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FOOD STABILITY

Can Small-Scale Farmers Feed the World?

From A Growing Culture:

“I—like many others—believed for a long time that industrial agriculture [is] a necessary evil, an unfortunate requirement given how many people now live on the planet. Once I learned about the importance of small-scale farming for biodiversity and cultural preservation, I still wondered whether these smaller farms would be able to “feed the world…”

There is ongoing controversy about exactly what percentage of the world’s food is produced by small-scale and peasant farmers. It’s a difficult question to answer, but an incredibly important one. If it turns out that small-scale agriculture does, in fact, feed the majority of the world, then that would be a huge blow to the industrial agricultural system, given its widespread environmental and social harms. In recent years, researchers have attempted to answer this question. But a couple of key studies have emerged, pointing us in the wrong direction, and creating dire consequences for policy-making. Let’s dive in.

Back in 2009, ETC Group published a report titled Who Will Feed Us? in which they cite the statistic that small-scale farmers feed 70 percent of the world (that is, they produce 70 percent of the food that actually goes to feeding people, vs. crops that are diverted for biofuels, animal feed, or other non-food uses). This distinction is important—they aren’t claiming that smallholder farmers produce 70 percent of net calories, but 70 percent of the food that ends up being consumed by people.

They assert, based on available data, that 50 percent of global crop production for human consumption can be attributed to small-scale farms under 5 hectares [or 12 acres] (this is relatively uncontroversial in the research). Then, they added in food resulting from practices like hunting and gathering, fishing, pastoralism, as well as small-scale urban and peri-urban food production, which accounted for an additional 20 percent of food consumed. These forms of food production are mostly informal—and chronically undervalued—so it’s difficult to ascertain exact figures, but they are nonetheless important ways that people feed themselves around the world.

In the past few years, two papers have been published that attempt to ‘debunk’ this 70 percent statistic. The two papers, published by Vincent Ricciardi et al. (2018) and Sarah Lowder et al. (2021), both claim that small-scale farmers account for just 30 percent of global food production—quite a jump down from 70 percent. This has led to a slew of headlines implying that these findings prove that small-scale agriculture is inefficient and incapable of feeding the world and that we should invest in industrialized methods instead. As a result of these papers, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has shifted its position from 70 to 30 percent, despite the fact that the papers are full of methodological errors and assumptions that warrant further scrutiny before being universally accepted.”

Learn more: Can Small-Scale Farmers Feed the World?

REGENERATIVE AG

True Carbon Farming Requires Deep Roots—in the Soil and in Community

Liz Carlisle reports:

“In recent years, carbon has become a handy shorthand for climate. Our national lexicon includes ‘carbon footprints’ and ‘carbon budgets’; we environmental advocates speak of going carbon-neutral or building a low-carbon economy. Measuring carbon molecules has also spread to agriculture as many producers and brands enthusiastically embrace ‘carbon farming.’

Farmers typically get paid for what they take out of the soil, namely crops like corn or lettuce. But some regenerative agriculture advocates are asking whether farmers also should be paid for what they put back in. By embracing practices like planting soil-building cover crops, spreading compost, and reducing tillage, farmers can gradually build up the amount of carbon in their land. More carbon underground means less carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, thus mitigating the impact of climate change.

Carbon farming has burst into the mainstream over the past decade. General Mills recently announced an initiative to monitor soil carbon across 175 million acres of farmland in North America, South America, and Europe, with the goal of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. Meanwhile, the 4 per 1000 soil carbon initiative has garnered vocal support… And the critically acclaimed documentaries Biggest Little Farm and Kiss the Ground have legions of gardeners enthusiastically carbon-farming their yards.

The notion that everything we do has a carbon benefit or cost has been an effective way to raise awareness of our impact on climate. But as this narrative is translated into federal agriculture policy and public funds are committed toward carbon programs, there’s the danger of too narrow a focus — bean counting one microscopic element rather than supporting healthy farm ecosystems.”

Learn more: True ‘Carbon Farming’ Requires Deep Roots — In the Ground and in Community

SYNBIO

What You Need to Know About Plant-Based (Lab-Produced) Meats

Roberta Louis interviews nutritionist Sara Keough for Price-Pottenger.org:

Roberta Louis: How do today’s plant-based meats differ from the veggie burgers of the past, which have been sold in health food stores for decades?

Sara Keough: The veggie burgers of the past mostly utilized vegetables and beans with some spices, herbs, and seasonings added. They were basically made from whole foods that underwent very minimal processing. In contrast, the leading plant-based meats on the market, which primarily include the brands Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat, consist largely of ultra-processed ingredients. They contain compounds such as soy protein isolates or pea protein isolates, which are often stripped out of the whole foods through the use of hexane or other harmful chemicals.

These modern plant-based meats are so highly processed that they no longer resemble whole foods. In fact, they barely even support the word plant. They are more like Frankenfood products that have been created in a lab – especially in the case of the Impossible Foods products, because these include novel ingredients such as genetically engineered soy leghemoglobin… They’re nothing like the veggie burgers of the past.

Roberta: Why is there so much consumer interest in these products?

Sara: When we look at the research surveys that have been done on consumer interest in plant-based meats, it’s very clear that health is a big motivator. There’s a lot of marketing behind these products in promoting the idea that there is a health benefit in moving away from meat, eggs, and dairy and adopting a more plant-based diet. But unfortunately, consumers are buying into a lie and what I consider to be very powerful propaganda.

Animal products have been routinely vilified as promoting heart disease, cancer, and other chronic diseases. However, there is actually no solid evidence to support these claims. In my professional opinion – based on what I see in my clinical practice, as well as what I hear from colleagues and read in the research – animal products from healthy regenerative farms are some of the most nutrient-dense and healing foods on the planet.

People are obviously also concerned about environmental issues, and I think that’s another big draw to these plant-based meats. Again, though, people are buying into a lie that’s being promoted by the plant-based meat advocates. We hear over and over how terrible animal agriculture is for the environment – and it’s true that factory farms such as concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) are destructive to the planet. However, what we’re not hearing is the story about regenerative agriculture.

Regenerative agriculture is essentially farming with nature, not against it. It involves learning to move away from chemical inputs and instead utilize natural practices, including grazing livestock, to rebuild ecosystems and regenerate soil. I highly encourage your readers to watch the award-winning movie Kiss the Ground so they can see how pasture-raised animals can be part of a healthy, well-functioning ecosystem that can help the planet.

Roberta: So, plant-based meats are not actually healthier than real meat?

Sara: Absolutely not, and we’ll go into more detail shortly about some of the specific ingredients in plant-based meats that are dangerous for human health. But to call these highly processed industrial products “healthy alternatives” to meat strains credulity, to say the least.

When I encourage my patients to include more healthy animal products in their diet, they experience amazing turnarounds in how they feel. I see dramatic improvements in their symptoms and various health biomarkers. For example, their cholesterol levels improve with the addition of more meat into the diet, and inflammation markers decrease.”

Learn more: What You Need to Know About Plant-Based Meats: An Interview with Sara Keough, MS, CNS, LDN

RFK JR.

A Letter to Liberals: Why I Wrote It & Why I Hope You Will Read It

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is one of our contemporary heroes. He is the author of the Introduction to my recent best-selling book, co-written with Dr. Joe Mercola, The Truth About COVID-19.

RFK Jr. has just written a powerful essay, entitled “A Letter to Liberals.” In his open letter RFK Jr., demolishes the “Lockdown Liberal” propaganda narrative on the origins, nature, virulence, prevention, and treatment of COVID-19. Kennedy pleads with the millions of well-meaning but often psychologically panicked and deranged Democrats to open their minds to scientific facts and our inalienable and absolutely essential Constitutional liberties and rights. He eloquently details the hazards of experimental, profit-at-any-cost vaccines, mandates, lockdowns, medical tyranny, and 21st Century Totalitarianism, hiding behind the façade of modern science, bogus fact-checking, and a so-called Great Reset or Fourth Industrial Revolution.

Robert Kennedy Jr. writes:

“It is my hope that “A Letter to Liberals” will remind all Americans that blind faith in authority is a feature of religion and autocracy — not of science or democracy.

To that end, this letter is a challenge to my fellow liberals to reexamine the scientific assertions upon which rest the oppressive policies that have savaged the presumptions of classical liberalism and the U.S. Constitution.

It is past time our nation had an open conversation about the strategies supposedly enacted for ending the pandemic, and the best measures for avoiding future crises.”

As Children’s Health Defense writes: “Kennedy’s fellow Democrats were once considered a party of intellectual curiosity and critical thinking with faith in scientific and liberal empiricism. They took pride in understanding how to read science critically, exercising healthy skepticism towards notoriously corrupt entities like the drug companies that created the opioid crisis and were outraged by the phenomenon of ‘agency capture.’ Not to mention the pervasive control of private interests over Congress, the media and scientific journals.

Yet, during the COVID pandemic, those attitudes took a back seat to blind faith in government mandates and countermeasures driven by pharmaceutical companies and captive federal agencies. New attitudes promoted by corporate media have cynically exploited the fears of the American people.”

Read more: A Letter to Liberals