Previously, I suggested that President Obama’s election was reason for cautious optimism regarding our nation’s food policy. But like the new president, I consider myself “an optimist, not a sap.”
As in all industries, corporate agriculture is filled with lobbyists who champion monied interests. Because there are no subsidy caps on crops, large corporate growers have been paid handsomely to grow raw-materials crops at the expense of food crops. Consider these sobering statistics from Reason:
“Ninety percent of all subsidies go to just five crops: corn, rice, cotton, wheat, and soybeans. Two thirds of all farm products—including perishable fruits and vegetables—receive almost no subsidies. And just 10 percent of recipients receive 75 percent of all subsidies.”
And not only are fruits and vegetables virtually unsubsidized, but growers who receive subsidies for these raw-materials crops are prohibited by law from growing other, unsubsidized crops. “But what about corn?” you ask. “Surely that’s food, and not a raw material like cotton.”
While corn can be a food, it is fundamentally used as a raw material. According to statistics compiled in Wired Magazine, of the 602.3 billion pounds of non-export corn grown annually in the United States, 332.2 billion pounds, more than half, is used for feed. Another 179.2 billion pounds is used in ethanol fuels. High-fructose corn syrup, grain alcohols and plastic fibers each account for more corn production than sweet corn, the corn that we know as food. Sweet corn by the ear, canned or frozen, represents only 5.8 billion pounds of the annual crop, less than 1%.
Adding even more perspective, from 1995-2006, corn subsidies in the United States totaled $56.2 billion. The most frustrating aspect of these subsidies, particularly corn, is that they empower a food economy that is bad for our health.
Think about processed foods for a moment. Take a look at the food labels in your pantry. Have you noticed how many of these processed foods contain high-fructose corn syrup or soy lecithin? Is it an accident that the most common food additives are derived from the most heavily subsidized crops?
Now let’s consider fast food. Subsidization has made fast food incredibly cheap. It’s no coincidence that as we fall deeper into a recession that McDonald’s is doing booming business.
But what about the beef in those McDonald’s hamburgers? Cattle raised for fast-food burgers have systematically been moved off of grazing fields and into feed lots. Their diet has shifted from the grass their systems were designed to digest to corn feed. Both of these factors have let to the rise of antibiotics, which are seeping not only into fast food burgers, but also cheese and other milk products.
And now, there is scientific evidence of just how widespread corn feeding really is. Researchers studying the chemical make-up of fast food have discovered:
Corn tends to have more of this 13C than other plants. That telltale signature persists as the corn travels through the complex system that turns it into feed, which is consumed and processed by cattle to grow tissue. It continues after the animals are slaughtered and the meat is cooked. The result: 93 percent of the tissue that comprised the hamburger meat was derived from corn.
Building on this study, Johns Hopkins is now researching the impact of corn-based sweeteners and corn-fed 13C on human blood. We already know the impact of fatty foods and artificial sweeteners though. While a fast-food diet may be cheap, and therefore popular among lower-income households, it’s been linked to health problems like obesity and diabetes.
Proponents of a change in food policy, and a shift from the current system of subsidization, have used the recent presidential election to lobby the new administration for a radical shift in policy. I’ve already mentioned Michael Pollen’s open letter about food policy to the presidental candidates, Farmer in Chief. And in his New York Times op-ed piece, Nicholas Kristof advocates transforming the Department of Agriculture into the Department of Food, explaining:
A Department of Agriculture made sense 100 years ago when 35 percent of Americans engaged in farming. But today, fewer than 2 percent are farmers. In contrast, 100 percent of Americans eat.
Even slow-foods advocate Alice Waters has lobbied the president and first lady, urging them to select a White House chef focused on healthful, environmentally friendly cooking.
Not surprisingly, with Change We Can Believe In as a campaign slogan, Obama’s candidacy inspired food advocates to champion major reforms. Now that he’s President Obama and not candidate Obama, the radical shift in policy some were hoping for, if not expecting, hasn’t materialized.
The Obamas kept President Bush’s chef, insisting that Waters and her fellow advocates were misinformed about the quality of the White House menu. As for an end to subsidies, or a Department of Food? Obama selected Tom Vilsack, former Governor of Iowa, as his Secretary of Agriculture. Iowa, of course, is a corn and soybean producing state. And Vilsack, as governor, was a tireless advocate of corn subsidies. Vilsack himself received subsidies from the USDA, to not grow crops, keeping his own farmland fallow.
All of which brings be back to my original point. I am optimistic about the potential for policy changes from the new administration. Real change, however, will come from consumers, or rather from non-consumers, who demand better choices, looking beyond the traditional supermarket choices. Purchasing whole foods over processed meals, buying locally grown produce from local farmers and selecting meat products from humanely raised livestock is the only effective way to send agribusinesses the message that their offerings are unacceptable.
Forget Change We Can Believe In and focus instead on Gandhi’s suggestion to embody the change we wish to see in the world.