Boise News

Food/Agribusiness/Health

Food, Inc. Preaches to the Converted

By Sharon Fisher, 8-07-09

A group of people got together to watch the agfood documentary Food Inc. the other day. The showing was in Boise, and the people were a married couple who lives on ten acres in Ada County, near Kuna, and their son; a single mom who lives on one acre near Kuna in Ada County and a married man who lives with his family on the Bench in Boise.

What’s wrong with this picture?

Food Inc. – like similar documentaries before it, such as Supersize Me and Fast Food Nation—isn’t getting to the people who *need* to see it, but is, as the film itself describes, “preaching to the converted.” The married couple with a child – David, Tracy, and Christian—have raised their own beef and have a garden. The single mom, Sharon, has a garden and uses community-supported agriculture (CSA) to provide most of the family’s meat and seasonal vegetables. The married man, Matthew, and his family have six raised vegetable beds in their front yard.

An example of the people who need to see the movie is right in the movie – a couple with two kids, who have two jobs and feed their kids in the drive-through because it’s cheap food. Several members of the family have health issues, including diabetes, that are related to their poor diet. “I liked how the movie explained their obesity,” Tracy said. “Now it makes sense. ‘I can get three pears, or a hamburger.’” The family also said in the movie that they didn’t have time to cook because of their jobs – though it didn’t explain why, for example, they couldn’t eat less expensive protein sources instead of the hamburgers.

“There are ways to eat faster and well,” said Matthew, noting that protein costs by the ounce can range from 35 cents for an egg to $3 for salmon jerky. Even at $3 a dozen for high-quality eggs, that many eggs provides enough protein for three meals, he pointed out – plus hard-boiled eggs don’t take long to make, can be made in batches, and are portable.

While the movie demonized large corporations such as Monsanto, pointing out the dangers of genetically modified organisms and what major roles company executives played in both Democratic and Republican governments, the group didn’t think that was necessarily a bad thing.  “You still find experts in industry, and you need experts,” said Matthew. “If the only source of experts is Monsanto, anyone who knows about soybeans is going to have his hand in Monsanto’s pocket. You can’t automatically fault them.” (Though studies are indicating small farms might do a better job of feeding the world.)

Even this group admitted that they sometimes got lazy and picked up beef or chicken at Wal-Mart because it was cheaper.  But recalling the scene in the movie where even Wal-Mart started stocking organic yogurt when its customers demanded it, they suggested that what’s needed is for consumers to start demanding meat that’s raised more safely.

In particular, changes need to happen at the schools, before kids develop bad habits, the group said. “I think that’s one of the biggest places to make a difference,” said David – who, along with Tracy, is a teacher. Schools should stop turning to companies such as Pepsi to subsidize school equipment like scoreboards, he said, describing one of his son’s friends who drank seven Pepsis a day. “We would love to have some animals on our school property” to help dispose of waste, and resolved to ask a local pig farmer whether he could use the large amount of food waste a school produces. (The book Farm City describes how a woman in downtown Oakland raised pigs by dumpster-diving behind restaurants.)

So why did this group see the movie? “I needed a re-education, a reminder,” said Tracy. “I wanted Christian to see it so he gets what we do.” And Christian? “I’m sure not going to eat any fast food any more,” he said. “I didn’t know anything about that.”

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