How has our food changed since 1930 s

How has our food changed since 1930’s • Fast food companies started up. • Wages lowered due to assembly line work • Fast food companies needed big suppliers of food. • We have developed into an industrialized food system • Top four companies supply 80% of the market

Chicken • Birds raised in half the time (49 days instead of 90) • People prefer white meat so birds genetically altered (hormones in their feed) to make them have bigger breasts, • No windows in chicken coops • Chickens given antibiotics due to the unhealthy crowded conditions. • Chickens can’t walk because their bones won’t support their weight. • Farmers highly in debt ($300, 000 for one chicken coop) and they earn 18, 000 per year. • Farmers work for big company.

Corn • • 90% of food has a corn product 30% of land base is corn Major feed for animals and fish. Corn is subsidized by the government so it is sold cheap.

Cows • Cows are natural herbivours. • Fed corn which makes them sick (corn is cheaper) • Because they are sick they are fed antibiotics in their feed. • Cows stand in manure (get sick) • E-coli is now in meat due to the poor health of cows. • CAFOs-consentrated animal feeding organizations • Only 13 slaughterhouses in USA. • Kevin’s Law-allows USDA to shut down unsanitary CAFO’s.

Why don’t people eat healthy foods? • Healthy food is expensive food (a head of broccoli costs more than a double cheeseburger). • Organic foods do not have pesticides, growth hormones, or antibiotics but are more expensive.

Health costs of eating unhealthy foods…. • Unhealthy food choices is causing Americans to develop diabetes, heart disease, strokes, and other diseases. • 1/3 of all Americans born after the year 2000 will develop type 2 diabetes. • Among minorities it will be 1/2.

Meat Packers of Today • Smithfield is the largest slaughterhouse in the world • 32, 000 pigs kills every day. • Meat packers in the 1950’s had good pay and benefits. • Today Smithfield hires illegal immigrants (cheap labor) and it is considered one of the most dangerous jobs.

Mexican corn growers because meat packers…. . • NAFTA forced Mexican corn growers out of business (North American Free Trade Agreement of 1982) • Smithfield advertised for illegal immigrants to work at their plant in Tarhill, North Carolina.

Soy Beans • Monsanto developed a genetically altered soy bean that was not killed by the pesticide Round Up. • All soy bean farmers had to buy their soy beans because they had a patent on them. • Any farmer that did not use their soy beans faced litigation. • Most farmers did not have enough money to fight Monsanto.

Oprah • Oprah was sued for $6 million by the Texas beef producers because she said that beef was unhealthy. • It took 6 years but she won.

Fruits and Vegentable Contamination • E-coli and salmonella are contaminates of animals in CAFOs. • Run-offs are when rain sends contaminates from the animal CAFOs to fruit and vegetable fields