as fast and cheaply as possible. Also included in feed are medications given routinely to animals even the healthy ones in order to boost growth and minimize infections. Nestle also takes a stance on mediciations, specifically antibitoics. Antibiotics are chemicals that prevent bacteria from reproducing, when added to animal food or water they tend to grow faster and need less feed. Antibiotic-resistant baateria survives and multiplies causing potential health problems for our animals. In 1977, the FDA proposed to restrict the use of antibiotics in animal feed but was overruled by Congress under pressure received from farm-state lawmakers, livestock producers, and makers of the drug. One might think to go organic but what does “organic” really mean?

In his piece, “Organic Illusions,” Blake Hurst, Missouri Farm Bureau’s Board of Directors president acknowledges the organic process. According to a Stanford study organic foods were less likely than conventional foods to have pesticide residues, while organic foods were higher in E.Coli. E.Coli is able to accept genes from related bacterial species to form “stable variants” that can pass the borrowed genes along to other bacteria as they divide and multitply. The E. Coli variant known as O157:H7 is especially dangerous, it picks up Shigella gene for a toxin that destroys  red blood cells and includes a syndrome of bloddy diarrhea, kidney failure, and death (Marian Nestle, “Resisting Food Safety, 41). He questions whether the organic food consumer’s purchase is actually organic because there is no testing done to check. He argues organic foods are labeled organic because producers certify that they’ve followed organic procedures.Yet again, here is evidence of government oversight where they trust that producers are honest when they say that their foods are organic because of procedures that were followed. Who is to say if these foods are honestly organic? How will consumers know if these producers are telling them the truth or robbing them for their buck?

Nestle argues that by switching to hay there is a 1% chance of an E. Coli presence, which is more appealing to the health on consumer. Meat producers are not likely to favor these approaches because they are concerned about putting the maximum weight on their animals, and drug producers are still concerned with selling antibiotics to meat producers. Consumer reports argues that animals being raised and fed organic feed would be safer for our food supply in some ways, but there is no guarantee that organic feed is free of garden variety bacteria including salmonella. The alternatives are presented, it is just a matter of producers being willing to accept them.

Should the FDA consider a new proposal for the restriction of animal feed? Or on a simplier note, is the FDA worthy of our trust? 700 FDA inspectors must oversee 30,000 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. They only conduct 5,000 inspections annually, visited less than 2% ofthe places under their jurisdiction and inspected less than 1%  of imported foods prior to 2001.

The food industry is one of the most important yet controversial industries in modern capitalism. Established by a few big name brands, such as Tyson, the food industry is comprised of big businesses trying to make the biggest bang for their buck. However, the methods used in order to ensure efficiency and create the cheapest possible product, comes with a price. We have discovered in class that food industry uses unsanitary and dishonest techniques in order to maximize their profit. With the recent exposure towards to methods that they normally keep behind the scenes, the food industry has been taking hits from people and companies that value healthy foods and a healthy environment. There is conflict between being healthy, and promoting health and well-being, and supporting the capitalistic business methods that exploit the system by practicing unsanitary and dishonest methods, but, yield the most in profit and efficiency. The question that I would like to bring up is: should the food industry be a part of the capitalistic system, or should a new structure be implemented that eliminates dishonesty to the public?

The intricate factor that a food company has versus, let’s say, a software company, is the fact that every human needs to eat. There is a large percentage of the population that does not have access to fresh and wholesome food. They are stuck buying cheaper products such as soda and fast-food, and are unable to control their diet due to economic issues. Organic companies are usually smaller establishments, and/or controlled by larger businesses. Due to the rigged system of capitalism, the smaller, health-branded companies’ products are marketed at a significantly higher cost. This is due to the fact that the larger food companies have the power, money, and resources to have cheaper prices, and run the smaller industries out of commision. In the movie Food Inc., a family explains how they are caught between buying quality food due to the high cost of medication. Paradoxically, purchasing high cost medication over healthy foods results the continuation of the family’s state of bad health. This cycle continues over and over again to people who suffer from poverty. Everyone should be able to have access to live a healthy life; it should not be determined by your economic standing.

Food companies such Tyson, have mastered a system that yields the most efficiency for their product. They are able to mass produce food at a fast rate for the lowest possible cost. Customers are grateful for these low prices, and continue to purchase their products. The company is doing their job, and we as consumers love the affordability of their product. But, ethically, is it right to  support companies and their dishonest methods? There are two schools of thought. One, that we, as the customer, are not at fault. We have the final say in what we purchase, and that the cruel methods have no effect on our lives or the product, so why should we be complaining about the efficient and low prices of the food. The other, that we as the customer have the power to change this seemingly rigged system, so why should we sit back and accept the cruel methods of the industry. The only way to make change is to change. Are we willing to pay a little extra money for a more organic product?

From a capitalistic perspective, the organic and healthier food industries would have to somehow combat the already established companies low priced products. From a liberal, almost socialistic perspective, the government would have to more gain control over the industry as a whole. Should food be handled by businesses, or the government? Hurst, writer of Organic Illusions,  explains that “plants and animals aren’t the least bit interested in the story the farmer has to tell. They don’t care about his sense of social justice, the size of his farm, or the business model that he has chosen. Plants don’t respond by growing better if the farmer is local, and pigs don’t care much about the methods used in the production of their daily ration. If those inputs that animals and plants require to grow are present, plants and animals respond in pretty similar ways. That means that when organic and/or conventional farmers provide the environment necessary for growth, plants and animals respond.” It is argued that anthropomorphism only limits ourselves as humans. However, we should not only practice for the sake of the environment and livestock, but for the sake of our own health.

In 1906, Upton Sinclare published The Jungle, a novel that exposed the food industry in a light that would gain attention politically through socialistic commentary.  He described these meat factories as “dingy,” “whose labyrinthine passages defied a breath of fresh air to penetrate them, and there were rivers of hot blood and carloads of moist flesh,” that “smelt like the craters of hell.” Rightfully so, Teddy Roosevelt established the Federal Meat Inspection Act, and other regulations to make sure the food industry was following a set of guidelines to ensure a quality product. This was the first of many acts and bills that involved the food industry. Nestle explains that “prior to the 1800s, the U.S. government took no responsibility for food safety.” Government regulation was the first step in ensuring a wholesome product, but businesses were still able to exploit the system in order to make prices cheaper. There needs to be a balance between the amount of freedom farmers have and the amount of control the government has on the product.

As humans, I believe that everyone should have the ability to obtain a healthy meal. The fact that people are unable to eat healthy and then become unhealthy due to economic issues is not right. People end up getting caught in this cycle of lack of health and are stuck contributing to the system. I believe that the structure of how we grow and produce our food needs to progressively change to support the health of everyone.

Pierce Noonan

Prof. Amy Barone

WRT205

1000 word draft

Opening

There are food industries and producers that oversee consumer health in exchange for high production rates and vast money income. Federal oversight is a problem that occurs when it comes to the production of food. There have been numerous documentaries, articles, blogs, and other pieces of writing that try to state the overall issue of federal oversight. In one of the highest viewed documentaries ever, Food Inc., an expert said, “The industry doesn’t want you to know exactly what you are eating.” This is because what we are actually putting into our system is much different than what it tastes like. From a Consumer Reports article, “You Are What They Eat;” the title says it all. We are eating what the animals ate in the past and this is not always a good thing. From this article, it is spoken that “Cattle and chickens are still given plant-based feed: Corn and soybean meal make up 70 percent to 90 percent of most commercial animal feed. But the remaining 10 percent to 30 percent of feed can differ radically from what cows and poultry would eat in their natural habitat.” That 10 percent to 30 percent could harm the animals and then that means it will most likely harm us as well. Furthermore, “The government Accountability Office, the congressional watchdog, has called the US Food and Drug Administration’s data on inspections of animal-feed producers “severely flawed.” When the FDA is being called out for flawed inspections, then what else is there to protect the consumers?

Not only does the government and food industries neglect their flawed work, but consumers are being punished with Food borne illnesses like E. coli and salmonella. E. coli is a bacteria that forms from fecal matter and is proven to be harmful and in some cases fatal. From Food Inc., expert Barbara Kowalcyk lost her 2 and half year old son to this deadly disease. This is a loss of life because of the lack of moral and sustainability in the food system. Along with the loss of life to her son Kevin, E. coli breakouts across the US have been sprouting including the most recent Chipotle Mexican food chain incident. According to the FDA website, “The FDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) along with state and local officials are investigating two separate outbreaks of E. coli O26 infections that have been linked to food served at Chipotle Mexican Grill restaurants in several states.” According to this credible website, as of January 27, 2016, the CDC reported a total of 55 infected people with 21 reported hospitalizations. This along with all of the small cases of other food borne illnesses that aren’t reported are a major issue. How can we eat something if we are not 100 percent sure it is healthy enough to sustain a healthy life cycle? E. coli merits extra attention because it shows how well the food system and society changes and how to provide new opportunities for the spreading of disease through food. From an article by Marion Nestle, a professor of nutrition, “Resisting Food Safety,” “E. coli infections originate from farm animals, and such animals increasingly harbor this variant.” Running back to the original topic of federal oversight; where the food is produced, is where the problem holds and turning the other way from such problems result in loss of life and lack of trust in the food production process.

Not only is this disease formed at the hands of the producers watch, but the ingredients these farmers give their animals are producing other diseases as well. From the Consumer Reports article, mad-cow disease is brought up and it is explained that such an illness is transferred up the food chain. From this article, a protein known as prions, “can be malformed and infect cud-chewing animals with mad cow disease.” This illness is spread throughout the community it started in and eventually infecting other organisms beyond that community. Food borne illness is a problem that effects the consumer because producers don’t provide us healthy food.

In most cases, farmers farm for bigger companies and they are doing what their contract tells them to do. For example, an expert chicken farmer, Carol Morison, had her contract terminated with a bigger company because she wouldn’t upgrade to the closed window ventilation housing. She was one of the only people that admitted on Food Inc. that what farming has become shouldn’t be called farming anymore, rather an assembly line. It is a problem that the people like Barbara Kowalcyk can’t even tell a documentary analyst what she ate and why because she was afraid of being sued by the food agency. Not only is federal oversight a major problem, but the way the food agency is protected by themselves is also a major problem.

Abuse is a word that is used in just about any category, you name it. Child abuse, alcohol abuse, drug abuse, verbal abuse, and even food abuse. Small time farmers are being abused and treated maliciously. From Food Inc., a seed farmer laughed when he was asked the question, “What happens if a farmer saves the seeds?” He then says, “There is only one company that does this now and that is Monsanto.” Then, he explains that Monsanto will investigate anyone who tried to save seed. Seed cleaner Moe Parr was brought to trial after Monsanto had set up an investigation into him and other local seed cleaners. Moe Parr said, “What scared me the most…” and then explained that Monsanto had records of every call, text, and credit card purchases. Moe Parr had to settle with Monsanto because he could no longer pay the bills. Moe Parr was bullied by Monsanto and he is definitely not the only one to ever have been. The almost monopolized company of Monsanto, is not even worried about the government or other industries on stopping them because of the amount of income and power they indeed control.

Closing

Problems with the Food Industry

            The food industry has experienced exponential growth over the last century. As a result, food safety has increasingly been compromised in favor of decreasing costs and increasing profits. Food companies such as Tyson Foods and Cargill Foods control a large percentage of the meat industry which gives them tremendous influence over prices and government policy. This puts food safety in the hands of the very companies that that produce and sell the foods. Food safety is supposed to be in the hands of the government. Government agencies such as, the Food and Drug Administration and the United States Department of Agriculture were created to ensure that food is safe to be sold and consumed. The documentary, Food Inc., and the articles, You are What They Eat, Organic Illusions, Resisting Food Safety, do a good job at exposing and examining the many problems within the food industry. Three major issues that are becoming topics of debate regard the feed that is given to animals on farms, the chemicals that are given to these animal, and the amount of government oversight. Each source gives its own view on these subjects which allows the reader to analyze and understand the issues and their causes

            What goes into the feed that is then given to animals has been a highly debated topic. In the documentary Food Inc., the director gives an argument against the current way that feed is produced. He argues that the food that is given to animals is harmful because it goes against what is supposed to be given to them. Giving corn to cows is dangerous because cows are not supposed to eat corn so their bodies are not very healthy which leaves them vulnerable to disease. Corn can also carry diseases such as E. Coli. It can then be spread to animals and humans. If the corn contains a disease, then the cow gets the disease. When combined with the horrid living conditions that these animals are forced to live in, the disease can then evolve and spread faster to the humans that eat the meat that comes from that cow. But this is not the only issue with the feed as the Consumer Reports article makes apparent. The article points out that the feed also contains unhealthy things such as recycled waste among other things like feathers and feces. These are meant to fatten the animal quickly so that they can be slaughtered and sold sooner. But instead, the feed helps make the animals walking petri dishes that contain many different diseases and bacteria. In addition to the unhealthy feed, all animals, regardless of health, are given medications that are supposed to “boost growth and keep infections at bay.” Although the conditions seem bad, the Consumer Reports article does give hope to the consumer, though, by providing some steps that they can take to protect themselves form these sometimes deadly diseases. As society continues to advance, so does technology and the food industry has taken full advantage of some of them. Companies continue to modernize and increase their profits at the expense of consumers by reducing their costs using new technology. These big companies have resorted to some inhumane practices as another way to reduce costs and increase profits. In Food Inc., they visit some of the biggest farms in America that house hundreds of cows, chicken, and pigs. These animals are all kept in tight, dirty spaces; sometimes even being kept in their own feces. This brings down the maintenance costs by giving the animals the bare minimum needed to live but it also creates a breeding ground for bacteria and disease. These companies have now resorted to another technology that is supposed to kill the bacteria: pesticides. Pesticides are natural but they can potentially do more harm than good. Blake Hurst in his article, Organic Illusions, spends some time discussing pesticides. According to a Stanford study, that he repeatedly refers to, pesticides cannot be doing any harm because if they were, then farmers would have stopped using them years ago. He also goes on to say that there is no way to be sure that organic foods, that are meant to have no pesticides used in the growing process, contain absolutely no pesticides. The Consumer Reports article partly disagrees by saying that if less pesticides and antibiotics were used, then there would be less risk of getting some diseases. But the article concedes that organic foods may not be the answer because there is no guarantee that it is disease free. Both articles agree, though, that organic foods are way too expensive to be the food of choice. So again, it all comes back to costs. Companies will continue to use these practices as long as it saves them money.

This all ties nicely under the idea that there is a lack of government oversight. The government created the Food and Drug Administration and the United Stated Department of Agriculture in order to oversee the food industry and ensure that the companies are following regulations that were that were implemented in order to make food safe for consumers. Food Inc., Marion Nestle, and Consumer Reports all argue that the government needs to do more. From Food Inc., “in 1972, the FDA conducted 50,000 food safety inspections. In 2006, the FDA conducted only 9,164.” There has clearly been a sharp decline in government involvement in the food industry. Consumer Reports and Marion Nestle go more into detail on the two agencies that are supposed to be protecting the consumers of America. Nestle believes that the lack of federal oversight stems from the “illogical division of food safety oversight.” An example being that the USDA regulates hot dogs in pastry doe and the FDA regulates hot dogs in rolls. But the main issue regarding these two is that they are very understaffed. The FDA has about 700 inspectors and does an inspection about once every five years due to this. The USDA has about 7000 inspectors, which is more than the FDA but is still not enough because the USDA does daily inspections but they cannot be thorough because they have a lot of companies to inspect. This results in situations like how the FDA only tests about 2 percent of imported seafood yet about 80 percent of seafood is imported. These are the very things that allows food companies to get away with skimping on proper safety procedures. The FDA and USDA need to be more funded. They ultimately need an overhaul in the way the agencies are structured. The current state of these agencies is one of inefficiency allows for the selling of unsafe food.

The food industry has been able to get away with not following safety instructions properly due to their size and power and also the lack of government oversight. This makes buying food dangerous because the average consumer is not able to tell whether the food they buy will get them sick. They put their trust in these companies and in the government and in return, they are let down when outbreaks occur and people die. These companies and the government agencies that are supposed to regulate them need to be overhauled if people want to feel safe when buying new food.