Last week, my Human Geography class was researching food production and distribution. From Monday, October 4th to Thursday, October 7th, I had to document every single piece of food that went into my mouth including what the brand was and where that brand’s factory was located. For example, I had a glass of Mott’s apple juice with my dinner on Monday and it came from Rye Brook, New York. Another day, I had a banana with my lunch. The banana came all the way from California. So that one banana had to be grown with steroids at a factory in California, shipped all the way on the other side of the country to Maryland. Then finally, it will be at a supermarket for my family to buy. Wouldn’t it be much easier to go to a local farmers market to by a batch of bananas? They grow their own bananas with no fillers or steroids at a local farmers market. In this essay, I’m going to talk about everything that goes into food production and distribution that I have learned and my feelings about them. I am sure you will find some of this very surprising!
I feel that the production of food is very nasty once you learn about it. Everyone knows that in order to have a hamburger, you have to kill a cow as well as all of the other meats, but at fast food places such as McDonald’s, their Southern Style Chicken Filet has ingredients such as modified tapioca starch, sodium phosphates, carrageenan, and maltodextrin in their chicken…how is that normal? Chicken should be strictly chicken, no fillers, or extra ingredients that no one even knows what they are. That is the same with every possible food that is produced by major companies. No one knows what’s really in it. Is Goldfish really made out of cheese? How do we know if Ore-Ida French fries actually have potato in them? The only way we can find that out is if you read the ingredients that are on the box and research what exactly you’re eating. How do we know what carrageenan is even though we are eating it? Carrageenan comes from seaweed, so technically we are eating seaweed or algae when we eat a Southern Style Chicken Filet from McDonald’s. In order to know exactly what you are eating and what it is produced from, you need to research it.
Another problem with food is its distribution. The typical food that you eat every day comes from all over the country, sometimes even all over the world! On Tuesday, October 5th, I had a chocolate donut from Pennsylvania, Gatorade from Chicago, a bag of Goldfish from Denver, some Dr. Pepper from Texas, and also a banana from California. That shows you how insane food distribution is. There are only a few major factories in this country. Many brands of food own other brands of food, so there is a lot of dictation over food in this country. In modern times, you can’t just go to the grocery store and buy some food that came from in-state. Almost everything in a grocery store comes from a factory out of state that makes food with un-natural fillers and distributes them to supermarkets all over the country. I even had some Sweet Tarts from Vevey, Switzerland last week! That just comes to show you how crazy the distribution and production of food is now-a-days. You never really know where your food is coming from unless you buy it from a local farmers market.
What would you say are the top five things a person could do to buy and eat food in a more sustainable way?
ReplyDeleteAlso, are you interested in helping with our JC organic garden?