© 2012 Joshua Stark
According to some producers, wild salmon just don't grow fast enough. Oh sure, a Chinook salmon can reach 40+ pounds in two years, feeding for free and adding to the health of our lands and waters as it does, but this kind of willy-nilly public resource just doesn't cut it for those who wish to have complete control over their market. So in the name of profit, these folks have genetically engineered a species of salmon that grows over twice as fast as wild fish. Meant to be farmed in closed systems, these GE salmon will be fed by fishing for baitfish, presumably, and will not be allowed to enter our oceans, for fear that they will out-compete and destroy wild salmon. First, however, the producers of this fish must get past the FDA, which doesn't look like too big a hurdle.
While the FDA wrestles with the question of legalizing GE salmon for consumers, California is considering whether or not to require labels identifying such meat as GE in the marketplace. And while I might address the basic question of even allowing GE salmon at some future point, right now I want to address consumer knowledge in the marketplace.
This, of course, is a no-brainer outside of the halls of governance: Libertarians to Socialists agree that consumers have the right to know where and how their food comes to be. Even the opponents of the labeling bill (AB 88) couch their opposition in a manner that acknowledges some leeway in labeling requirements, arguing not that they shouldn't be labeled, per se, but that such requirements are the responsibility of the federal government, not the State.
In reality, the bill's opponents are concerned that if consumers know what they are buying, they will probably choose not to buy it (about 50% say they wouldn't). Really, consumer choice is the issue here, and California has every right to require labeling.
Showing posts with label food security. Show all posts
Showing posts with label food security. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Friday, August 12, 2011
Level-headed and honest discussions about famine, climate change & overpopulation
© 2011 Joshua Stark
Within ten days, two separate radio programs addressed the controversy around overpopulation, and they did it exactly like it should be done: in passing, dismissing it as a separate threat, and mentioning it only in the context of sociopolitical pressures and poverty.
These two shows? Forum, with Michael Krasny, and Talk of the Nation Science Friday, with Ira Flatow.
In the Forum episode, an update on Somalia, Semhar Araia, the regional director for OxFam's work on the horn of Africa, addressed an email from a listener who railed about Somalia's inability to feed its too crowded landscape. In perhaps two sentences, Mr. Araia stated clearly that Somalia has the ability to feed itself even under the current circumstances. People were starving to death there because militia groups were preventing them from reaching food.
It is as simple and as horrifying as that. Somalia doesn't suffer from brown and black people having too many babies, it suffers under the hands of vile militias.
And today on Science Friday, in an entire discussion (I think it was a half-hour) on food, its production, and climate change, only a few scant seconds were given to overpopulation as a problem in and of itself. Ira Flatow started off with the fear-mongering threat we often hear - by 2050 there will be 9 billion people - and the respondent replied, to agreement with the other speakers, that: first, we may not even reach 9 billion by 2050; second, we grow enough under current situations to feed all of us; third, the problems are an overpopulation of poverty and distribution - and more specifically, that when people get out of abject poverty, they will want to eat more and different foods; fourth, climate change is going to impact our yield, and so we need to study those impacts and do what we can to mitigate them.
Again, that was it. Overpopulation was not the problem. (For the record, I think Mr. Flatow was lobbing a softball in his question on overpopulation.)
I hope to post a bit more on the Science Friday show, because there is so much in there to take apart related to ethics and the environment, but I wanted to make the overpopulation issue clear: For most folks seriously working to improve food security, overpopulation isn't the problem.
Within ten days, two separate radio programs addressed the controversy around overpopulation, and they did it exactly like it should be done: in passing, dismissing it as a separate threat, and mentioning it only in the context of sociopolitical pressures and poverty.
These two shows? Forum, with Michael Krasny, and Talk of the Nation Science Friday, with Ira Flatow.
In the Forum episode, an update on Somalia, Semhar Araia, the regional director for OxFam's work on the horn of Africa, addressed an email from a listener who railed about Somalia's inability to feed its too crowded landscape. In perhaps two sentences, Mr. Araia stated clearly that Somalia has the ability to feed itself even under the current circumstances. People were starving to death there because militia groups were preventing them from reaching food.
It is as simple and as horrifying as that. Somalia doesn't suffer from brown and black people having too many babies, it suffers under the hands of vile militias.
And today on Science Friday, in an entire discussion (I think it was a half-hour) on food, its production, and climate change, only a few scant seconds were given to overpopulation as a problem in and of itself. Ira Flatow started off with the fear-mongering threat we often hear - by 2050 there will be 9 billion people - and the respondent replied, to agreement with the other speakers, that: first, we may not even reach 9 billion by 2050; second, we grow enough under current situations to feed all of us; third, the problems are an overpopulation of poverty and distribution - and more specifically, that when people get out of abject poverty, they will want to eat more and different foods; fourth, climate change is going to impact our yield, and so we need to study those impacts and do what we can to mitigate them.
Again, that was it. Overpopulation was not the problem. (For the record, I think Mr. Flatow was lobbing a softball in his question on overpopulation.)
I hope to post a bit more on the Science Friday show, because there is so much in there to take apart related to ethics and the environment, but I wanted to make the overpopulation issue clear: For most folks seriously working to improve food security, overpopulation isn't the problem.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Women's rights, food justice and security - from the social to the individual and back
© 2010 Joshua Stark
Two great articles out last week, speaking to different issues around the ethics of food, got me to thinking about the nexus of hunting, food security, and women's rights.
First, this article at Grist on the implications of a whitewashed food justice movement. The author is honest, thoughtful, and far better at her craft than I. Definitely read it. Two weeks back, I posted a piece on how the environmental movement (which, in my mind, includes 'food justice' folks) hamstrings itself through apprenticeship programs, subsequently passing on its expertise and influence to a disproportionately wealthy group of individuals, and creating difficult burdens to entry for those who cannot afford to work for free. Natasha Bowens, the author of the piece at Grist, talks about this from a different perspective, and also shows just how one group is trying to break the homogeneity.
Next, I wanted to get a little more traffic over to Ms. Winfrey's site, to help out as I can... O Magazine has a wonderful article on hunting for the Thanksgiving turkey. Although the category is "women and hunting", the author (Kimberly Hiss) doesn't wax political about it - I wouldn't care if she did, it's a great subject, and she is an amazing writer - she writes about hunting and shooting a bird for Thanksgiving, and this act's personal and family implications. She does allude to the strange, new pressures she received when she began hunting, and also the beauty and sense of fulfillment she gets by providing food through hunting, and her subtlety is wonderful. Being thoughtful and considerate, she really lets the reader join her.
Ms. Hiss might not have considered her's a piece on food justice or food security, but I do. When she talks about her bird's diet vs. those packaged in stores and when she describes the hunt, she alludes to important aspects of food security. Food security means, at its most basic level, the ability to safely provide healthy food, now and in the future, for you and your family. For some of us, this is solely an economic problem, but for many, food security addresses the quality of food (a healthy variety) and the physical act of acquisition (keeping out of harm's way when getting it) as much as it does the ability to pay for it when it is available.
Many parts of our country are effectively food deserts, communities with no walking access to anything other than the local liquor store. In these places (as in almost everywhere on Earth), women are most often responsible for providing food for the family, and yet, the physical act of trying to get healthy food often puts them in harm's way. The empowerment that comes from effectively and efficiently wielding a gun (or a bow) to provide for one's family is profound; it strikes the very core of both food and security.
Which is why I read with happiness this piece by Holly Heyser, the Nor Cal Cazadora (another writer of the fist caliber), on the numbers of women hunting. As she points out, women hunt at a much higher rate in the West than in other parts of the country. This core of hunters and what they represent, if I may be allowed the latitude, can have a global impact on the role and empowerment of women.
Hunting embodies empowerment. Taking the life of an animal to provide sustenance is one of the three or four most basic things a human really needs in order to survive, and honing those skills requires controlling and mastering a powerful force. Guns are powerful, they equalize people like few other things - and this empowerment can mean so much more in the hands of women.
Now, I'm no trigger-happy gun fanatic, nor am I a violent person, a condition of my religion. What I am, as my Momma raised me, is as much a feminist as a man can be. And I'm not naive when it comes to understanding and recognizing power as choice and the ability to defend and provide for oneself, especially at the personal level, and especially as that relates to women in the World. In my household, I'll make darned sure that my daughter and son can shoot, of course, and also catch, garden, forage and cook good food. On the social level, I recognize that access to these basic skills is vital to equality.
As I thought more about this issue, I remembered a piece by Scott Simon of National Public Radio. When he learned of the possibility for peace talks with the Taliban, he reminded his listeners about Afghanistan under their rule, as he had reported from there for quite a while in the early 2000's. In particular, he talked about watching the first soccer game in Kabul after the Taliban were run out, where a British commando took off her beret to call to a friend, and the crowd erupted in cheers. Soon after, and every few minutes during the game, a woman would stand up in the crowd and remove her veil.
Yes, this may feel like a tangent, but I think you know where I'm going. There in Afghanistan, one empowered woman expressed that power without even thinking about it, and helped other women to see themselves as powerful. Around the world, U.N. forces with women soldiers empower local women who've suffered as slaves for untold millennia, just by being there. I don't pretend that all these women are automatically freed, but changes do happen because of these experiences. Here in the Western U.S., where women first took the right of suffrage in the U.S., it is important to remember, make conscious and plain and pass down, this power.
Hunting necessarily taps and hones that power. Increasing food security for communities and individuals by developing local means to produce food also empowers individuals. From Holly, Ms. Bowens and Ms. Hiss all the way to those women in Afghanistan who stood up in that stadium and dared to show their society that they have faces, these expressions of power shake our very foundations in the best possible way. Thank you.
Two great articles out last week, speaking to different issues around the ethics of food, got me to thinking about the nexus of hunting, food security, and women's rights.
First, this article at Grist on the implications of a whitewashed food justice movement. The author is honest, thoughtful, and far better at her craft than I. Definitely read it. Two weeks back, I posted a piece on how the environmental movement (which, in my mind, includes 'food justice' folks) hamstrings itself through apprenticeship programs, subsequently passing on its expertise and influence to a disproportionately wealthy group of individuals, and creating difficult burdens to entry for those who cannot afford to work for free. Natasha Bowens, the author of the piece at Grist, talks about this from a different perspective, and also shows just how one group is trying to break the homogeneity.
Next, I wanted to get a little more traffic over to Ms. Winfrey's site, to help out as I can... O Magazine has a wonderful article on hunting for the Thanksgiving turkey. Although the category is "women and hunting", the author (Kimberly Hiss) doesn't wax political about it - I wouldn't care if she did, it's a great subject, and she is an amazing writer - she writes about hunting and shooting a bird for Thanksgiving, and this act's personal and family implications. She does allude to the strange, new pressures she received when she began hunting, and also the beauty and sense of fulfillment she gets by providing food through hunting, and her subtlety is wonderful. Being thoughtful and considerate, she really lets the reader join her.
Ms. Hiss might not have considered her's a piece on food justice or food security, but I do. When she talks about her bird's diet vs. those packaged in stores and when she describes the hunt, she alludes to important aspects of food security. Food security means, at its most basic level, the ability to safely provide healthy food, now and in the future, for you and your family. For some of us, this is solely an economic problem, but for many, food security addresses the quality of food (a healthy variety) and the physical act of acquisition (keeping out of harm's way when getting it) as much as it does the ability to pay for it when it is available.
Many parts of our country are effectively food deserts, communities with no walking access to anything other than the local liquor store. In these places (as in almost everywhere on Earth), women are most often responsible for providing food for the family, and yet, the physical act of trying to get healthy food often puts them in harm's way. The empowerment that comes from effectively and efficiently wielding a gun (or a bow) to provide for one's family is profound; it strikes the very core of both food and security.
Which is why I read with happiness this piece by Holly Heyser, the Nor Cal Cazadora (another writer of the fist caliber), on the numbers of women hunting. As she points out, women hunt at a much higher rate in the West than in other parts of the country. This core of hunters and what they represent, if I may be allowed the latitude, can have a global impact on the role and empowerment of women.
Hunting embodies empowerment. Taking the life of an animal to provide sustenance is one of the three or four most basic things a human really needs in order to survive, and honing those skills requires controlling and mastering a powerful force. Guns are powerful, they equalize people like few other things - and this empowerment can mean so much more in the hands of women.
Now, I'm no trigger-happy gun fanatic, nor am I a violent person, a condition of my religion. What I am, as my Momma raised me, is as much a feminist as a man can be. And I'm not naive when it comes to understanding and recognizing power as choice and the ability to defend and provide for oneself, especially at the personal level, and especially as that relates to women in the World. In my household, I'll make darned sure that my daughter and son can shoot, of course, and also catch, garden, forage and cook good food. On the social level, I recognize that access to these basic skills is vital to equality.
As I thought more about this issue, I remembered a piece by Scott Simon of National Public Radio. When he learned of the possibility for peace talks with the Taliban, he reminded his listeners about Afghanistan under their rule, as he had reported from there for quite a while in the early 2000's. In particular, he talked about watching the first soccer game in Kabul after the Taliban were run out, where a British commando took off her beret to call to a friend, and the crowd erupted in cheers. Soon after, and every few minutes during the game, a woman would stand up in the crowd and remove her veil.
Yes, this may feel like a tangent, but I think you know where I'm going. There in Afghanistan, one empowered woman expressed that power without even thinking about it, and helped other women to see themselves as powerful. Around the world, U.N. forces with women soldiers empower local women who've suffered as slaves for untold millennia, just by being there. I don't pretend that all these women are automatically freed, but changes do happen because of these experiences. Here in the Western U.S., where women first took the right of suffrage in the U.S., it is important to remember, make conscious and plain and pass down, this power.
Hunting necessarily taps and hones that power. Increasing food security for communities and individuals by developing local means to produce food also empowers individuals. From Holly, Ms. Bowens and Ms. Hiss all the way to those women in Afghanistan who stood up in that stadium and dared to show their society that they have faces, these expressions of power shake our very foundations in the best possible way. Thank you.
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