Final Exam Question 1....

Final Exam Question 1:

• Describe the past & present of food. Predict the future, with reference to class materials and historical trends.

Focusing on the two Americas, North & South, groups of people or civilizations have lived years before the industrial revolution. They cultivated and grew their food. These inhabitants hunted animals, gathered plants and relied on nature for their survival & nutrience. Tribal groups such as the Diaguita or Guarani, that resided in various countries in South America like Argentina, Brasil and Paraguay, were agriculturists who used primarily a digging stick as their main tool for cultivating food. They cultivated foods like pepper and corn (Jonathan C. Brown.) Small groups like the Diaguita and Guarani throughout North and South America shared a basic similarity in the gathering and hunting of food; with no use of any fossil fuels, guns or man-made machinery. Foods like vegetable and fruit were grown naturally in season. Meaning the food cycle wasn’t rushed or pushed out of its normal growth time period. Food before the Industrial Revolution was locally grown. If a field of vegetables was growing on a farm, those that would eat these foods growing were the ones close by the farm. Food before industrial farming was something independent and a responsibility of each person, household or community. This is called subsistence farming. This still exists within small communities of South & North America. For example, in the Huorani tribe of Ecuador, the Huorani grow their plants, gather their bananas and catch the monkeys they eat. This means that it will be the Huorani community that eats this food; it won’t be imported for others to eat.

The present of food is basically the complete opposite of the past of food. In the two Americas, there exists people, families, communities, etc. that eat and grow food the way it was eaten and grown years ago. But looking at those people and then looking at the general population of major cities and small towns within the countries, there are more that eat in a modern day matter. The modern or urban way of eating food, getting food and “raising” food is much easier and faster than it used to be. Machines, fossil fuels, chemicals have taken over the role of digging sticks making the work of harvesting and farming faster. This resulting in more food to feed the abundance of people that need to be fed. Machines and chemicals (like pesticides) are not just used for plants, BUT they are also for the cattle, pigs and other animals. The machines in industrial food factories like seen in the movie “Our Daily Bread” are transporting these animals for the workers to kill. The chemicals are put in animals, like the hormones put in cows, which makes them, reproduce faster and thicken their meat. Natural cycle in plants and fruit has been crushed. For example, any fruit or vegetable is available yearlong. This natural cycle is pushed in order for bigger industrial companies to keep making their profits. These industrial factories work fast and the food is what feeds the country, contrasting how local food used to be before industrialization.

My prediction of the future of food… well I don’t think that we will see in our future, the elimination of big corporations, mainstream food companies or the industrial factories. These are corporations that make global profits and capitalists who won’t be willing to back down. In spite of the tremendous pressure of the cheapest food and manufacturing at a fast pace in order to gain more money, in our culture at least there will be more of an awareness of the importance of local grown food. Also awareness to forming connections between one and the food they are eating. In other words, developing trends in the opposite direction of the direction we are at now. HOWEVER, before we reach that state and if we reach that, I have my prediction of peak oil or a decrease in resources like what happened in Cuba during the early 90’s. With the chemicals, use of fossil fuels, and with the wastefulness in our food system, it will happen and as a result we will have to begin to turn our actions around, and not because we want to. The general stubbornness of this culture’s present society is overwhelming to think of there being a possibility of drastic change coming from one’s own choice rather than from a consequence like peak oil.