Download or read book The Modern American Food Supply written by and published by . This book was released on 1982 with total page 76 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book In Defence of Food written by Michael Pollan and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2008-01-31 with total page 243 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'A must-read ... satisfying, rich ... loaded with flavour' Sunday Telegraph This book is a celebration of food. By food, Michael Pollan means real, proper, simple food - not the kind that comes in a packet, or has lists of unpronounceable ingredients, or that makes nutritional claims about how healthy it is. More like the kind of food your great-grandmother would recognize. In Defence of Food is a simple invitation to junk the science, ditch the diet and instead rediscover the joys of eating well. By following a few pieces of advice (Eat at a table - a desk doesn't count. Don't buy food where you'd buy your petrol!), you will enrich your life and your palate, and enlarge your sense of what it means to be healthy and happy. It's time to fall in love with food again. For the past twenty years, Michael Pollan has been writing about the places where the human and natural worlds intersect: food, agriculture, gardens, drugs, and architecture. His most recent book, about the ethics and ecology of eating, is The Omnivore's Dilemma, named one of the ten best books of 2006 by the New York Times and the Washington Post. He is also the author of The Botany of Desire, A Place of My Own and Second Nature.
Download or read book The Omnivore s Dilemma written by Michael Pollan and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2006-04-11 with total page 476 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the New York Times Book Review's Ten Best Books of the Year Winner of the James Beard Award Author of How to Change Your Mind and the #1 New York Times Bestsellers In Defense of Food and Food Rules What should we have for dinner? Ten years ago, Michael Pollan confronted us with this seemingly simple question and, with The Omnivore’s Dilemma, his brilliant and eye-opening exploration of our food choices, demonstrated that how we answer it today may determine not only our health but our survival as a species. In the years since, Pollan’s revolutionary examination has changed the way Americans think about food. Bringing wide attention to the little-known but vitally important dimensions of food and agriculture in America, Pollan launched a national conversation about what we eat and the profound consequences that even the simplest everyday food choices have on both ourselves and the natural world. Ten years later, The Omnivore’s Dilemma continues to transform the way Americans think about the politics, perils, and pleasures of eating.
Download or read book Food Power written by Bryan L. McDonald and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Food Power brings together the history of food, agriculture, and foreign policy to explore the use of food to promote American national security and national interests during the first three decades of the Cold War.
Download or read book A Framework for Assessing Effects of the Food System written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2015-06-17 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How we produce and consume food has a bigger impact on Americans' well-being than any other human activity. The food industry is the largest sector of our economy; food touches everything from our health to the environment, climate change, economic inequality, and the federal budget. From the earliest developments of agriculture, a major goal has been to attain sufficient foods that provide the energy and the nutrients needed for a healthy, active life. Over time, food production, processing, marketing, and consumption have evolved and become highly complex. The challenges of improving the food system in the 21st century will require systemic approaches that take full account of social, economic, ecological, and evolutionary factors. Policy or business interventions involving a segment of the food system often have consequences beyond the original issue the intervention was meant to address. A Framework for Assessing Effects of the Food System develops an analytical framework for assessing effects associated with the ways in which food is grown, processed, distributed, marketed, retailed, and consumed in the United States. The framework will allow users to recognize effects across the full food system, consider all domains and dimensions of effects, account for systems dynamics and complexities, and choose appropriate methods for analysis. This report provides example applications of the framework based on complex questions that are currently under debate: consumption of a healthy and safe diet, food security, animal welfare, and preserving the environment and its resources. A Framework for Assessing Effects of the Food System describes the U.S. food system and provides a brief history of its evolution into the current system. This report identifies some of the real and potential implications of the current system in terms of its health, environmental, and socioeconomic effects along with a sense for the complexities of the system, potential metrics, and some of the data needs that are required to assess the effects. The overview of the food system and the framework described in this report will be an essential resource for decision makers, researchers, and others to examine the possible impacts of alternative policies or agricultural or food processing practices.
Download or read book Eating in the Dark written by Kathleen Hart and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most Americans eat genetically modified food on a daily basis, but few of us are aware we’re eating something that has been altered. Meanwhile, consumers abroad refuse to buy our engineered crops; their groceries are labeled so that everyone knows if the contents have been modified. What’s going on here? Why does the U.S. government treat engineered foods so differently from the rest of the world? Eating in the Dark tells the story of how these new foods quietly entered America’s food supply. Kathleen Hart explores biotechnology’s real potential to enhance nutrition and cut farmers’ expenses. She also reveals the process by which American government agencies decided not to label genetically modified food, and not to require biotech companies to perform even basic safety tests on their products. Combining a balanced perspective with a sense of urgency, Eating in the Dark is a captivating and important story account of the science and politics propelling the genetic alteration of our food.
Download or read book Food in America 3 Volumes written by Andrew F. Smith and published by ABC-CLIO. This book was released on 2017-02-16 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This three-volume work examines all facets of the modern U.S. food system, including the nation's most important food and agriculture laws, the political forces that shape modern food policy, and the food production trends that are directly impacting the lives of every American family. Americans are constantly besieged by conflicting messages about food, the environment, and health and nutrition. Are foods with genetically modified ingredients safe? Should we choose locally grown food? Is organic food better than conventional food? Are concentrated animal feed operations destroying the environment? Should food corporations target young children with their advertising and promotional campaigns? This comprehensive three-volume set addresses all of these questions and many more, probing the problems created by the industrial food system, examining conflicting opinions on these complex food controversies, and highlighting the importance of food in our lives and the decisions we make each time we eat. The coverage of each of the many controversial food issues in the set offers perspectives from different sides to encourage readers to examine various viewpoints and make up their own minds. The first volume, Food and the Environment, addresses timely issues such as climate change, food waste, pesticides, and sustainable foods. Volume two, entitled Food and Health and Nutrition, addresses subjects like antibiotics, food labeling, and the effects of salt and sugar on our health. The third volume, Food and the Economy, tackles topics such as food advertising and marketing, food corporations, genetically modified foods, globalization, and megagrocery chains. Each volume contains several dozen primary documents that include firsthand accounts written by promoters and advertisers, journalists, politicians and government officials, and supporters and critics of various views related to food and beverages, representing speeches, advertisements, articles, books, portions of major laws, and government documents, to name a few. These documents provide readers additional resources from which to form informed opinions on food issues. Examines a breadth of contemporary food controversies and offers diverse viewpoints on them, placing these perspectives fairly into a broader historical context Presents a multidisciplinary approach to the subject of food that highlights related issues in transportation, business, diet and nutrition, public health, the environment, and public policy Includes primary documents that illuminate important laws, policies, and perspectives on the environmental, public health, and economic impact of food Provides readers with the latest information about food controversies as well as extensive resources for further study on major food controversies
Download or read book Improving Food Safety Through a One Health Approach written by Institute of Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2012-09-10 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Globalization of the food supply has created conditions favorable for the emergence, reemergence, and spread of food-borne pathogens-compounding the challenge of anticipating, detecting, and effectively responding to food-borne threats to health. In the United States, food-borne agents affect 1 out of 6 individuals and cause approximately 48 million illnesses, 128,000 hospitalizations, and 3,000 deaths each year. This figure likely represents just the tip of the iceberg, because it fails to account for the broad array of food-borne illnesses or for their wide-ranging repercussions for consumers, government, and the food industry-both domestically and internationally. A One Health approach to food safety may hold the promise of harnessing and integrating the expertise and resources from across the spectrum of multiple health domains including the human and veterinary medical and plant pathology communities with those of the wildlife and aquatic health and ecology communities. The IOM's Forum on Microbial Threats hosted a public workshop on December 13 and 14, 2011 that examined issues critical to the protection of the nation's food supply. The workshop explored existing knowledge and unanswered questions on the nature and extent of food-borne threats to health. Participants discussed the globalization of the U.S. food supply and the burden of illness associated with foodborne threats to health; considered the spectrum of food-borne threats as well as illustrative case studies; reviewed existing research, policies, and practices to prevent and mitigate foodborne threats; and, identified opportunities to reduce future threats to the nation's food supply through the use of a "One Health" approach to food safety. Improving Food Safety Through a One Health Approach: Workshop Summary covers the events of the workshop and explains the recommendations for future related workshops.
Download or read book A Nation of Farmers written by Sharon Astyk and published by New Society Publishers. This book was released on 2009-05-01 with total page 409 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Provides information on ways to solve the food crisis in the United States by creating a local food supply system.
Download or read book In Defense of Food written by Michael Pollan and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2009-04-28 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: #1 New York Times Bestseller from the author of This is Your Mind on Plants, How to Change Your Mind, The Omnivore's Dilemma, and Food Rules Food. There's plenty of it around, and we all love to eat it. So why should anyone need to defend it? Because in the so-called Western diet, food has been replaced by nutrients, and common sense by confusion--most of what we’re consuming today is longer the product of nature but of food science. The result is what Michael Pollan calls the American Paradox: The more we worry about nutrition, the less healthy we see to become. With In Defense of Food, Pollan proposes a new (and very old) answer to the question of what we should eat that comes down to seven simple but liberating words: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." Pollan’s bracing and eloquent manifesto shows us how we can start making thoughtful food choices that will enrich our lives, enlarge our sense of what it means to be healthy, and bring pleasure back to eating.
Download or read book A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age written by Amy Bentley and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2014-05-22 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the modern age (1920–2000), vast technological innovation spurred greater concentration, standardization, and globalization of the food supply. As advances in agricultural production in the post-World War II era propelled population growth, a significant portion of the population gained access to cheap, industrially produced food while significant numbers remained mired in hunger and malnutrition. Further, as globalization allowed unprecedented access to foods from all parts of the globe, it also hastened environmental degradation, contributed to poor health, and remained a key element in global politics, economics and culture. A Cultural History of Food in the Modern Age presents an overview of the period with essays on food production, food systems, food security, safety and crises, food and politics, eating out, professional cooking, kitchens and service work, family and domesticity, body and soul, representations of food, and developments in food production and consumption globally.
Download or read book Cornered written by Barry C. Lynn and published by Turner Publishing Company. This book was released on 2009-12-10 with total page 411 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A manifesto for our times." —Thomas Frank, Wall Street Journal Barry C. Lynn, one of the most original and surprising students of the American economy, paints a genuinely alarming picture: most of our public debates about globalization, competitiveness, creative destruction, and risky finance are nothing more than a cover for the widespread consolidation of power in nearly every imaginable sector of the American economy. Cornered strips the camouflage from the secret world of twenty-first-century monopolies-neofeudalist empires whose sheer size, vast resources, and immense political power enable the people who control to direct virtually every major industry in America in an increasingly authoritarian manner. Lynn reveals how these massive juggernauts, which would have been illegal just thirty years ago, came into being, how they have destroyed or devoured their competition, and how they collude with one another to maintain their power and create the illusion of open, competitive markets. A confluence of small government zealotry and misguided efficient market theories has lead to a complete dismantling of government oversight of industry. Has that brought us the promised economic utopia? Just the opposite. For decades, the dominant elite has used the federal government to all but encourage companies to buy one another up, outsource all their production, and make their profits by leveraging their complete power over the market itself. Lynn makes clear it will take more than a lawsuit or two to overthrow America's corporatist oligarchy and restore a model of capitalism that protects our rights as property holders and citizens, and the independence of our Republic. Details how regular citizens can join together to beat the great powers, and how to do so by relearning the real history and language of our democratic republic. Includes stories of real people and real industries that show how monopolies threaten independent businesses, squelch innovation, degrade the quality and safety of products, destabilize vital industrial and financial systems, and destroy the fabric of democracy Explores monopoly power across a wide array of industries, including appliances, auto parts, beer, eyeglasses, medical supplies, pet food, surfboards, vitamins, and more. Demonstrates how the drive for "always lower prices" makes your job disappear, puts your small business out of business, and turns dreams of entrepreneurial success into impossible fantasies Lynn is that rarest of creatures, a journalist whose theoretical writings are taken very seriously by the top policymakers and economic thinkers in Washington and around the world. His work has been compared already to John Kenneth Galbraith and Peter Drucker. The Washington Post called Lynn's last book-on globalization-"Tom Friedman for grownups." Cornered is essential reading for anyone who cares about America and its future.
Download or read book Bet the Farm written by Frederick Kaufman and published by Turner Publishing Company. This book was released on 2012-09-05 with total page 173 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A prominent food journalist follows the trail from Big Pizza to square tomatoes to exploding food prices to Wall Street, trying figure out why we can't all have healthy, delicious, affordable food In 2008, farmers grew enough to feed twice the world's population, yet more people starved than ever before?and most of them were farmers. In Bet the Farm, food writer Kaufman sets out to discover the connection between the global food system and why the food on our tables is getting less healthy and less delicious even as the the world's biggest food companies and food scientists say things are better than ever. To unravel this riddle, he moves down the supply chain like a detective solving a mystery, revealing a force at work that is larger than Monsanto, McDonalds or any of the other commonly cited culprits?and far more shocking. Kaufman's recent cover story for Harper's, "The Food Bubble," provoked controversy throughout the food world, and led to appearances on the NBC Nightly News, MSNBC, Fox Business News, Democracy Now, and Bloomberg TV, along with features on National Public Radio and the BBC World Service. Visits the front lines of the food supply system and food politics as Kaufman visits farms, food science research labs, agribusiness giants, the United Nations, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, and more Explains how food has been financialized and the powerful consequences of this change, including: the Arab Spring, started over rising food prices; farmers being put out of business; food scientists rushing to make easy-to-transport, homogenized ingredients instead of delicious foods Explains how the push for sustainability in food production is more likely to make everything worse, rather than better?and how the rise of fast food is bad for us, but catastrophic for those who will never even see a McNugget or frozen pizza
Download or read book Modern Food Moral Food written by Helen Zoe Veit and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2013-08-01 with total page 317 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: American eating changed dramatically in the early twentieth century. As food production became more industrialized, nutritionists, home economists, and so-called racial scientists were all pointing Americans toward a newly scientific approach to diet. Food faddists were rewriting the most basic rules surrounding eating, while reformers were working to reshape the diets of immigrants and the poor. And by the time of World War I, the country's first international aid program was bringing moral advice about food conservation into kitchens around the country. In Modern Food, Moral Food, Helen Zoe Veit argues that the twentieth-century food revolution was fueled by a powerful conviction that Americans had a moral obligation to use self-discipline and reason, rather than taste and tradition, in choosing what to eat. Veit weaves together cultural history and the history of science to bring readers into the strange and complex world of the American Progressive Era. The era's emphasis on science and self-control left a profound mark on American eating, one that remains today in everything from the ubiquity of science-based dietary advice to the tenacious idealization of thinness.
Download or read book The Meat You Eat written by Ken Midkiff and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2005-11 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author examines the dangers posed by corporate control of agriculture, maintains that big business is more concerned with volume and profits at the risk to consumer health, and argues that supporting local farmers will improve the quality of life for all.
Download or read book The Poison Squad written by Deborah Blum and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2018-09-25 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Notable Book The inspiration for PBS's AMERICAN EXPERIENCE film The Poison Squad. From Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times-bestselling author Deborah Blum, the dramatic true story of how food was made safe in the United States and the heroes, led by the inimitable Dr. Harvey Washington Wiley, who fought for change By the end of nineteenth century, food was dangerous. Lethal, even. "Milk" might contain formaldehyde, most often used to embalm corpses. Decaying meat was preserved with both salicylic acid, a pharmaceutical chemical, and borax, a compound first identified as a cleaning product. This was not by accident; food manufacturers had rushed to embrace the rise of industrial chemistry, and were knowingly selling harmful products. Unchecked by government regulation, basic safety, or even labelling requirements, they put profit before the health of their customers. By some estimates, in New York City alone, thousands of children were killed by "embalmed milk" every year. Citizens--activists, journalists, scientists, and women's groups--began agitating for change. But even as protective measures were enacted in Europe, American corporations blocked even modest regulations. Then, in 1883, Dr. Harvey Washington Wiley, a chemistry professor from Purdue University, was named chief chemist of the agriculture department, and the agency began methodically investigating food and drink fraud, even conducting shocking human tests on groups of young men who came to be known as, "The Poison Squad." Over the next thirty years, a titanic struggle took place, with the courageous and fascinating Dr. Wiley campaigning indefatigably for food safety and consumer protection. Together with a gallant cast, including the muckraking reporter Upton Sinclair, whose fiction revealed the horrific truth about the Chicago stockyards; Fannie Farmer, then the most famous cookbook author in the country; and Henry J. Heinz, one of the few food producers who actively advocated for pure food, Dr. Wiley changed history. When the landmark 1906 Food and Drug Act was finally passed, it was known across the land, as "Dr. Wiley's Law." Blum brings to life this timeless and hugely satisfying "David and Goliath" tale with righteous verve and style, driving home the moral imperative of confronting corporate greed and government corruption with a bracing clarity, which speaks resoundingly to the enormous social and political challenges we face today.
Download or read book Can We Feed the World written by Scientific American Editors and published by Scientific American. This book was released on 2013-08-19 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Can We Feed the World?: The Future of Food by the Editors of Scientific American With global population numbers projected to increase by 2 billion by 2050, a veritable food crisis is on the horizon. In this eBook, Can We Feed the World? The Future of Food, we examine some of the complex causative factors involved in the coming "food crisis" and the innovative ideas and technologies designed to increase food production sustainably. We also examine current industry methods to increase production and the controversies surrounding them, including not only hot-button issues like genetically modified (or GM) and processed foods, but also food safety and the physical effects of the modern diet. To start the discussion, Jonathan Foley throws down the gauntlet with the first article, "The Grand Challenge: Can We Feed the World and Sustain the Planet?" In it he takes a macroscopic look at the coming crisis and presents five solutions that could both double the world's food production by mid-century as well as decrease greenhouse gas emissions and curb environmental damage. Other articles discuss technologies ranging from more sustainable offshore fish farming to "vertical farms," and an entire section tackles GM crops. Hugely controversial, GM crops are either the magic bullet that will save millions from starvation or Frankenstein's monster. To that end, don't miss Sasha Nemecek's "The Pros and Cons of GM Foods," in which she interviews experts on both sides of this issue, as well as "Three Myths about Genetically Modified Crops," by Natasha Gilbert. Later, we delve into the processed food industry, taking a magnifying glass to fast food and high fructose corn syrup, as well as food safety issues, including monitoring sources of contamination as well as preventing food poisoning. With all the possibilities on the horizon—from GM crops to new technologies in farming and fishing—world hunger does not have to be inevitable, but we'll need to be resourceful in managing the food supply so that we can preserve the planet and ourselves.
