Omnivore's Dilemma: Ch. 11
Finally, a producer of not only chickens, but cows, hogs, rabbits, and turkeys that does it old natural way. Not only does Polyface Farms raise its animals without using any chemicals such as pesticides and antibiotics, they are also extremely cost-efficient. Every animal they raise at the farm helps each other in growing the best possible way they could. For instance, chickens graze the grasslands of Polyface daily (different parts of the farm each day) to reap the benefits of the vitamins and minerals in the greens and to fertilize the soil with their manure. The highly nitrogenous chicken manure allows Polyface to be completely self-sufficient in nitrogen, a large cost that is saved. Usually efficiency refers to doing things in a more concise, simpler way, but at Polyface their efficiency comes from "complexity and interdependence." The species help each other out; for instance chicken eggs are produced by cow manure and beef is produced through the chicken's secretions thus eliminating the use of chemicals. The chickens also help out the rabbits as well. At Polyface they have Raken Houses (Raken = half rabbit, half chicken and no it's not a genetically engineered animal). The rabbits live in cages above some hens on a bedding of woodchips in these houses. Rabbits have powerful ammonia-filled urine which is usually a large problem with raising rabbits indoors. However, the hens scratching away at these woodchips somehow turns the rabbit urine into a carbonaceous bedding which in turn creates a rich compost with earthworms that the hens eat. Quite an interesting phenomenon.
The Salatin family at Polyface Farms are today's innovators in raising farm animals. By raising several types of animals they are able to produce chemical-free food and still reduce costs. It's incredible how they are completely organic and extremely efficient at the same time. Who knew that chicken and cow manure and rabbit urine could turn into beneficial materials for the other animals around them. In many ways disgusting, but that's food science, isn't it? Different animals living together in harmony and not knowing how their actions are benefiting the other animals. Truly amazing.
1. What sort of chemical reaction takes place between the chicken's scratching of the woodchips and the rabbit's urine that earthworms are born from this newly created compost?
2. What is it in the chickens' manure that keeps the soil so fertile?
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Food Inc. Reviews
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=105152916
http://www.boxoffice.com/reviews/theatrical/2009-05-food-inc
http://movies.nytimes.com/2009/06/12/movies/12food.html
It was difficult to find a critical review of Food Inc., considering how well it was made and how valid its points are. The review from NPR, a more liberal than conservative radio station, broke the movie down into various sections that the critic liked, including the organic farmer Joel Salatin and the impoverished Orozcos family. The review from Box Office Magazine, a magazine of movie reviews has a more general review of the film. This review sort of summarizes the film, while also talking about a couple of issues a little more in depth. One of these issues is the mother and daughter making a trip to Washington D.C. to try get a law passed to prevent bacteria like E. coli infecting our food. (This law has been passed and is know as Kevin's Law). The last review is from the New York Times. This review talks about how good the film's case is, but does give one small criticism. This critic claims that at several times throughout the film it stops short before really getting started. I guess that is true in a sense, but the film covers so many different points that the director can only allocate so much time to each point.
http://www.boxoffice.com/reviews/theatrical/2009-05-food-inc
http://movies.nytimes.com/2009/06/12/movies/12food.html
It was difficult to find a critical review of Food Inc., considering how well it was made and how valid its points are. The review from NPR, a more liberal than conservative radio station, broke the movie down into various sections that the critic liked, including the organic farmer Joel Salatin and the impoverished Orozcos family. The review from Box Office Magazine, a magazine of movie reviews has a more general review of the film. This review sort of summarizes the film, while also talking about a couple of issues a little more in depth. One of these issues is the mother and daughter making a trip to Washington D.C. to try get a law passed to prevent bacteria like E. coli infecting our food. (This law has been passed and is know as Kevin's Law). The last review is from the New York Times. This review talks about how good the film's case is, but does give one small criticism. This critic claims that at several times throughout the film it stops short before really getting started. I guess that is true in a sense, but the film covers so many different points that the director can only allocate so much time to each point.
Mass Production: Is it All McDonald's Fault?
Food Inc.
The mass production of food that we know today was not always like this. Animals used to be born, fed, raised, and killed normally. These animals were healthy and nobody got sick from them. However, when the McDonald brothers came into play, the whole industry changed. They brought the assembly line system into a restaurant in order to take orders, make food, and deliver the food quickly. They created the fast food system that we see all over the country today. Because of the quick production in the restaurants, they needed quick production of the food's ingredients in order to meet demand. Thus began the food industry of this day and age. Mass production of cattle, chickens, pigs, and even vegetables all started, in essence, because of the McDonald brothers. Majority of these animals are confined to pens in which they don't see the light of day and are literally living in their own feces for their entire lives. Due to scientific breakthroughs in antibiotics, these animals can become two or three times heavier in the same amount or even less time than when they were killed and sold before this system. Not only do the antibiotics affect the animals, but they also affect us humans. One chicken grower for Perdue is now allergic to all antibiotics from dealing with these chickens and putting antibiotics into their feed daily. Should we continue this system to allow these mass producers and fast food chains to become even more profitable at the expense of our hard-working citizens?
The answer to my above question is very complicated. For someone like me who eats fast food on very rare occasions, if the system were to shut down I don't think it would have a great effect on me. Not all of the finished product of this system goes toward fast food, and I don't know how much of it goes to the food I eat on a daily basis. However, there are many people and families across the country who are not as lucky as I am and can choose when and when not to eat fast food. For many people, fast food is the most affordable option they can get and eat it at least once daily. It is a huge dilemma for these people - what are their options? Eat fast food and have their bodies suffer, or not eat fast food and eat on an irregular diet (also having their bodies suffer). Quite the omnivore's dilemma.
The mass production of food that we know today was not always like this. Animals used to be born, fed, raised, and killed normally. These animals were healthy and nobody got sick from them. However, when the McDonald brothers came into play, the whole industry changed. They brought the assembly line system into a restaurant in order to take orders, make food, and deliver the food quickly. They created the fast food system that we see all over the country today. Because of the quick production in the restaurants, they needed quick production of the food's ingredients in order to meet demand. Thus began the food industry of this day and age. Mass production of cattle, chickens, pigs, and even vegetables all started, in essence, because of the McDonald brothers. Majority of these animals are confined to pens in which they don't see the light of day and are literally living in their own feces for their entire lives. Due to scientific breakthroughs in antibiotics, these animals can become two or three times heavier in the same amount or even less time than when they were killed and sold before this system. Not only do the antibiotics affect the animals, but they also affect us humans. One chicken grower for Perdue is now allergic to all antibiotics from dealing with these chickens and putting antibiotics into their feed daily. Should we continue this system to allow these mass producers and fast food chains to become even more profitable at the expense of our hard-working citizens?
The answer to my above question is very complicated. For someone like me who eats fast food on very rare occasions, if the system were to shut down I don't think it would have a great effect on me. Not all of the finished product of this system goes toward fast food, and I don't know how much of it goes to the food I eat on a daily basis. However, there are many people and families across the country who are not as lucky as I am and can choose when and when not to eat fast food. For many people, fast food is the most affordable option they can get and eat it at least once daily. It is a huge dilemma for these people - what are their options? Eat fast food and have their bodies suffer, or not eat fast food and eat on an irregular diet (also having their bodies suffer). Quite the omnivore's dilemma.
To Eat Steak or Not to Eat Steak, That is the Question
Omnivore's Dilemma: Chapter 4
The meat-making process is long, hard, and disgusting in several ways. Raising steer, hogs, and bulls the "traditional" way is seen as illogical, stupid, and even offensive these days. Big companies like Tyson, Cargill, and Perdue are only concerned with being economically efficient with their production and do not care about the animals' well-being. Michael Pollan took it upon himself to follow the meat being produced from birth of the animal to consumption. Besides being a product of unnatural insemination, the calf is born in a normal way more or less. He begins nursing, and then shifts his diet toward grasses. However, about a month after he is born his life turns upside down. He is branded and castrated. He still continues to eat grass for a couple months after, but about seven months after his birth he will never eat grass again. So what does the calf eat for the rest of his life until he grows into a steer and is slaughtered? You know it folks, corn. Everything always goes back to corn. It is cheap and provides enough carbs and other nutrients to make the calf grow fatter quicker. An average cow in a feedlot consumes thirty two pounds of corn and gains four pounds per day. A major downside of this consistent corn consumption not only effects the steer itself, but it also effects the consumer. E. coli. Ever heard of it? A deathly bacteria that lives in feedlot cattle, forty percent of which carry it in their gut. So what stops these microbes from getting into our food? Studies have shown that if a feedlot steer were to simply eat grass or hay for only a couple days before being slaughtered, eighty percent of the E. coli in the cattle would be eliminated. So does the cattle industry use this practice? No. They use a practice called irradiation, more simply sterilizing the manure that gets into the meat. I think we can all tell who's wrong here.
I think that what the cattle industry does in all aspects of its business practices is repulsive. All they care about is producing meat at the fastest rate they can. They don't give a shit about our country's health or that people actually die from E. coli infections. Three days worth of eating grass or hay and a vast majority of the bacteria living in the cattle would disappear. Three days, that's it. Would it really cost the cattle industry that much more money to feed grass and hay to their products for the last three days of their miserable lives? If I had to take a wild guess, I'd say probably not.
The meat-making process is long, hard, and disgusting in several ways. Raising steer, hogs, and bulls the "traditional" way is seen as illogical, stupid, and even offensive these days. Big companies like Tyson, Cargill, and Perdue are only concerned with being economically efficient with their production and do not care about the animals' well-being. Michael Pollan took it upon himself to follow the meat being produced from birth of the animal to consumption. Besides being a product of unnatural insemination, the calf is born in a normal way more or less. He begins nursing, and then shifts his diet toward grasses. However, about a month after he is born his life turns upside down. He is branded and castrated. He still continues to eat grass for a couple months after, but about seven months after his birth he will never eat grass again. So what does the calf eat for the rest of his life until he grows into a steer and is slaughtered? You know it folks, corn. Everything always goes back to corn. It is cheap and provides enough carbs and other nutrients to make the calf grow fatter quicker. An average cow in a feedlot consumes thirty two pounds of corn and gains four pounds per day. A major downside of this consistent corn consumption not only effects the steer itself, but it also effects the consumer. E. coli. Ever heard of it? A deathly bacteria that lives in feedlot cattle, forty percent of which carry it in their gut. So what stops these microbes from getting into our food? Studies have shown that if a feedlot steer were to simply eat grass or hay for only a couple days before being slaughtered, eighty percent of the E. coli in the cattle would be eliminated. So does the cattle industry use this practice? No. They use a practice called irradiation, more simply sterilizing the manure that gets into the meat. I think we can all tell who's wrong here.
I think that what the cattle industry does in all aspects of its business practices is repulsive. All they care about is producing meat at the fastest rate they can. They don't give a shit about our country's health or that people actually die from E. coli infections. Three days worth of eating grass or hay and a vast majority of the bacteria living in the cattle would disappear. Three days, that's it. Would it really cost the cattle industry that much more money to feed grass and hay to their products for the last three days of their miserable lives? If I had to take a wild guess, I'd say probably not.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Corn in Our World
Omnivore's Dilemma: Chs. 1, 2, and 3.
Corn plays a pretty big part in our everyday lives. Although we may not know it, corn is a component for many of the foods that we eat day to day, and even other non-food products also used daily. More than a quarter of the forty-five thousand items in an American supermarket contain corn. Chicken nuggets, beer, waffles, syrup, and even bologna all contain corn. Even though corn is a major staple and an ingredient in tens of thousands of food items, the production side is quite difficult. Iowa is one of several states that produce corn. Conditions for Iowa corn farmers have grown increasingly worse over the last seven or eight decades or so. One farmer, George Naylor, has a one hundred sixty acres of corn planted on his farm. However, when the price of corn is only one dollar per bushel, it doesn't work out so well for him. Even so, Naylor keeps planting seeds and growing corn. The price of corn varies very often. When Naylor was planning to sell his corn, the price was at three dollars a bushel. By the time he actually sold, it was a dollar - a price that is good for everyone but the corn farmer. Naylor keeps planting because of the strange economics of corn farming. The benefits are reaped by the suppliers of many food products. They buy this corn at a low price and utilize it to make their products and ultimately sell it to consumers. The corn farmer is still left in peril.
The economics of corn farming probably should be a sign for the corn farmer to get out of business, but to the corn farmer I feel like its more of a challenge - a challenge to persevere and keep doing what they know and eventually make a profit. The price per bushel fluctuates so often that maybe one day it could be highly inflated and corn farmers will make a killing. Also, most of these corn farmers are descendants of corn farmers, so they probably feel like they owe it to their father and grandfathers before them to keep farming and carry on.
1. Considering there is always a high demand for corn with a limited supply, why does the price per bushel get so low?
2. What is it about corn that makes it so usable in tens of thousands of food products?
Corn plays a pretty big part in our everyday lives. Although we may not know it, corn is a component for many of the foods that we eat day to day, and even other non-food products also used daily. More than a quarter of the forty-five thousand items in an American supermarket contain corn. Chicken nuggets, beer, waffles, syrup, and even bologna all contain corn. Even though corn is a major staple and an ingredient in tens of thousands of food items, the production side is quite difficult. Iowa is one of several states that produce corn. Conditions for Iowa corn farmers have grown increasingly worse over the last seven or eight decades or so. One farmer, George Naylor, has a one hundred sixty acres of corn planted on his farm. However, when the price of corn is only one dollar per bushel, it doesn't work out so well for him. Even so, Naylor keeps planting seeds and growing corn. The price of corn varies very often. When Naylor was planning to sell his corn, the price was at three dollars a bushel. By the time he actually sold, it was a dollar - a price that is good for everyone but the corn farmer. Naylor keeps planting because of the strange economics of corn farming. The benefits are reaped by the suppliers of many food products. They buy this corn at a low price and utilize it to make their products and ultimately sell it to consumers. The corn farmer is still left in peril.
The economics of corn farming probably should be a sign for the corn farmer to get out of business, but to the corn farmer I feel like its more of a challenge - a challenge to persevere and keep doing what they know and eventually make a profit. The price per bushel fluctuates so often that maybe one day it could be highly inflated and corn farmers will make a killing. Also, most of these corn farmers are descendants of corn farmers, so they probably feel like they owe it to their father and grandfathers before them to keep farming and carry on.
1. Considering there is always a high demand for corn with a limited supply, why does the price per bushel get so low?
2. What is it about corn that makes it so usable in tens of thousands of food products?
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