Arrayed on the table before the Guatemalan Mendoza family was a colorful bounty of fresh food for the week – tomatoes, squash, carrots, green beans, garlic, potatoes, and among other things, two large burlap sacks full of grain.
In sharp contrast, the Caven family from California were the beneficiaries of an industrialized food system which processes many of the raw ingredients on the Mendoza’s table, along with enough preservatives to make them last indefinitely, and enough sugars and artificial flavor to make them taste good once they finally reach the dinner table. But it’s not really the Caven’s fault that they eat such unhealthy food, any more than it is the Mendoza’s that they either can’t access or can’t afford such “luxuries” as Coke, processed grain cereals, and packaged meat. Rather, the huge disparity represents the effects of institutional, economic, political, and ecological determinants of the global food system.
The World Bank, the World Trade Organization (WTO formerly GATT), and the US government to a great degree collectively determine the vast differences in the foods eaten by the two families. These have collectively produced a system that favors US businesses, and caused the kinds of asymmetries that led to the food crisis in Haiti. Institutional determinants have also had the unfortunate effect of creating a culture of cheap eats in the US that has had dramatic health consequences including obesity and diabetes.
And economic and health effects are not the only ones. Clearly evident was the greater ecological footprint of a wealthier, developed nation. Where the Mendoza’s food was contained in baskets and burlap, the Caven’s was a commercial package collage that required natural resource extraction, production, and that, after use, would be discarded, signifying the entropy of an unsustainable system.
The challenge for the future, at least in terms of the world food system, may be to redirect the economic emphasis of the current system to a moral emphasis that will lead to greater equality, environmental and human health, and the end of poverty and hunger – all fed by more nutritional food.
Photo sources:
Storch, Camile. How To Choose A CSA That’s Right For You, Bounty From The Box, 04/2015, https://bountyfromthebox.com/how-to-choose-a-csa-thats-right-for-you/, Website, Accessed 07/2017
We Photography, Packaged Food, Speechfoodie, http://speechfoodie.com/packaged-foods/, Website, Accessed 07/2017