Bounty of Ideas at Slow Food Nation

As I thoroughly described in my last post, I was in attendance at Slow Food Nation’s “Food For Thought” speaker series on Saturday, August 30th. Following are my notes  as well as some thoughts of the discussion on Climate Change and Food, which included Wes Jackson, Carl Pope, Ari Bernstein, Patrick Holden, and Anna Lappe, and was moderated by Mark Hertsgaard.

 The talk began on a somber note, as projections of drastic decreases in crop yields as a result of climate change was discussed, as well as potential future problems with water availability for those crops. 

Wes Jackson countered that the actual changes that will take place as a result of climate change are unpredictable, and Carl Pope stated that it is that very unpredictability which may lead to our demise. “We are a weedy species,” Pope said, “we adapt– but we cannot adapt to uncertainty.” Just one degree celsius increase in temperature in our prairie land, Jackson said, may turn the prairie to a dry, hot, sandy terrain, or, some say, could even create the exact opposite effect of a wetter (but still hotter, of course) environment.

Anna Lappe spoke of her “sleuthing” at food industry conferences and what those industries are or are not doing to counter global warming. While the Grocery Manufacturers Organization held its first ever Sustainability Summit, the Meat Manufacturers Conference was void of any inquiry on the topic– this when meat production creates 18% of greenhouse emissions globally!

Monsanto, according to Lappe, puts forward the rationale that the increase of small, organic farms would take up so much space that we will be sacrificing our forests for farms. Proponents of biotech farming dispense this information to the public, creating a false impression of the real consequences of organic farming vs. chemical farming. It is true that organic farming can result in lower yields in the short term, but if we concern ourselves with the future of the human species, land that is sapped of its ability to support plant life as a result of irresponsible farming becomes the obvious loser in the production-race. Indeed, Lappe said, the inefficiency of chemical agriculture is not accounted for in many calculations (for example, the oil used to ship fertilizer across the globe).

And, anyways, hunger is not even about scarcity, it’s about democracy! We do not have a lack of food, we have unequal access and distribution. (Berry discusses democratic land distribution in Home Economics.)

Speaking of food democracy, Lappe touched on the growing consumption of meat, and how it is held that humans naturally desire meat. She asks, is this really autonomous desire? In South Korea, she recounted, she had witnessed boycott demonstrations against U.S. imported beef. They felt the beef to be unsafe and a possible carrier of mad cow disease and were critical of ad campaigns which they felt had created a demand for meat. I think of advertisements I have seen for U.S. beef. They show lean steak at very close range, so that it appears to be a landscape. Herbs appear to be trees and bushes. If eating meat is such a natural inclination, what is the use for millions of dollars spent on ad campaigns? People should just naturally seek out flesh, no? Hence, the market for meat is created through ads and through cultural ideals on the performance of wealth.

There was also much discussion on the U.S. Farm Bill signed by Mr. Bush. Pope made the argument that the farm bill is not about food for the poor at all, but is rather about the most food from the least labor. This, of course, creates unemployment, and even a permanent unemployable class. Jackson agreed, and stated that the greatest source of untapped energy on this planet is in fact, human energy.

Patrick Holden put it succinctly that “a lot needs to happen in a terrible hurry.” I firmly believe it does, and the hurry will be terrible if we don’t hurry now. However, solutions made to work in the short term, said Carl Pope, must also work for the long term. 

A rich point in the conversation was reached when, following this comment, Jackson spoke of the need to de-emphasize growth as the dominant economic ideology. This sounded to me like Bill McKibben’s Deep Economy. Jackson certainly had a good point with this comment– our country in particular suffers from the Frontier Illness, which contributes to the tacit understanding that there is always space to grow into. This is what creates sprawling suburbs and decrepit inner cities; growing out leaves everything shallow. 

Pope raised issue with this idea, stating that we cannot stop thinking about growth when “three hundred million people in India want electricity.” Jackson diffused the tension by raising above his head a swatch of prairie grass he had traveled with from Kansas. The grass itself measured about 18″ long, but the thin, intertwined, knit-like roots stretched 8 ft. down. Talk about deep economy!