MayesFilmAnnotation9

Meredith Mayes

Annotation #9: Food, Inc.

11/14/11

Word Count: 1508 The film Food Inc. was directed by Robert Kenner in 2008. The film is a startling expose on the food industry in America and what the core group of corporations is hiding from the consumers. The film’s narrative is told by farmers, the cameraman, and a walk through the supermarket. The film begins with a brief introduction from the author of __Fast Food Nation__, and progresses through various industries, such as chicken, corn, beef, the head of processing plants, and finally the consumers, namely the Gonzalez family, who cannot afford good food. There is some emotional appeal in the film, most particularly the woman whose son died of hemorrhagic E. coli and the call to arms at the end of the film. The matrix of problems in Food Inc. was enormous. First and foremost is our cultural viewpoint of food. Americans have become distanced from their food and its source and allowed ourselves to become very ignorant of our food. Marketers put a farm on our packaging and we are convinced that that product is good, healthy, and straight from the farm food. We are obsessed with getting more for our dollar and this reflects in how businesses run themselves. This feeds into economic principles and issues. A corporation such as McDonald’s cut costs to provide cheaper food by getting rid of people and limiting the factors of human uncertainty in their product, which created a more uniform and cheaper product. When other businesses saw how successful this model was, they followed suit. And then these companies became the largest purchasers of beef and chicken in the nation and began to drive the quality of that product as well. Chickens were bred to have more white meat breast in less time. And farmers are okay with that as it increased their profit margins as well. One such farmer in the film said “if you could have a chicken in 49 days, why would you want one in 3 months?” Perhaps because, as another farmer noted, the rapid growth causes problems with their bones and organs, making walking nearly impossible and early death more likely for the chickens. The southern United States switched over to chicken farming for the processing companies after the decline of tobacco, but the start-up costs and forced “improvements” to their henhouses often leave them in $500,000 worth of debt. The economic effects also run into other countries. Aside from the ecological issues of having out of season food all year round, the government has subsidized certain products such as corn to encourage over-production. This subsidized corn can beat out the prices of other nations, and has put thousands of Mexican corn farmers out of business, so many have illegally immigrated to the United States in hopes of finding work. Furthermore, much of this corn is sold to be used as feed corn to fatten up pigs, chickens and cows for slaughter. This is not because corn is actually good for these animals, but because it produces the same results over and over. There are further issues with the food industry. Companies are now legally allowed to patent life, and because of this, Monsanto now virtually owns the soybean, as their genetically modified soybeans have leached into other soybeans, and the company owns the patent to any soybean with the genetic modification. Furthermore, the legal system in the United States and elsewhere allows corporations to sue individuals for saying negative things about the company in public. Most individuals cannot pay the heavy court fees and end up in an even worse situation than before. Politically speaking, the FDA and USDA are often headed by former lobbyists for the food industry, which makes them heavily biased in the corporations’ favor. Companies, since they are technically people, can lobby the government with millions to get food laws passed, as was the case with commodity crops such as corn. These lobbyists also help to suppress debate, since few members of these organizations are going to initiate arguments against those that helped them get to these positions of power. But the organization of the food industry right now is so dependent on stability in many fields – production, oil, the consumer market, that it would take very little to topple the American food market. Technology does little to help in this case, as the efficiency just causes more problems, and when problems such as diseases occur, more technology is applied to the problem (in this case antibiotics), instead of more practical and healthy solutions such as free-range cattle not locked in their own feces eating corn, which promotes the growth of E. coli, instead of their natural diet. This film was very convincing to me. There was a nice blend of statistics and progressive narrative, and the film provided sufficient information without being overbearing. For example, the fact that there are over 47,000 products in an average supermarket and 4 meat packagers control over 80% of the market is both scary and informative. I also really liked the visual representations of the chickens from today and fifty years ago, as it really conveyed the issue of just how much we’ve changed other animals for our uninformed consumerism. The fact that none of the food companies except for one meat processing plant (who is gunning for monopoly) would be interviewed for the film is also clearly not a case of “no news is good news.” There were also some gross parts, such as the cow with a hole in its stomach for direct feeding, which, in its shock value, were both horrifying and convincing. There was also a long list of unlikely items which buy corn and use them in their products, which was really strange, some of which were batteries, diapers, and most of those chemicals found in food. It was also really scary how there are now only 13 slaughterhouses in the United States, making it extremely easy for the meat to become tainted and the deaths of pigs on screen was practically nightmare inducing. The final part that was convincing to me was the genuine fear the soybean farmers had for Monsanto. No one producing the food that I eat should be afraid of growing food or have to buy it again every year. There were a few unconvincing bits. In the beginning, the narrator calls it “eating meat produced by the system.” While I understand that it is a system, it makes him sound like a paranoid hippie, which a man making a serious documentary should avoid. I was also not convinced by the Wal-mart representative who was claiming that Wal-mart was trying to make their food better for their customers, because I didn’t get the feeling that he actually understood all the issues behind why the food industry is so corrupt. Overall, though, the film was very convincing, if a little hard to stomach at times. The film certainly has an age limit, as there are some disturbing images in it (a very different film than “What’s on Your Plate), and I do not think I would recommend it for someone much under 16, although I would certainly recommend it to adults who have access to farms and farmers markets as a method of convincing them to support the local food movement. This is one of the major points of action the film suggests. Another is working to learn more about the food and start beginning a movement towards more open food policies and working towards more knowledge about the food we do consume, including consumption of in-season food. In my research on this topic, I found another issue with the current food industry. The American government is paying both for the cause and the effects of these foods, as it is subsidizing the costs of high fructose corn syrup and the obesity and diabetes it causes. With the upcoming healthcare reform, the government must consider that right now the U.S. pays $147 billion every year to treat obesity and $116 billion to treat diabetes. One study from M.I.T. and Columbia has proposed that in order to successfully decline childhood obesity would be to switch away from globalized agriculture to regional food economies ([]). I had not previously considered the fact that healthcare costs for everyone with the advent of this new bill would be impacted by the junk that the government sponsors for us to consume. U.S News also ran a report on the shadier aspects of the food industry, including that junk food makers (an underrepresented group in the film) make large donations to nutrition companies, minimize the health concerns and advertise specifically to children. The fact that there is pressure on the government not to affect the free market limits their ability to make clear suggestions to the people in order to keep their lobbying money ([]). I found the entire film to be a little discomforting and also made me wish there was more time to visit the farmers market in downtown Troy.