Commentary—

Factory Farm Food Has Real Costs

By Ellie Hurley

Almost two years ago, Americans got a good hard look at one of the hidden costs of industrial agriculture. Not the cost we see in our paychecks as our taxes go to pad the pockets of corporate food producers, not the cost we see as our family farmers file for bankruptcy, and not the cost we see on price tags in the supermarket. What we were exposed to was the cost it has on our health.

From late August to early September 2006, E. coli bacteria were found in Dole brand baby spinach across the nation. The result was 205 related illnesses and three deaths. Americans were outraged and afraid and for the first time in a long time, the debate between cheaper industrial foods vs organic or local foods was front-page news.

Now contaminated produce is making headlines once again. This time it’s in the form of salmonella and it’s being found in tomatoes. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),“Salmonellosis is an infection with bacteria called salmonella. Most persons infected with salmonella develop diarrhea, fever, and abdominal cramps 12 to 72 hours after infection. The illness usually lasts four to seven days, and most persons recover without treatment.”

While people rarely are in need of hospitalization, the disease can become serious especially when found in the elderly, infants, and those with impaired immune systems who are more likely to have a severe illness.

Unlike with the spinach, where the serial numbers on contaminated bags were used to track it to its source, it’s unlikely we’ll ever know exactly where the tomatoes came from. But one thing is for sure, they didn’t come from your local farmer. So far, the strain of salmonella, known as St Paul, has been linked to some raw red plum, red Roma, round red tomatoes, and products containing these raw tomatoes.

The CDC states that 707 cases of Salmonella St Paul have been reported in the US between mid-April and June 13, 2008. Some of the states with higher instances of outbreak are Arizona (36), California (10), Maryland (25), New Mexico (80), New York (18), and Virginia (22). Texas has been hit the hardest, with a reported 293 illnesses. So far, 73 people have been hospitalized; no related deaths have been identified.

That people’s health is currently being threatened, once again, by food that was meant to nurture our bodies is cause for great concern. For years local food advocates, family farmers, environmentalists, and even the rare politician have extolled the virtues of eating locally grown produce. Eating locally promotes community food security, and community food security means strong, sustainable, local and regional food systems that ensure access to affordable, nutritious, and culturally appropriate food for all people at all times. This means people are feeding themselves, feeding themselves well, feeding themselves in an affordable way.

Most importantly when it comes to the issue of food quality and community food security means that food should only travel as short a distance as possible from farm to plate. The food miles each item you consume has logged have much to do with the amount of fossil fuels used in their transport (important for reducing global warming) and with the freshness of the food you are consuming. According to Sustainable Table, most Americans live about 60 miles from an apple orchard, yet the apples we typically buy at the grocery store travel 1,726 miles between the orchard and our home. As the website (sustainabletable.org) states, that’s further than driving from Portland, Maine to Miami, Fla. Because food produced on large-scale factory farms travels far and wide across the globe, a batch of contaminated food has the ability to reach millions of people before it’s even pulled from the shelves.

We are currently in the middle of a global food crisis, brought on by corporate control of our food system. As energy costs rise, so has the price of our food, and now the security of our health. Knowing where your food comes from not only increases the chances that it’s good for you, it also increases money being spent within the community, which increases jobs in a time when unemployment is high. It reduces the amount of greenhouse gas emissions because it’s not being transported as far, it reduces our reliance on industrial agriculture, and as of late, it reduces our chances of becoming ill.

(Ellie Hurley is the communications coordinator at World Hunger Year (WHY), a leading advocate for innovative, community-based solutions to hunger and poverty. www.whyhunger.org )