I know it has been awhile, and I am sorry for that, but this Monday has been deemed "food day." As any busy mom can tell you, when you have a crew to feed- everyday is food day! It seems like every time I turn around, I am making grocery lists, shopping for the best food values, and hearing the same question over and over, "what's for supper?" I know that many of you are also confronted daily with food questions, and as I have said before:
"If you want to talk about food, talk to a farmer!"
So, these are the goals of this year's food day:
1 Reduce diet-related disease by promoting safe, healthy foods
2 Support sustainable farms & limit subsidies to big agribusiness
3 Expand access to food and alleviate hunger
4 Protect the environment & animals by reforming factory farms
5 Promote health by curbing junk-food marketing to kids
6 Support fair conditions for food and farm workers
In this post, I want to personally talk about #3. Every decision we make on our farm leads right back to the goal of expanding access to food and alleviating hunger. We try to never forget that we are not only growing crops or cows, but that we are responsible for the food that ends up in the grocery stores and then eventually on your table and mine.
We are so fortunate in this country to experience unprecidented access to food. For most Americans, when a stomach growls, that person can walk to the fridge. (Or, if nobody has done the shoppping lately, they could head to the store or a restaurant.) However, despite this abundance of food, 14.5% of households in the U.S. are food insecure. (http://www.feedingamerica.org/) As farmers, we are in the food business, and that isn't acceptable to us. I'm not proclaiming to have the answer to end hunger, but I would like to tell you how farmers are working to meet the challenge of sending everyone to bed each night with a full tummy.
We have to first make sure that we are producing enough, and the way we can do that is through technology. The world population is still growing, but we are loosing productive farm ground every day to growing cities. That means we are going to have to grow more food per acre of land every year to meet demand, and that is going to take innovative technology and improved farming practices. Yes... that means things like genetically modified organisms and biotechnology. As farmers we use sound science to make decisions about what new technologies to use, because we know that the crops we are growing will eventually end up on our family tables.
Second, the crops that will become your dinner have to get from our farm (way out in the country) to a processor of some sort, and then a grocery store. This means that our livelyhood and your grocery cart depends on the transportation system, including trucks, trains, and river systems. Over-regulation of these industries and inadequate infrastructure is leading to difficulties for farmers to get the crops we grow to the people that need them for food, so we are always concious of ways to protect the environment while utilizing cost-effective methods of transportation.
Finally, one of the underlying causes of food insecurity is financial insecurity. Many people want to blame the farmers when they go to the grocery stores and see the prices rising. What we would like people to understand is that in the U.S., we spend approximately 10% of our income on food. In other parts of the world, that percentage runs between 18-25% and that means for every dollar you make, you spend 10 cents instead of the 18-25 cents spent in other countries. As I said before, we have one of the most abundant food supplies in the world, and now you know that we also spend less to utilize that supply. On top of that, most of the price food is not going to the farmer. The farmer's share of the food dollar has been on the decline since the 1960's, and today we earn about 19 cents for every food dollar spent.
Okay, so there is a crash course on how my family, and the other farmers across the nation are working to expand access for food and alleviate hunger. As you celebrate food day this Monday, remember that just like all you busy moms, to those of us in agriculture everyday is food day!
If you want to talk about food, talk to a farmer!
Visit http://www.findourcommonground.com/
or join the conversation at www.facebook.com/commongroundnow
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