Agribusiness mad at Obama's organic garden

I keep reading this thinking it has to be a late April Fool's day joke.

Some PAC named MACA ( Mid America CropLife Association) has sent Michelle Obama a letter asking her to use regular pesticides in the White House Garden.

No - I'm not making this up!

"Did you hear the news? The White House is planning to have an "organic" garden on the grounds to provide fresh fruits and vegetables for the Obama's and their guests. While a garden is a great idea, the thought of it being organic made Janet Braun, CropLife Ambassador Coordinator and I shudder. As a result, we sent a letter encouraging them to consider using crop protection products and to recognize the importance of agriculture to the entire U.S. economy."

Read all about it here.

So me and N.C. Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler are like, buds now.

One of my new year's resolutions was to try to get to know Steve Troxler better. So when I saw the News and Observer was having an "Ask Anything: 10 Questions with Steve Troxler" feature, I was all over it.

And my question was selected and answered.

9. A December 2006 article in Rolling Stone magazine painted a very ugly picture of pollution and cruelty perpetrated by the Smithfield Foods corporation in North Carolina. Smithfield refutes the claims, and I know we've since passed Swine Farm Environmental Performance Standards Act. What is your position on so-called CAFO (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations) and their role in North Carolina agriculture? Do you see CAFO's as the future of hog farming? – Matt McCann, Durham

By and large, North Carolina hog farmers care about the environment and care about humanely treating the animals on their farms. It doesn’t make good business sense for them to think, or do, otherwise.

Raising hogs indoors allows farmers to properly care for and feed their animals. And hog farms are held to strict standards regarding manure storage. Currently, there is a moratorium on construction or expansion of any hog farms with more than 250 hogs.

Well - there ya go. Thanks Steve.

Election results

Despite my vote, incumbent North Carolina Commissioner of Agriculture Steve Troxler successfully defended his seat from opponent Ronnie Ansley this election; although it was a fairly close call at 52% to 48%.

It wasn’t that I was really excited about Ansley; this is his 4th election running for different positions, and he’s a lawyer when he’s not running for something. He had a booth up at the North Carolina State Fair this year, and I stopped to talk a bit. I didn't know what he looked like at that point, so I mistakenly assumed I was about to talk to Mister Ansley himself, but then I saw his picture on a flier and realized that the both was being manned by a volunteer. So I spoke to the volunteer who kept telling me the Ronnie had lots of great ideas, but had trouble explaining them to me, and he also knew very little about the raw milk debate. Oh well.

Troxler is a former farmer, so he’s got that going for him, and the State Farmer’s market is his oversight, and I’ve never seen a better one – so what’s my problem with him?

He lists “Helping agribusiness” as one of his job priorities. Who do you think needs more help; a young farmer trying to run a sustainable farm in this economy or Monsanto and Arthur Daniels Midland? He’s never talked about the environmental impact of CAFO operations in this state. In short - he seems to be a real friend to agribusiness.

So – the results are in, and Steve kept his job. ‘If you can’t beat ‘em; try to get to know them’ is going to be my mantra for Steve. I’m going to try to make it a priority of mine to get to know Mister Troxler and get his opinions on these issues that are important to me. After all, he does supposedly work for me.

Pastured meat - why it matters to me.

Why do I pay a lot more for pastured meat? What's the big deal?

There are a couple of reasons - but this is the big one.

"Smithfield's pigs live by the hundreds or thousands in warehouse-like barns, in rows of wall-to-wall pens. Sows are artificially inseminated and fed and delivered of their piglets in cages so small they cannot turn around. Forty fully grown 250-pound male hogs often occupy a pen the size of a tiny apartment. They trample each other to death. There is no sunlight, straw, fresh air or earth. The floors are slatted to allow excrement to fall into a catchment pit under the pens, but many things besides excrement can wind up in the pits: afterbirths, piglets accidentally crushed by their mothers, old batteries, broken bottles of insecticide, antibiotic syringes, stillborn pigs -- anything small enough to fit through the foot-wide pipes that drain the pits. The pipes remain closed until enough sewage accumulates in the pits to create good expulsion pressure; then the pipes are opened and everything bursts out into a large holding pond."

Lovely, no? That's just the tip of the iceberg. Read the whole article if you can. I couldn't take it in one sitting.

After you've read as much as you can of that article, read this one for a breath of fresh air. Things should be much less confusing.

Follow up on the UNC FLO students and Smithfield

I was very interested to see if I could find any more news regarding my previous post about the UNC students that were trying to get alternatives to Smithfield products in their dining halls, as I was too busy to research it yesterday.

I did find an excellent article; here's the real highlight for me:

Grass-fed burgers are now served in the Carolina Kitchen kiosk in Lenoir Dining Hall. At $3.99 for a quarter-pound burger, the grass-fed option is a dollar more than a conventional burger—yet, it outsold its conventional counterpart in its first month.

"People pay more if they think that value is there. The health benefits outweigh the price issue," says Skip Herrod, UNC's food service director. He handed out samples at UNC's Focus the Nation event on Jan. 31.

Rich in flavor and moist without a fatty taste, the beef was a hit among samplers.

Amen!

I really encourage you to read the whole article, there's also a lot of great news coming out of Duke University:

In addition to providing nutritious food, the program supports a thriving local community as well as greatly reduces food miles, resulting in decreased global warming, air pollution, water contamination, traffic congestion and the need for oil. Bon Appetit purchases 16.5 percent of its food from local farmers, and Duke chefs create menus based on seasonality to capitalize on the availability of local products.

Amazing.

Students smack down Smithfield

Sometimes I find the most fascinating stories completely by accident. I'm not even sure how I found this; I think I was searching for data on the number of hog CAFO operations that call North Carolina home.

Anyway - this is old news from back in March of this year. I hadn't even started blogging about food yet, and come to think of it, that was before I read Fast Food Nation and Omnivore's Dilemma, so it probably wouldn't have even sparked my interest.

A group of students from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill took a look around at some of the smaller, pasture raised meat produced by small farmers in the neighborhood, and decided to get some into the dining hall. The dining hall is run by CDS (Campus Dining Services). CDS sat down with the students, but there was, as they say, a 'failure to communicate'. CDS had Smithfield listed as a "sustainable" operation because of their proximity to campus. Never mind the environmental disaster and disgusting conditions at Smithfiled CAFO's.

Smithfield runs the world's largest hog processing facility - according to the article that means 32,000 hogs per day. Some former workers and neighbors were invited to talk about the conditions.

"Duplin resident Devon Hall testified to the horror of living close to knock-you-over stench and toxic hog waste. Smithfield workers including Marvin Steele told of the pork giant's abysmal disregard for worker safety and ruthless, ongoing union-busting effort.

While these speakers delivered devastating indictments against industrial meat production, two others offered a different vision for pork: Eliza MacClean, owner-farmer of above-mentioned Cane Creek Farm; and Jennifer Curtis, of NC Choices, a group trying to break down market obstacles to pastured hog production in an area dominated by Smithfield.

Several hundred students packed the hall, engaged and ready to take action."

No word on the outcome, but good to see a younger generation taking an interest in these issues.

Signed up for a chicken CSA

I went to the Carrboro farmer's market 2 weeks ago, and while purchasing a chicken, in talking with this particular farmer came to find out that they were opening a fall CSA for chickens.

If you don't know what a CSA is; it stands for Community Supported Agriculture. There are different kinds with different requirements. At their most simple, like this one, you pay for a "share" and then you get something (in this case, chickens) in return at some point in the future.

I had wanted to sign up for a vegetable CSA, but missed the season. You have to sign up early as they fill up quickly.

I had been getting my chickens from another farm at the Raleigh market, and they were both excellent chickens, but these will end up being a bit more affordable, and the pickup location is the Durham market, so it's nice and close. I'll still buy eggs, bacon and sausage from this farm when I'm at the Raleigh market. The plan is to rotate each week between the Raleigh and Durham markets.

I don't know how big they'll end up being, I read somewhere that the limit for slaughter was 4 pounds. With a large chicken we're able to get 3 meals out of them; breast meat for either stir fry, or something pounded like lemon chicken, then the rest of the meat for BBQ or a bastardized catchatorie in the slow cooker and finally a stock out of the carcass that becomes noodle or vegetable soup.

Other than getting really delicious chicken, and supporting small, local agriculture, the other benefit is not having to worry if the chickens are being de-beaked. This farm uses floorless coops that are moved to new pasture daily, and are free to eat insects, worms, grass, frogs, mice, clover or the antibiotic free, animal-by-product-free grain feed.

Are vegetarians just picky eaters?

I was having an on-line debate with vegetarian who claimed that the human body was not adapted to eating meat. As proof, he offered up that our teeth are too dull and our intestines are too long, and besides, if you'd just look at the studies, meat eaters have higher rates of cancer (and erectile dysfunction, for some reason he kept bringing that symptom up, it was odd) than vegetarians.

I countered with that fact that my incisors are pretty good at cutting meat, that my stomach produces enzymes that break down components that are found only in meat, and that there's no vegetable that offers complete protein, and a purely vegetarian diet is easy to have iron, B12 and protein deficiencies. Also that bacon cooking is the best smell ever. Your body knows what it wants, and it wants pot roast.

The cancer studies? I'll gladly give him the point that vegetarians are going to have lower rates of cancer than someone who eats processed meat, fast food, gets no fiber and thinks ketchup is a vegetable. Find me a bunch of twins who lead identical lives as far as exercise and environment, but where one is vegetarian and the enjoys a grass-fed steak now and then, a farm fresh egg for breakfast on Sundays and pastured chicken a few times a week and we can compare cancer rates and I'd be willing to bet they'd be identical.

My opponent and I did have some common ground, we both think CAFO's are horrible. We both think that large beef processing plants are evil. I'll even go so far as to grant him that the world would be better off if we ate less beef. But stop eating meat? That's cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Speaking of faces - that's another argument isn't it, 'I wont eat anything with a face'. Well that's just stupid. Cockroaches have faces, how do you feel about killing them? And roaches are pretty closely related to shrimp and crayfish, and from there it's a very short hop to lobster.

My theory is that vegetarians are just picky eaters. Like some sort of spoiled brats that won't eat their dinner.

God went to a lot of work to give us cows. Some plantets don't have any cows.

Irradiated Food

I've been reading up on the issue of using radiation to protect our food supply from contamination; e.coli and the like. Evidently, a recent decision has given the green light for it's use on lettuce and spinach.

Prima facie, such arguments as:

"When ground beef is irradiated, at least 99.99 percent of E. coli and other harmful foodborne bacteria are killed."

- and -

"The CDC estimates that if just 50 percent of the meat and poultry consumed in the United States were irradiated, the number of foodborne illnesses would be reduced annually by 900,000 and deaths by 352."

It almost seems a no brainer, but the more I think about it, the less I like it.

First of all it just seems patently absurd to me; that these most basic food elements off the farm; spinach, beef - they just aren't safe. Gotta nuke it! Cheez Whiz and Twinkies? Perfectly safe.

I know there are logical flaws with that argument, but even so - is this really the best solution we can come up with? Seems to me the tail is wagging the dog.

And it's not the issue of lingering radiation in the food that scares me. (It doesn't give me warm fuzzies, but it doesn't scare me) What worries me most is that we've just closed any real incentive to keep poop away from food in the first place. Don't worry about it - the radiation will kill it!

And there are other concerns..I was reading a decent debate on Bill Marler's Blog when I noticed this tidbit from Linda Greene - testing director for Food & Sensory Sciences at 'Consumer Reports' regarding radiation treated meat:

"Does irradiated meat taste different? - When presented with pairs of food, our trained tasters were able to detect the irradiated beef or chicken 66 of 72 times because it had a very slight "off" taste. But the average consumer may not notice the difference."

Yikes.

And there's some vitamin loss caused by the radiation that we know about. Are we so arrogant that we don't think there could be unintended consequences from a nutritional standpoint from eating this stuff?

Lastly, one other thing to keep in mind - irradiated produce lasts longer. Why is that a bad thing? Because produce is supposed to rot. That's how you know it's no good for you anymore.