FERN’s Friday Feed: The inconvenient truth of the U.S.-Canada dairy dustup
Welcome to FERN’s Friday Feed (#FFF), where we share the stories from this week that made us stop and think.
Canada understands the milk market; the U.S. seemingly does not
Mother Jones
There is a global glut of milk; demand for all dairy products in the U.S. is stagnant. Yet American dairy farmers keep cranking out more milk, trying to produce their way to profitability, but instead driving prices even lower. “Ironically, an answer to this dilemma sits just to our north, in the very country Trump and Vilsack falsely claim is squeezing US farmers,” writes Tom Philpott. “In Canada, overproduction of dairy is very rare, because farmers coordinate to keep supply in line with demand, ensuring they get a decent price.”
From refugees to profitable farmers
Orion
Plant It Forward, launched in 2012, marries Houston’s huge number of refugees (the second-largest in the country) with the city’s abundant land and booming demand for fresh produce. “Self-sufficiency in the form of a livable wage is Plant It Forward’s vision for its farmers,” writes Kimberly Meyer, “and its success in making this vision a reality distinguishes it from most other refugee farm and garden programs across the country, which focus on generating supplemental income and produce to feed refugee families.
The tragedy of dynamite fishing in the Philippines
The New York Times
The coral-laden waters around the Philippines are among the most biodiverse in the world. But the fisheries are collapsing, and a major culprit is the use of homemade bombs that destroy most everything within “the 30- to 100-foot radius of an explosion,” writes Aurora Almendral. “Blast fishing kills the entire food chain, including plankton, fish both large and small, and the juveniles that do not grow old enough to spawn.”
In rural areas, a shortage of vets
NPR’s The Salt
Since 2003, there’s been a shortage of large-animal veterinarians in rural areas. “In 2017, the U.S Department of Agriculture identified 187 mostly rural areas that lack sufficient access to a veterinarian,” writes Esther Honig. New veterinary graduates, carrying high debt burdens, are less likely to want to work in rural areas, where their salaries are often half what they could make in cities. “Without vets, farmers and the nation’s food supply are more vulnerable to disease outbreaks. It also could mean sick and infected animals will increasingly go untested,” Honig writes.
The collapse of a ‘crusading’ obesity researcher
Wired
In 2012, “crusading science journalist” Gary Taubes launched the Nutrition Science Initiative. “It quickly raised more than $40 million from big-name donors to facilitate expensive, high-risk studies intended to illuminate the root causes of obesity,” writes Megan Molteni. “With a goal of raising an additional $190 million, they wanted to fund science that would help cut the prevalence of obesity in the US by more than half—and diabetes by 75 percent—by 2025.” But after six years, the organization has all but disappeared, leaving Taubes searching for his next funders.