Reimagining Sustainability

In the midst of a global health crisis and a heightened awareness of systemic inequality, it is imperative that individuals, communities, and large-scale institutions consider the implications of the current food and agricultural system from an environmental and social perspective.

The global movement away from humanely-raised food and toward mechanized formulations is both detrimental to the health of humans and the environment. Michael Pollan explores the implications of industrial agriculture in his book The Omnivore’s Dilemma (I HIGHLY recommend). American families after WWII aimed to “[liberate] food from nature” given that fresh food spoils relatively quickly compared to energy-rich, nutrient-poor processed food can be stored for extended periods (Pollan 2006: 91). Furthermore, mass food production gained momentum during the Industrial Era, placing more pressure on factories to provide and manage cheap labor.

Although the expansion of the food manufacturing industry drastically decreased the amount of labor necessary for American consumers to obtain palatable food items compared to our hunting and gathering ancestors, product-quality naturally decreases with greater dependency on mass-production, cheap labor, and a lack of biodiversity. Consequently, factory farms are producing more food than the American population can consume, and this waste accumulates at an alarming rate. Overproduction at the agricultural and industrial level can also cut the prices of raw materials and hurt the businesses of those who are growing the food. For instance, buying whole fruits and vegetables allows more money to enter the pockets of farmers, but the farther the raw material moves down the industrial chain, the more major corporations profit. Not only do smallholding farmers and human health suffer the consequences of large-scale industrial farming, but the amount of waste and the emission of fossil fuels to keep up with the rate of production contaminate the land, water sources, and air quality.

Considering the compounding impact of mass food production and consumption on humans and the larger ecosystem, it is apparent that each of these concepts cannot be analyzed in a vacuum. The intensified food system produces calories at a cheaper cost, often leading to a lack of biodiversity. Oftentimes, industrial farmers will focus on producing profitable crops like corn or soy that can be ultra-processed and used to formulate many self-stable products in supermarkets. In addition to carbohydrate-rich processed food, copious animal protein that is higher fat may contribute to chronic disease. Factory-raised chickens, pigs, and cows are fed grains rather than grass to reach a desirable market weight at the cost of the animal’s health (Pollan 2006). To manage illness among livestock, they are often injected with antibiotics that then affect the humans who consume them (Weiss 2016).

Biosecurity aims to keep infectious strains isolated, but disease can still spread between humans and animals (Blanchette 2015). Viruses reproduce by finding a host and spreading to another and may generate an epidemic if they do not kill the host too quickly. Antibiotic-treated livestock impact the human consumers who become increasingly drug-resistant, and spreading animal waste on fields to improve the soil contaminates the air and water, increasing the spread of pathogens.

In an era of mass production, consumption, environmental degradation, and declining health, it is eye-opening to evaluate such issues by unraveling the detriments of industrial agriculture. Compared to hunting and gathering, agricultural methods of food production manipulate the natural environment. The domestication process is significant in that it is a symbiotic relationship that reveals the interdependence of plant and animal species. When humans alter the natural environment through resource management, diversity is favorable and specialization is key. It is not until communities reestablish biodiversity that the harmful notion of human development or progress be eradicated. Based on this logic, if we are to address the release of biomass and waste, it is useful to analyze this issue from both an ecological and humanistic perspective.

It is evident that industrial farming organizations exploit the natural environment monocropping, resorting to animal confinement, spreading waste on fields, and relying on fossil fuels to sustain the high rate of production. Not only does the ecosystem suffer, but unregulated access to low quality food increases the rate of chronic disease among the human population.

Humans feel a deep-seated need to separate or distinguish themselves as the more advanced species by altering landscapes and finding new ways to control natural resources - there is a long-standing belief that culture stands in opposition to nature or is an improvement upon nature. Culture is adaptive to the natural environment, and much like the process of domestication which is often utilized to create a stable food source, cultural customs develop to organize relationships, meet collective needs, and ultimately aid survival.

As we persist through this period of uncertainty, disparity, and suffering, I encourage readers to consider looking into topics related to human ecology. This subject area provides a holistic lens to analyze pressing environmental and societal issues and not only applies to large-scale environmental concerns such as climate change or population growth, but to individual health and well-being.

References

Blake, Micheal. 2015. “Old Puzzles and New Questions about Maize’s Origins and Spread.” Pp. 53-73 in Maize for the Gods: Unearthing the 9,000-Year History of Corn. University of California Press.

Blanchette, Alex. 2015. “Herding Species: Biosecurity, Posthuman Labor, and the American Industrial Pig.” Cultural Anthropology 30(4): 640–669.

Diamond, Jared. 2005. “Twilight at Easter.” In Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. Pp 79-119. New York: Viking.

Dunning, N. P., T. P. Beach, and S. Luzzadder-Beach. 2012. “Kax and Kol: Collapse and Resilience in Lowland Maya Civilization.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 109(10): 3652–3657.

Hunt, Terry L. and Carl P. Lipo. 2010. “Ecological catastrophe, collapse, and the myth of ‘ecocide’ on Rapa Nui (Easter Island).” In Questioning Collapse: Human Resilience, Ecological Vulnerability, and the Aftermath of Empire. Edited by Patricia McAnany and Norman Yoffee. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Krulwich, Robert. 2013. “What Happened On Easter Island — A New (Even Scarier) Scenario.” NPR. Retrieved March 30, 2020 (https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2013/12/09/249728994/what-happened-on-easter-island-a-new-even-scarier-scenario).

Kwong, Emily. 2019. “The Deadly Winters That Have Transformed Life For Herders In Mongolia.” NPR.

McCabe, J. Terrence. 1990. “Turkana Pastoralism: A Case against the Tragedy of the Commons.” Human Ecology 18(1): 81–103.

Pollan, Michael. 2006. The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York, NY: Penguin Press.