Industrial Food System

1565 Words7 Pages
Many Americans have already begun to realize our industrial food system is unsustainable. The increase of farmers’ markets and organic foods are just a few examples of the steps we have taken towards change. The system we have created has made a hierarchy, with corporations at the top and non-industrialized countries at the bottom. Instead, our food system should become more like a web. By creating more small scale farms, external costs, such as health care and environment impacts, will decrease. Plus, jobs, such as butchers, will be created. The problem is we have expanded our food system around the world. Driving our industrial agricultural system is capitalism. The obsession with maximum profit has shaped how we produce, distribute, and consume food (Ritzer 1983, 372). Our current industrial food system is unsustainable because of the capitalistic focus on efficiency, which negatively affects both consumers and producers. The ideals of capitalism, clearly embraced by the fast food industry, have allowed the modern food system to expand and become much more profitable (Schlosser 2001, 6). Emphases on efficiency and technological advancements have led to the success of fast food and the modern industrial food system. This system rewards quantity over quality (Ritzer 1983, 374). However, rather than meeting people’s needs through these advances, most of the fast food industry and modern food system have used these changes to sustain corporate profit. In a capitalistic world, profit or money equal success. Part of the modern food system, Charoen Pokphand (CP) and Tyson are both examples of multinational corporations looking for a successful business. Economically CP and Tyson are extremely accomplished, efficiently mass producing an abundance of chicken. For example, Tyson is one of the largest chicken producers in the United States (Bourgarel, 2005). The

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