We at Tabula Rasa strive to be, amongst other things, evermore critical. That’s why we bring you this article as a part of our new partnership with UCRITICAL.
By Irene Pena Abellan & Sanne Raggers
UCRITICAL
Many people in the Global South starve because of land exhaustion and unequal food distribution. In the Global North many are afraid to eat due to the antibiotics and chemicals used in the processing of food before it reaches the consumers. Food is increasingly involved in controversies on the transnational level: unequal power relations, unfair distribution and control. Food has also acquired a certain status of risk since the outbreaks of diseases such as the BSE (“the mad cow disease”).
But despite the frequent anxiety about food, we do not know where many products we eat come from or how they are processed. Our relation to food is primarily through the supermarket. The more you think about it, the odder it seems: how could we lose so much of the connection with one of the most crucial things that we need to stay alive?
Throughout the twentieth century eating habits in the Global North have changed drastically and have gradually shifted to a problem of overeating, which has all kinds of negative consequences for the body, such as diabetes and an increased risk for strokes. A logical response to this problem is one that food companies are trying to disregard with all possible strength: “eat less”. The corporate interest is to sell, and nutrition or even more rarely, ethics, get involved only when they help increase the sales.
Marion Nestle, a professor at New York University states that many of the nutritional problems that Americans face today can be traced back to “the food industry’s imperative to encourage people to eat more in order to generate sales and increase income in a highly competitive marketplace.” What this means, is that the food industry is as much money-oriented as any other industry, with an increase in sales and making profit as its primary goal, thereby perpetuating the logic of neo-liberalism.
Ignorance of the origin of our foods is part of our culture. In fact, we are even unaware of where the basis for our diet comes from. Since primary school, we are taught basic dietary guidelines through the food pyramid. Have we ever asked ourselves how this was established and why we follow it? In the 1960’s the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) developed a list of basic guidelines for a healthier diet, in response to an increase in obesity and heart disease in the country. The food pyramid was thus introduced, with bread, pasta and cereals at the bottom as essential elements of our diet.
At the time, US grain industries (the biggest food production and distribution companies in the world) wanted to be more prominent in people’s diet, thus they collaborated with the USDA. The food pyramid recommends 6 to 11 servings of carbohydrates a day, which is a lot. Grains would have probably never made it to the base of the pyramid if it were not for the grain lobby. Nowadays nutritionists all over the world are contesting the food pyramid for its lack of scientific proof. The biggest issue at hand here is that nobody had ever questioned it before.
Because food has become a part of profit-seeking businesses, the quality of food people eat greatly depends on income. In many places in North America, food distribution is unequal and fresh food such as vegetables, dairy products and meat are a privilege. Food deserts reflect this unequal distribution. In overpopulated cities such as New York, accessing fresh food in lower class neighbourhoods is nearly impossible. Because conventional American stores New York City has no supermarkets. The only grocery stores available are organic markets, unaffordable for those in greater need. Furthermore, corner stores and delis in lower-class neighborhoods are unregulated and sell out of date vegetables and animal products for low prices.
Food deserts in the US are one example showing that we have lost agency over our food. We, in the Global North, are not just ignorant about where our food comes from. We also fully depend on and blindly trust this system that is based on the food pyramid and the supermarket. For those who can afford it, biological and “responsible” food is available in the supermarket or in urban gardens where renting a piece of land and growing your own food is possible. However, these choices are not open to everyone. Those who are in the greatest need can only opt for what they can afford in the supermarket. We have lost the capacity to determine what we eat – our food sovereignty.
While most of us in the Global North are living in a convenient ignorance, many people particularly in the Global South have started to reclaim their food sovereignty. They represent an alternative way of thinking about land-use and social and environmental justice, which instead of seeking financial profit, puts local organizations and engagement with the food production and processing first. Food sovereignty is also a right to secure food, not only to buy it from a supermarket, but also to grow it in autonomy. It is the right for people to decide what to produce and consume.
Food sovereignty combines social, environmental and economic factors in an attempt not to let one compromise the other, something happening in many Western and non-Western countries where the economics are dominating the other aspects. Although the need for food sovereignty is more apparent in the Global South where food crises and unfair distribution are more pronounced, our dependency and ignorance regarding what we eat shows this issue should gain greater importance closer to home, in such countries of the Global North as the Netherlands.
Interested in more critical views? Visit: www.ucritical.org
On Wednesday the 23rd at 20.00 UCRITICAL will have a discussion session about Earth Democracy. Join us in Eleanor 12!
Irene Pena Abellan, Class of 2014, is an Human Geography and Anthropology major form Almería, Spain
Sanne Raggers, Class of 2014, is an Anthropology and Sociology major from Noordwijk, the Netherlands.
I don’t necessarily see the critical side of this argument, as it sounds awfully similar to what is preached in Public Policy class. It may be critical of the relevant actors, but the writers themselves were not exactly exploring a new or original view point/research so much as reiterating a widely circulated one. Maybe my expectations were higher because their organization blatantly states that they are critical in nature.