Can We Re-invent Food Production?

I heard Michael Pollan awhile back on NPR* and have not been able to get it out of my mind.

He explained that the roots of the current U.S. agricultural system go back to the Nixon presidency. Nixon was worried about inflation of food prices and asked an agricultural economist how to keep them under control. According to Pollan, the answers created today’s reliance on corn and soy which are produced (and subsidized by the U.S. government) in mass quantities to ensure low cost. They are used for feed and for processed foods of all kinds. They are also the key ingredient in the processed foods that have come to dominate the U.S. diet and fuel our obesity epidemic.

The large farms needed to produce these quantities economically drove out the family farm which had a sustainable system where farm animals provided manure to fertilize crops. The current system moved animals into huge production farms where their waste becomes an environmental problem-there is too much of it to deal with effectively. So the fields are fertilized with petrochemicals, many of which we have to import from the Middle East.

In this context, Michelle Obama’s act of creating an organic garden at the White House more radical than it seems on the surface. The shift to a knowledge economy is helping us use our intellectual capital to rethink industrial business models that are not sustainable. The story in so many industries today is a story of re-thiking business from the bottom up. It’s beginning to happen with energy, healthcare and transportation.  Food will not be far behind.

*Note: I tried to find the interview on line. It looks like the report I heard was a replay from October, 2008. Even if it’s not the right one, Pollan is worth a listen anytime…But here’s a quick version in an open letter he wrote around the same time in the New York Times to the President Elect of the U.S.