FERN’s Friday Feed: Ag’s David and Goliath moment
Welcome to FERN’s Friday Feed (#FFF), where we share the stories from this week that made us stop and think.
The collective future of American agriculture
FERN and The Nation
“In 2020, when the coronavirus disrupted industrial food systems, causing widespread backlogs and shortages, local co-ops, farm collectives, food hubs, and other distribution projects found fresh relevance,” writes Dean Kuipers. “[S]ome food hubs, which aggregate food from local producers and sell it to consumers and institutions, giving small farmers access to bigger markets, reported revenue increases as high as 500 percent, according to a May 2021 report from the Wallace Center, a nonprofit that supports community food and farming solutions. It was a moment that crystallized both the weaknesses of the industrial food system and the strengths of local alternatives in a way that 20 years of proselytizing by food reformers never could.”
Is biogas a pollution solution, or prop for Big Chicken?
FERN
The poultry industry along Delmarva peninsula “generates hundreds of thousands of tons of chicken waste, including manure, feathers, bones, and processing sludge. These dregs — which contain high levels of nitrogen and phosphorus — are often over-applied to farm fields and then run off into local waterways, including the Chesapeake Bay,” writes Leanna First-Arai. Biogas companies want to build anaerobic digesters on Delmarva, turning that waste into what the industry calls ‘renewable natural gas,’ as well as nutrient-rich solids and liquids that can be used as fertilizer. “It sounds like a great deal … but some environmentalists and neighbors of production barns worry that anaerobic digesters will merely enable Big Chicken to further expand across poultry-producing regions of the nation.”
The ghost riders of Johannesburg, South Africa
The Guardian
“These men are among an army of thousands of riders who spend up to 16 hours a day, usually seven days a week, frantically ferrying food around the city. It is hazardous work. Accidents and muggings, sometimes at gunpoint, are common. Rainy weather, when roads are slippery and visibility poor, is feared most,” writes James Oatway. “They race from fast-food joints to student digs in the grimy inner city or from posh restaurants to fancy suburbs in one of the world’s most unequal cities … Some are undocumented, leaving them doubly vulnerable to police shakedowns and exploitation in an unregulated gig economy. Despite their ubiquitous presence on the streets, their lives and travails are largely invisible to the residents of Johannesburg.”
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We are who we eat with
The MIT Press Reader
“Since long before the dawn of humanity, eating has been a social act. Some of our primate ancestors shared food. Early humans were more successful when they banded together to hunt; they enjoyed greater security when they cooked and ate their food together. Farmers have long collaborated in a range of tasks, from chasing away the animals consuming their crops, to forming work parties in order to make some tasks possible and others easier or more pleasant,” writes Harry G. West. “To labor alone and, especially, to eat alone, is not only shameful in many cultural contexts, it is often considered monstrous or sub-human. In the villages of Mueda where I worked, there was a special word for one who ate alone: nkwaukanga. Such people were traditionally condemned as greedy, even ugly. But modern life has slowly changed this, and not only in Mueda … More and more, we eat alone, whether at work, at home, or even in restaurants.”
Your beloved ‘family’ recipe may have begun in a corporate test kitchen
Taste
“It is clear from reporting and telltale legacy that many of America’s favorite recipes today were born from commercial incentives,” writes Cathy Erway. “From the obvious Rice Krispies Treats and Jell-O salads, to beloved condensed-soup casserole and stuffing recipes passed down for generations, moving product has been a significant contributor to culinary innovation in America. Behind the labels, recipe developers at food brands have started food trends, crafted viral recipes, and steered America’s eating habits perhaps even more than cookbook authors with their free recipes, creating lasting traditions in home kitchens.”