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I hope to watch the Food Inc documentary in class but it might turn me off food for a while. Here is an interesting article about the loss of food diversity. Check it out
1) What are you thoughts?
2) What can we do?
3) “Now, we can get strawberries year round, which look beautiful and taste of nothing,” How does that make you feel?
4) “the privileged among us would pay an economic price for that lack of planning and prioritising through higher food cost, but the poor would pay for it with their lives.” How does this make you feel?
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140401-the-worlds-most-endangered-food
This is my weekly post:
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the attached article, I was initially taken aback by the fact that certain breeds of crops have gone extinct over time and others can be rendered as endangered. I suppose that due to the earth’s ongoing climate change there’s been many occurring shifts in agriculture but it never really dawned on me how severely this impacts the food that’s sold on the market today. Even though we’re constantly exposed to products that are severely processed and encompass many GMOs – it’s still a bizarre concept that a lot of the staple foods that our diets consists of us didn’t exist way back when and are in truth – just genetic duplications. When it comes down to it – I think it’s the changed prioritization in agriculture that’s lead to this. The article even states that farming is solely driven by quantity. It seems as if now their main goals are to produce as much livestock/crop possible and to do so quickly in order for it to be available for transfer. As a result, a lot of these produces’ authentic properties are sacrificed in this extreme process.
The following phrase “Now, we can get strawberries year round, which look beautiful and taste of nothing,” really resonated with me. I think it’s mainly because it sums up this new ideal conceived by the food industry that immense frequency of production should be perceived as a preference over general quality. As consumers we tend to be fairly greedy to say the least and that’s why these high demands for lavish, seasonal fruits like strawberries exist. Since we refuse to delay the production of these crops even when it’s not their time of year to be grown – we’re forced to settle with the decline in quality. I think if we decided to simply wait for spring and summer to eat strawberries – we’d definitely appreciate them more and not mind the wait.
I really like the idea of the food vault. It may not be the definite resolution but it’s at least comforting to know that quality in some ways is still being ranked over quantity. I looked a bit more into this food vault and I was pleased to find out that it’s also not very costly for it to be maintained - it’s all funded by the Norwegian government and an organization called Crop Trust. I’m also a fan of the fact that Trust is supporting developing nations with a unique partnership involving assistance of packaging, preparing and transferring their own accessions to the safety provided by the vault. With that in mind, this’ll encourage many countries to see the importance of crop protection and they’ll be more willing to contribute. All in all, it’s a great way to preserve crop diversity and benefits many on a global scale.
This site has more information on the crop vault that was referenced in my post:
https://www.croptrust.org/content/svalbard-global-seed-vault
I was also just as shocked to figure out that certain crops have become extinct and that others have become endangered over time. I suppose that it is due to climate change and a shift in our environment, but I also have to wonder if we are speeding up the process with our over-industrialized ways and anti-environment conscious chemicals.
Deleteyour post was really interesting and in depth, great job! :)
ReplyDeleteThis is my post for the week,
ReplyDeleteInteresting article to read! I have heard similar things about the "biodiversity" dilemma before and all-in-all it is quite scary. The number of species that have been wipe out for the sake of convenience to humankind is a little bit shocking to me. The article states that 75% of the earth's plant biodiversity has been wiped out since Pre-1900's era. To me that is just insane.
When the article talks about the taste of strawberries produced year round and those produced seasonally previously, I started to think. When i eat strawberries grown at my cottage in the wild they taste much sweeter than those that we buy in the grocery store. The article is totally right! Because the strawberries are being produced year round the actual taste has changed due to herbicide use but the quantity and availability of the strawberries has gone way up. The topic of biodiversity intertwines with consumerism quite readily and create markets for food based on demand for the product.
The fact that in today's day and age if i pick up a 'carrot' and eat it i may not be eating an actual 'carrot' is shocking. I have heard numerous stories saying that the orange colour of carrots is not there natural colour and in fact is only made that colour to appeal to the consumer and help distinguish them between other root vegetables. Carrots are often many different colours ranging from white to red to purple. These have been phased out and the orange carrot has prevailed. The fight for biodiversity rages, but until us humans realize the magnitude of our mistakes it may be too late.
Here is an article I found about the different coloring's of carrots:
http://www.nextnature.net/2009/08/why-are-carrots-orange-it-is-political/
I had no idea carrots could be purple or any other color of that matter, that is so interesting ! Great post :)
DeleteThese facts are really interesting Adrian! I agree with you about the strawberry thing. My family is from Sudbury where you can pick wild blueberries pretty much anywhere. When I moved to Barrie and went to Barrie Hill Farms, I could not believe that the blueberries they were growing were actually blueberries. They were twice as large and tasted nothing like the real wild blueberries from home. It just goes to show how we as humans can change these crops so drastically.
DeleteI agree with Anne, when my family goes camping we often pick wild berries and I have always found it worrisome how the differ from the berries in the stores.
Deletethis is my weekly post;
ReplyDeleteI found this article very interesting, yet also a bit scary. I was not aware of this issue whatsoever prior to reading this, so you can imagine how blind sided i must feel. I mean the fact that we're losing entire breeds of animals and produce is just awful and i feel like it's also very preventable. It all comes back to the issue of industrialization. Our society is only worried about time and money, anything that gets in the way can go is our motto, and that seems so careless to me. We have wifi on airplanes and men on the moon but we can't seem to stop apples or pears that taste like butter (awesome!!) from going extinct. I mean 75% of the earth's bio diversity has dissapeared since before the 1900's, and my question is HOW? If the government had small farms all over that grew enough of these endangered plants from going completly extinct then there would be no worries.
The quote about strawberries being able to be sold all year at the cost of their delicious sweetness just grosses me out. Because when i think about it, the strawberries i pick from barrie hill farms taste 400% better than the massive ones i get from zehrs. They basically taste like water. Due to the fact that these berries are being produced all year around, of course herbacides and chemicals will cause a biological change in the end product, because its not natural for them to grow all year. The "need" for this food has caused it to lose all of it's goodness and to sucumb to the quantity over quality motto of today's consumerist society.
As for the food vault, i think that it is a very smart idea, although they are putting all of the worlds fruit in one basket so to speak. I am glad something is being done about this world issue because a lot of the time people complain or they worry but they don't do anything to help so i think the vault is a great step in the right direction.
here is cool but kind of sad article about Cavendish bananas going extinct :o
http://news.msn.com/science-technology/is-it-time-to-say-bye-bye-to-the-banana