A Kernel Powered Fortune
King Corn begins with a transparent idea of finding the source of our food. After the initial finding that corn is present in almost all food available to an average American, two curious men, Ian and Curt, decide to follow the journey of the crop as a seed to its prevalence in every American plate. The idea that corn is part of their sweet morning beverage to their favorite choice of protein-- meat, at dinner comes as a surprise to them in the beginning. Their journey begins in the grain belt—Iowa, where “fertile soil and humid summers” make the yellow crop the dominant choice for farming.
With the support of the farming community in Greene, Iowa, the two young men sow their genetically modified seeds and use powerful
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The only crop they harvest is corn, which is inedible due the demand of the specific strain, which efficiently used in processed food as high fructose corn syrup and as animal feed. Similarly, another farmer states, “[their corn as] the poorest quality crop worlds ever seen..don’t care what’s done with it”. Has agriculture stopped defining our food? As the movie continues, it is argued that this has been the case for two generations now. The first disengagement of production and consumption was seen with the increasing use of sugar, which corresponded with rise of rapid capitalism …show more content…
Corn is found in jam, beef, beer, and it also ends up fueling vehicles as ethanol. This further use of corn has been made possible by 1970’s farm policies that subsidized expanded production. One of farmers shows Ian and Curt a town symbol of “love of family farm”, the corn palace. The contrast is striking as we continue to watch the farmers state the loss of their family farms as supply and demand for corn continues to grow in with substantial amount. As a result, large subsidies has redefined farming as production of corn or “the urban creatures” growing in a tightly knit environment to meet and surpass the demand.
The two storytellers allow the audience to view an issue from the roots up and let the audience define the problem as it relates to them. An average American may not know the perils with the industrial food system as they sit at the end of the commodity chain, where they receive food from behind the counter. But, the health effects of such covered facts can be seen in public health epidemics like obesity, increasing presence of food deserts especially in urban areas, and large inequalities in food access across socioeconomic status (Beaulac and
In the video, “America Revealed: Food Machine,” the host, Yul Kwon, investigated the modern American agricultural industry, with an emphasis upon the contrasts between contemporary farming and the American farming of previous generations. At the start of the program, Mr. Kwon discusses the route of a pizza delivery person in New York City, and he describes the origins of the ingredients of the pizza. To do this, the host travels to California’s Central Valley, a region that was once a desert, but is now the breadbasket of the United States. In this valley, thirteen million tomatoes are grown per year as well as fifty percent of the country’s fruits and nuts. Water is the most expensive resource in this region, as it must travel many miles from
In the New York Times article “When a Crop Becomes a King”, author Michael Pollan argues there is an overproduction of corn that does more harm than it does good. He writes this in response to a farm bill signed by then President Bush to increase the budget for corn production which caused much controversy. Pollan uses an infuriated and frustrated tone in order to convince American consumers that corn has taken over their environment and economy. Michael Pollan uses rhetorical strategies to challenge conventional views of corn and to argue against additional corn production.
Food Inc. is a documentary displaying the United States food industry in a negative light by revealing the inhumane, eye opening, worst case scenario processes of commercial farming for large corporate food manufacturing companies. Food Inc. discusses, at length, the changes that society and the audience at home can make to their grocery shopping habits to enable a more sustainable future for all involved.
Corn took over American farmlands at the end of World War II, when a new synthetic fertilizer was introduced and manufactured by former munitions factories. It allowed for the elimination of crop rotation, leading to the switch from family farms to the corn monoculture. Economically, this system seems to make more sense, but it destroyed the once sustainable, sun-driven fertility cycle. Now, farmers are trapped into making more and more corn by government policy. As the abundance of the crop causes prices to fall, farmers must plant even more in order to make ends meet, surviving off constantly decreasing government subsidies. What’s worse is that the New Deal system that allowed corn farmers to stay afloat has since been dismantled in an effort to lower food prices and increase production without considering the farmers
In “Called Home”, the first chapter of the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year in Food Life, Barbara Kingsolver presents her concerns about America's lack of food knowledge, sustainable practices, and food culture. Kingsolver introduces her argument for the benefits of adopting a local food culture by using statistics, witty anecdotal evidence, and logic to appeal to a wide casual reading audience. Her friendly tone and trenchant criticism of America's current food practices combine to deliver a convincing argument that a food culture would improve conditions concerning health and sustainability. I agree with Kingsolver that knowing the origin of food is an important and healthy benefit of developing a true food culture, but it is impractical to maintain that everyone is able to buy more expensive food. Kingsolver presents a compelling argument for developing a food culture, however this lifestyle change may not be practical or even possible for a poverty-level citizen. The following essay will summarize and respond to Kingsolver’s argument to demonstrate how “Called Home” is a model for novice social scientists.
The idea of the family farm has been destroyed by large food corporations. As discussed in class, industrial farming typically leads to the mass produ...
Corn soon became the crop of choice to Iowa farmers. They found that it was more resistant to disease than the other crops they were growing, such as barley, oats, wheat, and apples. With this newfound “wonder crop”, Iowans found that farming had become the ideal way of life. Working on the farm involved all of the members of the family, which brought them together and made them stronger through hardships and great opportunities.
...nergy from an acre of Iowa farmland. Unfortunately, for more than fifty years, farm policies is designed to encourage the overproduction of this crop and hardly any other. It simply because the government subsidize high-fructose corn syrup in this country. While the surgeon general is warning the epidemic of obesity, our government is still signing bills encouraging the river of cheap corn flowing. It is clearly shown that food production in America is partly a mixture of politic, economic and morality.
...struggling to earn any income at all and sometimes do not even get the opportunity to eat. Another issue that Raj Patel did not touch on is the lack of care consumers have for the farmers. It seems that consumers care about farmers about as much as the corporations do, which, in my opinion, is not a lot. When consumers only care about low prices and large corporations only care about making a profit, the farmers are left out to dry. Many consumers believe “food should be available at a bargain price, a belief that relies on labor exploitation and environmental exhaustion at multiple points along the commodity chain.” (Wright, 95) Corporations as well as consumers generally tend to be selfish and I think Raj Patel is afraid to mention this. If only these people cared a little bit more about each other I believe the hourglass of the food system will begin to even out.
The 1920’s were the singularly most influential years of farming in our country. The loss of farms following the war, and new agricultural practices resulted in the dawn of modern agriculture in our country. The shift from small family to big corporation during this time is now the basis for how our society deals with food today. Traditional farming in the 1920’s underwent a series of massive transitions following WWI as the number of farms decreased and the size of farms increased.
Brook speaks about a woman named Kelly Bower and her suggestions for solving this problem in low-income neighborhoods. One of Bower’s suggestions is having local policymakers find ways to convince supermarkets and grocery stores to locate in “food desert” areas. According to Sanger-Katz’s article, policymakers have relocated the supermarkets to improve the health of poor neighborhoods but people are still choosing the same foods. People still choose the same unhealthy food because they prefer to eat that kind of food. Obesity is becoming a big problem in America and Finley says that “drive-thrus are killing more people than the drive-bys” because there are more fast food restaurants than there are grocery stores. In the article “Giving the Poor Easy Access,” Sanger-Katz talks about a man named Brian Elbel, who did a study with grocery stores, and he states “improving access, alone, will not solve the problem” of food
A major issue that is occurring in America is a phenomena known as “food deserts”, most are located in urban areas and it's difficult to buy affordable or good-quality fresh food. Whereas in the past, food deserts were thought to be solved with just placing a grocery store in the area, but with times it has become an issue that people are not picking the best nutritional option. This issue is not only making grocery store in food deserts are practically useless and not really eliminating the issue of food deserts because even when they are given a better nutritional option, and people are not taking it. In my perspective, it takes more than a grocery store to eliminate ‘food deserts’. It's more about demonstrating the good of picking the nutritional option and how it can help them and their families. For example, “Those who live in these areas are often subject to poor diets as a result and are at a greater risk of becoming obese or developing chronic diseases.”(Corapi, 2014).
The way that our society has been able to produce food has changed in the last fifty years that the several thousand years beforehand. Robert Kenner addresses problems of our society’s food system and how there is only a handful of large corporations that have basically taken over the food system in the United States in the film Food, Inc. Large businesses have been able to significantly produce vast amounts of food and set low prices for consumers, usually because of government subsidies, which results in enormous profit and greater control of the food supply sources. This leads to negative health, safety, and economic consequences. This documentary examines the exercises of the few large food corporations from the start of production
Farmers are essentially the back-bone of the entire food system. Large-scale family farms account for 10% of all farms, but 75% of overall food production, (CSS statistics). Without farmers, there would be no food for us to consume. Big business picked up on this right away and began to control the farmers profits and products. When farmers buy their land, they take out a loan in order to pay for their land and farm house and for the livestock, crops, and machinery that are involved in the farming process. Today, the loans are paid off through contracts with big business corporations. Since big business has such a hold over the farmers, they take advantage of this and capitalize on their crops, commodities, and profits. Farmers are life-long slaves to these b...
Due to recent advancement in science and technology, there has been a rapid increase in business competition and therefore, organizations requires input from their employees and often it becomes the reason for a conflict between a subordinate and the supervisor. Inside a business, the relationship between the subordinates and the supervisors are always been considered critical and very important. Good interpersonal skills guide the successful future of subordinates. Confrontation between the subordinate and the reporting manager usually leads to devastating results. The term challenge refers to participate in a competitive situation to decide who is superior in terms of capability and power, whereas the term stand down refers to quitting and