More on food ethics (briefly)

Thanks, Amy & Zwieblein for your interest in continuing the conversation!

Based on my reading and learning over the past year, here are some of the factors to consider if one wants to eat more ethically:

1. Location/origin of food: Americans eat food that travels, on average, 1500 miles from point of origin to our dinner plates. That's halfway across the continental U.S. Which may actually not seem all that shocking to those of us now accustomed to a global, year-round market, but it used to be that you could only eat fresh fruits and vegetables when they were - wait for it - in season locally. Barbara Kingsolver's latest book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, chronicles her family's experience eating 95% of their food locally for a year. In addition to the environmental impact of so much transportation (consumption of fossil fuels, production of greenhouse gases), long-distance crops are grown to be sturdy to withstand shipping, rather than to have high levels of flavor and healthful vitamins.

2. Organically grown: It used to be that most foods in the U.S. were grown on small(ish) family farms that produced diverse crops, often kept animals as well as crops, and used minimal or no chemicals. Throughout the 20th century, food production became increasingly industrialized (check out Michael Pollan's book, The Omnivore's Dilemma, for a more thorough history), with the development of pesticides, chemical fertilizers, monoculture crops (especially corn and soy), and agribusiness. Supporters argue that returning to a more natural/organic model of farming is better for the land, better for the health of our bodies, and produces better-tasting food.

3. Animal welfare: Any vegans reading this can skip to the next point, but please wait until you're no longer in the company of omnivores to pat yourselves on the back. As a former "meatasaurus" trying to make ethical choices, I have given up most meat and know that I should probably give up eggs and dairy as well. Sadly, along with the industrialization of plant-based foods, we have come to treat animals as food-producing machines, to be grown to full size as quickly as possible, with as little exercise as possible, cramming more animals than is possible into a small space, pumping them full of antibiotics to keep down disease, and slaughtering and processing them without regard for animals' experience of pain or fear, all to maximize production and keep us supplied with cheap hamburgers, hot dogs, and chicken nuggets. Dairy cows and egg-laying chickens have longer lives than those destined immediately for the slaughterhouse, but they experience similarly cruel treatment and eventually become meat as well.

Now, all of the above refers to factory farming, the source of the vast majority of meat available from supermarkets and restaurants today. (In addition to being bad for animals, factory farms are terrible for the environment and bad for human health as well.) Depending on where you live, you may be able to find ethically raised meat and other animal products from smaller farms committed to humane and sustainable practices, either directly or through specialty grocery stores.

4. Labor practices: Part of the effect of being literally distanced from the origins of our food is that most Americans today (myself included) have little or no idea what is involved in harvesting crops or processing food. The recent attention to immigration concerns and general desire to "close" or "secure" American borders has an impact on many industries, as undocumented immigrants often do the work that citizens don't want to do; farm work is one of these. Because so many farm workers are undocumented, or in the U.S. legally but with lower levels of education and less access to resources, those who pick tomatoes or grapes or strawberries are often more vulnerable to abuse or exploitation by their employers. Of the four categories listed here, this is the one I find hardest to track. Occasionally a labor union or advocacy organization will single out a particular restaurant chain or crop industry in which worker injustice has gotten particularly bad, but unless you are buying your produce from local farms where you personally know how the workers are treated, it can be almost impossible to know what goes on between the soil and the supermarket. Shortcuts for the sake of profit often lead not only to injury and illness among those who work for agribusiness, but also to contamination of our food supply, as is explored in the (fictional) film Fast Food Nation, based on the non-fiction book by journalist Eric Schlosser.

Well, this post ended up being longer than I anticipated, and is clearly far from objective, but it still barely scratches the surface. Are there other considerations you think are important that I left off this list?