Why is Big Ag Bad?

As the great-grandchild of European immigrants, I am extremely proud of my ancestors’ ambitions to start a new life in America, the land of opportunity. My grandpa and grandma started their small family restaurant in Kansas City in the 1960s and with hard work eventually expanded to a larger venue. Before long they had two restaurants, the original in Kansas City and a new shop in Lake Ozark, Mo., and Ken Baker’s Restaurant became a hotspot for families and some of Kansas City’s best fried chicken.

It seems as if bigger is better, right? My grandparents, along with many other business owners, are heralded for managing their stores successfully, growing and changing with the times, and expanding their enterprise. However, it appears that farm and ranch families are not held to the same standards as many other industries and embracing technology, sustaining a livelihood and improving efficiency are only selectively celebrated. "Big Ag", the term anti-efficiency activists like to use, is bad.

For example, does society condemn Coca-Cola for being big? Or is Whole Foods publicly denigrated for commandeering the organic market? Michelin, Goodyear and Firestone, for their huge tire empires, are never reprimanded for their firm grasp on the tire industry. Why is it ok to be profitable, self-sufficient and efficient in nearly every other industry in the world but not food?

Bo Stone, one of the U.S.F.R.A. Faces of Farming of Ranching, recently shared his thoughts on this paradox on CNN’s Eatocracy blog and on World Food Day, October 24, the Food Dialogues panel focused on answering that very question. Panelists included the executive director of the Center for Science in Public Interest, a Bloomberg news reporter, food pundits and farmers.

In agriculture, the viewpoints are varied and information is commonly misconstrued but the efforts of MBA grads are often not unnoticed. I encourage all of those involved in agriculture to read Bo’s piece, watch the Food Dialogues video and critically evaluate how you can convey that "Big Ag" isn’t bad.

 

Until next time,

~ Buzzard ~

 

Disclaimer: I wrote this for the Masters of Beef Advocacy newsletter that went out earlier this week but I liked it so much I had to share it here too. It's applicable to more than just MBA grads!

If You're Wasting, You Shouldn't Be Whinging

There's a little bit of Australian vocab for you - whinging means to whine, complain, protest, etc. Didn't know you were going to learn about food wastage and vocab today, did you?

Anyhow, several factors led to this blog post - first, there was this article from Drover's. I'll be sort-of summarizing it so if you don't want to read a whole article, you can read a whole blog post. You're welcome.

Secondly, this blog post that I wrote on Monday.

Thirdly, this:

A fridge full of leftovers for two people who couldn't possibly eat said leftovers in a normal amount of time before the food will be unappetizing, stinky and/or unpleasurable to the digestive system.

Hence, this post was born.

Food wastage occurs in a lot of different ways. I'm sure you're thinking, "Buzzard, you idiot. Food wastage occurs when good food is thrown away." Idiot, I am not. Food wastage, and this comes from the Drover's article, varies depending on the setting/income level of the country of origin. For example, my trashcan is an example of how food is wasted in a first-world or developed country. Sometimes, I throw away perfectly good green beans. But I am not going to save four or five bites of canned green beans when the Ninja refuses to finish them (he is my human garbage can). I am a human-being, not perfect. Did you know that up to HALF of the food that is purchased in Europe and the US is thrown away? Half, people. One 8 oz sirloin is thrown away for every pound of steak purchased. I am extremely embarrassed of that fact - one in seven people in the world go hungry every night and we are throwing away 1/2 of our food. If you're not embarrassed, you're part of the problem. Don't come whining to me about not being able to afford food if you throw out 1/2 your grocery cart every week.

However, food wastage in Malawi or a similar less than developed country is different because that loss occurs during harvest, when advanced technology isn't available to yield optimum levels. Wastage also occurs through improper storage or unfortunately, the all too common problem of a lack of infrastructure. This means the food is produced but the roads, government etc are so broken down that the food can't get to the people. Very sad. The more the developed the country, the further down the line the wastage occurs. Here, I drew you a picture:

 

 How about those epic graph drawing skills? Thanks Ag Economics degree, you're coming in handy after all.

The reason this is all very important is of course, that we are projected to have a population of 9.5 billion by 2075. Or if you don't want to look that far into the future, 9 billion by 2050. We are going to need a lot of water, land and other non-renewable resources to feed all these hungry future-people.

Which is where my post from Monday comes in - by cutting down larger cuts of meat we can continue to utilize the efficiency of the beef industry (smaller herds but bigger cattle) without sacrificing any valuable protein to the garbage can. And if science is allowed to prevail and keep making advancements, I believe that the ingenious folks at John Deere, Monsanto, Pioneer etc can find ways to produce more with less.

Of course, it's not just on the shoulders of engineers and beef producers. You, yes you, can help with the whole feed the world mantra. Buying/preparing smaller portions. Saving (and eating) leftovers. Making your kids clean their plates or save their leftovers too (never too young to help the planet). Anyone else have any ideas or suggestions on how to make our food supply more efficient from a consumer stand point?

How's that for tying several different trains of thinking into one post? That was exhausting...

Until next time,
~ Buzzard ~

p.s. I hope that Jessie Vipham is impressed with my graph and that I have officially kind-of used my Ag Econ degree.

Australia Day

Last year at this time, I wasn't yet in Australia but was hastily packing my house after being married only four days previous (post on our anniversary coming soon). Nonetheless, we still heard plenty of hype about Australia day, and many other Australian holidays, while we were abroad.

For those of you who don't know, Australia Day is on January 26th this year and is a celebration of the arrival of the First Fleet of 11 convict ships (Australia's first populants, besides Aboriginals, were convicts from Europe) and the flying of the Union Jack (flag) by that fleet's leader, Captain Phillip. In essence it's a celebration of the entire country's history, akin to our Independence Day. However, they also have an ANZAC Day which is akin to our Veteran's Day or Memorial Day holidays and is celebrated in April.

Back on track, if you want to read more about Australia Day click here.

The real reason for this post is to bring attention to the food movement for Australia Day that's taking place. Tweets and Facebook posts have been in my feed for a few weeks about 'eating Australian' on Australia Day. Know what that means? 

It means eat this:

 

or a better depiction, this:

 image from here

In order to boost lamb sales, producers want Australians to eat Australian lamb on Australia Day (that's a lot of Australia's in one sentence). It makes sense, it's the #1 consumed meat in the land down under and is becoming more affordable (or it was when we left a month ago) through 'price wars' between Coles and Woolies/Safeway which are the two biggest supermarket chains.

Eating products of their own country makes sense and I applaud the marketing efforts being made to promote a home-grown product. Maybe a few Americans should eat lamb to celebrate Australia Day, everyone should try it at least once.

Until next time,

~ Buzzard ~

Who Are We to Judge Horse Meat?

Last week I posted about the recent reinstatement of federal funding for horse slaughter inspection. As a a member of the horse industry, I can attest to the fact that many horse owners are very excited about this development. For more of my thoughts and the facts behind this issue, read last week's post by clicking here.

A lot of people have said, "We don't eat horsemeat in the U.S. so why slaughter it here?"  My question is, "Why don't we eat it here?" A 100 gram serving is a good source of iron and protein and it has less fat per 100 gram serving of beef sirloin.

I am expecting the run of the mill responses; horses are pets, my religion prohibits it, horses are majestic, it's wrong etc etc. Who are we to judge what others should eat? Aren't we as consumers constantly saying how much we appreciate having food choices? This is just another choice that American agriculture can provide to a struggling economy. Furthermore, the U.S. is small percentage of the world population and what we eat doesn't dictate the eating habits of the rest of the world. For example: you'd think things like bacon or grape jelly were pretty run of the mill products, right? Wrong. The U.S. should not condemn those who choose to investigate alternative sources of protein due to income, religion, morals or taste preferences.

For the record, I have NOT tried horse meat but in my defense I've only been presented with the opportunity once while in Germany. Mark my words, I'll try it the next time I have a chance.

If you too would like to try horse meat here is a simple chart that gives a breakdown of the meat cuts.

Lastly, I just want to reiterate that I AM a horse owner and I am in favor of horse slaughter.

Until next time,

~ Buzzard ~