A bold, science-based corrective to the groundswell of misinformation about food and how it's produced, examining in detail local and organic food, food companies, nutrition labeling, ethical treatment of animals, environmental impact, and every other aspect from farm to table. Consumers want to know more about their food—including the farm from which it came, the chemicals used to grow it, its nutritional value, how the animals were treated, and the costs to the environment. They are being told that buying organic foods, unprocessed and sourced from small local farms, is the most healthful and sustainable option. But what if we’re wrong? In Resetting the Table, Robert Paarlberg reviews the evidence and finds abundant reason to disagree. He delineates the ways in which global food markets have in fact improved our diet, and how "industrial" farming has recently turned green, thanks to GPS-guided precision methods that cut energy use and chemical pollution. He makes clear that America's serious obesity crisis does not come from farms, or from food deserts, but instead from "food swamps" created by food companies, retailers, and restaurant chains. And he explains how, though animal welfare is lagging behind, progress can be made through continued advocacy, more progressive regulations, and perhaps plant-based imitation meat. He finds solutions that can make sense for farmers and consumers alike and provides a road map through the rapidly changing worlds of food and farming, laying out a practical path to bring the two together.
The politics of food is changing fast. In rich countries, obesity is now a more serious problem than hunger. Consumers once satisfied with cheap and convenient food now want food that is also safe, nutritious, fresh, and grown by local farmers using fewer chemicals. Heavily subsidized and underregulated commercial farmers are facing stronger push back from environmentalists and consumer activists, and food companies are under the microscope. Meanwhile, agricultural success in Asia has spurred income growth and dietary enrichment, but agricultural failure in Africa has left one-third of all citizens undernourished - and the international markets that link these diverse regions together are subject to sudden disruption. The second edition of Food Politics: What Everyone Needs to Know® has been thoroughly updated to reflect the latest developments and research on today's global food landscape, including biofuels, the international food market, food aid, obesity, food retailing, urban agriculture, and food safety. The second edition also features an expanded discussion of the links between water, climate change, and food, as well as farming and the environment. New chapters look at livestock, meat and fish and the future of food politics. Paarlberg's book challenges myths and critiques more than a few of today's fashionable beliefs about farming and food. For those ready to have their thinking about food politics informed and also challenged, this is the book to read. What Everyone Needs to Know® is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press.
Compared to other wealthy countries, America stands out as a gluttonous over-consumer of both food and fuel. The United States boasts an obesity prevalence double the industrial world average, and per capita carbon emissions twice the average for Europe. Still worse, the policy steps taken by America in response to obesity and climate change have so far been the weakest in the industrial world. These aspects of America's exceptionalism are nothing to be proud of. Is it possible that America is hard-wired to consume too much food and fuel? Unfortunately, yes, says Robert Paarlberg in The United States of Excess. America's excess is driven in each case by its distinct endowment of material and demographic resources, its unusually weak national political institutions, and a unique political culture that celebrates both individual freedoms over social responsibility, and free markets over governmental authority. America's over-consumption is shown to be over-determined. Because of these powerful underlying circumstances, America's strongest policy response, both to climate change and obesity, will be adaptation rather than mitigation. As the damaging consequences of climate change become manifest, America will not impose adequate measures to reduce fossil fuel consumption, attempting instead to protect itself from storms and sea-level rise through costly infrastructure upgrades. In response to the damaging health consequences of obesity, America will opt for medical interventions and physical accommodations, rather than the policy measures that would be needed to induce better diets or more exercise. These adaptation responses will generate serious equity problems, both at home and abroad. Responding to obesity with medical interventions will fall short for those in America most prone to obesity - racial minorities and the poor - since these groups have never enjoyed adequate access to quality health care. Responding to climate change by building more resilient infrastructures at home, while allowing atmospheric concentrations of CO2 to continue their increase, will impose greater climate disruption on poor tropical countries, which are far less capable of self-protection. Awareness of these inequities must be the starting point toward altering America's current path.
In Starved for Science Paarlberg explains why poor African farmers are denied access to productive technologies, particularly genetically engineered seeds with improved resistance to insects and drought. He traces this obstacle to the current opposition to farm science in prosperous countries.
Covering the many important changes in food markets and food politics that have shaped both global and local farming and eating over the past decade, this compact and authoritative primer lays out everything you need to know to understand today's global food landscape. The politics of food is changing fast. In rich countries, obesity is now a more serious problem than hunger. Consumers once satisfied with cheap and convenient food now want food that is also safe, nutritious, fresh, and grown by local farmers using fewer chemicals. Heavily subsidized and underregulated commercial farmers are facing stronger push back from environmentalists and consumer activists, and food companies are under the microscope. Where does power lie in this increasingly complex global food system? Moreover, what is the future of food politics, both in the United States and beyond? The third edition of Food Politics: What Everyone Needs to Know® has been thoroughly updated to reflect the latest developments and research on today's global food landscape, including the realities of food markets, farm production methods, food manufacturing, and dietary health challenges. New material covers the rise of China in world food markets and global food politics, the unabated and increasing risks to farming from climate change, the impact COVID-19 had on incomes and hunger, the equally shocking impact from the war in Ukraine on food prices and trade, and surprising scientific and technical breakthroughs such as the genome editing of crops (CRISPR) and the marketing of cell-cultured (animal-free) meats. As well, each chapter has been updated with new data on population growth, hunger and food security, trade conflicts, humanitarian aid, carbon farming, regenerative agriculture, holistic grazing, animal welfare, genetically engineered food, and more. Discussing the politics and policies that continue to shape our contemporary food system, Robert Paarlberg challenges myths and critiques more than a few of today's fashionable beliefs about farming and food. For those ready to have their thinking about food politics informed, but also challenged, this is the book to read.
When U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Earl L. Butz announced in 1974 that "food is a weapon," he voiced a growing national belief in the political power of food resources. President Carter's 1980 decision to embargo grain sales to the Soviet Union appeared at first to confirm this popular notion. But can exporting nations, such as the United States, really use food as a powerful instrument of foreign policy? If so, are they using that weapon more frequently? Are importing nations taking steps to reduce their vulnerability? Challenging the view that food has emerged as a political weapon, Robert Paarlberg undertakes the first systematic inquiry into the relation between food resources and international power. Paarlberg maintains that food trade is seldom manipulated for reasons of foreign policy, due to the greater priority assigned by most nations to domestic food and farm policy objectives. To support his argument, he reviews the recent grain trade experience of three significant and divergent nations—India, the Soviet Union, and the United States. He then examines in detail two exceptional instances in which the coercive power of the U.S. food weapon was put to the test: Lyndon Johnson's manipulation of food aid to India in 1965–1967 and the Carter embargo on grain sales to the Soviet Union in 1980–1981. He concludes that the difficulties experienced in each instance only reinforced the larger trend against linking grain trade policy to foreign policy—a trend that can be applauded by those concerned with world food security and trade efficiency. Robert Paarlberg's challenge of the food power concept provides a valuable comparative insight into the conduct of national as well as international food policies.
Genetically modified (GM) food crops have inspired increasing controversy over the past decade. By the mid-1990s they were widely grown in the U.S., Canada, and Argentina, but precautionary regulations continue to limit their use elsewhere. The restrictive policies of Europe and Japan toward GM crops have been much discussed. Less attention has been paid to the policies affecting the adoption of GM crops in the developing world, where their potential impact on the availability and quality of food is even greater. In this book Robert Paarlberg looks at the policy choices regarding GM food made by four important developing countries: Kenya, Brazil, India, and China. Of these, so far only China has approved the planting of GM crops. Paarlberg identifies five policy areas in which governments of developing countries can either support or discourage GM crops: intellectual property rights, biosafety, trade, food safety, and public research and investment. He notes that highly cautious biosafety policies have so far been the key reason that Kenya, Brazil, and India have hesitated to plant GM crops. These cautious policies have been strongly reinforced by international market forces and international diplomatic and NGO pressures. China has been less cautious toward GM crops, in part because there is less opportunity in China for international organizations or independent critics of GM crops to challenge official policy.
Students of public policy and practitioners within the farm program arena will find theis book an essential source of insight, information, and original cross-disciplinary argument."--BOOK JACKET.
In the conversation about the food we eat and where it comes from, this bundle, consisting of Food Politics: What Everyone Needs to Know and Agricultural and Food Controversies: What Everyone Needs to Know, tackles the questions that arise from conflicting opinions. Reflecting on the latest global food landscape and the most controversial issues in agriculture, these two books provide a wealth of research and information on farming and food.
Bank lending for agriculture and rural development from the 1970s to the 1980s: will the decline continue? Anticipating the challenges of the 1990s. Regional variations.
Commissioned by the International Food Policy Research Institute, this discussion paper asks who is responsible for assuring food security in an age of globalization? Paarlberg (political science, Wellesley College) argues that significant hunger persists in some regions largely because of governance deficits and failures at the national, rather than the global, level. He then suggests options for improving the performance of national governments in countries increasingly affected by hunger (particularly those in Africa). Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
Thank you for visiting our website. Would you like to provide feedback on how we could improve your experience?
This site does not use any third party cookies with one exception — it uses cookies from Google to deliver its services and to analyze traffic.Learn More.