Thread: Food, Inc.

I haven't seen the movie, but I have read the Omnivore's Dilemna and a few other of Pollan's books--I absolutely love them, the philosphy, and the idealism. I grew up on a family farm as did my parents, and it has 'evolved' from the Polyface ideal as Pollan described which is how my parents grew up--huge gardens, livestock chickens, raw milk from the neighbor's dairy; to largely grain and livestock in my generation (I am 37), and now livestock is controlled by a select few, and grain is controlled by a select few with Monsanto leading the free world in genetics.

The economies of scale will be interesting--even with government subsidies in place, the price of a badgof seed corn may double or triple within the next 4 to 5 years as the parent crop genetics get more complex; which will yield more theoretically....but where will the market price be? Last year, it was $7/bushel (56 pounds of corn), this year it is $3. How will this economic model play out? Do enough consumers want the Polyface/Pollan/My Parents farm fresh food to pay more $$ for it, take land out of row crop production which drives corn and soybean prices up even more, and driving the rest of our food supply cost up up and up so the average or impoverished can't afford it? And also, thereby limiting the national and world supply of corn? Maybe we have too much corn, maybe not--but as a friend of mine who farms 3000 plus acres says, we can take it all out of production--and if enough of us do this, you tell us who will starve.

The other aspect of this is--

Originally Posted by jeff2011

I haven't seen the movie, but I have read the Omnivore's Dilemna and a few other of Pollan's books--I absolutely love them, the philosphy, and the idealism. I grew up on a family farm as did my parents, and it has 'evolved' from the Polyface ideal as Pollan described which is how my parents grew up--huge gardens, livestock chickens, raw milk from the neighbor's dairy; to largely grain and livestock in my generation (I am 37), and now livestock is controlled by a select few, and grain is controlled by a select few with Monsanto leading the free world in genetics.

The economies of scale will be interesting--even with government subsidies in place, the price of a badgof seed corn may double or triple within the next 4 to 5 years as the parent crop genetics get more complex; which will yield more theoretically....but where will the market price be? Last year, it was $7/bushel (56 pounds of corn), this year it is $3. How will this economic model play out? Do enough consumers want the Polyface/Pollan/My Parents farm fresh food to pay more $$ for it, take land out of row crop production which drives corn and soybean prices up even more, and driving the rest of our food supply cost up up and up so the average or impoverished can't afford it? And also, thereby limiting the national and world supply of corn? Maybe we have too much corn, maybe not--but as a friend of mine who farms 3000 plus acres says, we can take it all out of production--and if enough of us do this, you tell us who will starve.

The other aspect of this is--

There is a commune that's about a 45-minute drive from me and I've only been there once. They have a food gala every year in which they show off their homegrown foods in various dishes, so my wife and I went to check it out. We came back with a whole chicken and various cuts of beef, and it was absolutely delicious.

If we had a nearby farm similar to Polyface, I would support it in a heartbeat. We usually get our meats from a local grocer. If we get meat from Fresh Market or Publix (a large supermarket chain in the southeast) then we make sure it's grass fed. Typically, the more marbling (fat) in beef the better it will taste. The largest difference I've seen in grass fed is that there is much less marbling and I personally think it tastes better. It could also be that I'm a sucker for nature and it's reassuring to know that the animal I'm eating led somewhat of a natural life.

It's hard to imagine that the philosophy will ever become dominant in America. First, we probably have too many people and too little land for it to be feasible and second, they'll always be competing against $.99 hamburgers already prepared. Some people are like us and prefer paying a fair price for good food while others would rather spend $12 for a family meal at KFC than a single whole chicken.

Here's a nice segment from USA Today about Polyface:
YouTube - Polyface farm