Food + Agriculture

Question 1

food industry -> western and pervasive globally (Vasille et al., 2019)

Answer 1

driven by demand and is in the hands of corporations -> ‘corporate food regime’ (Scrinis, 2007)

Question 2

expansion of the conventional food system

Answer 2

• Meatification of diets
• Plantationocene (colonialism and globalisation) -> increased amount of farmed land + mechanisation and intensification e.g. Haber-Bosch process, Green Revolution -> terminator technology + utilization of bodies and the nonhuman as cheap sources of labour.
• Livestock -> greatest contribution to global biomass (62% livestock and 24% humans) (MFTF, podcast)
• Undernourishment decreasing e.g. 1970= 35% -> 2015= 13%

Question 3

impacts of cognitive dissonance

Answer 3

urbanisation -> alienation between farmer and consumer = poor animal welfare

Question 4

poor animal welfare

Answer 4

 Battery chickens -> poor conditions: overcrowding, dirty, cramped, poor hygiene…
 Zoonotic diseases -> from farming through anti-microbial resistance or increased wild animal-human interactions.
 Removing the brutality process -> depict ‘happy animals’ e.g. remove blood before meat is sold (Miele, 2011).
 Food semiospheres -> process of edibility for people e.g. context in which they were introduced to food, colour of food etc (Parasecoli, 2011).

Question 5

Food and agriculture in the Anthropocene

Answer 5

• Planetary boundaries exceeded = unsustainable food system (Beacham, 2018)
• Contributes to ¼ of total ghgs -> need to reduce this impact -> meat is a large producer of ghgs e.g. sheep, cattle and goats with methane
• Food system = unequal – food insecurity and often used as a weapon within politically unstable regions
• Homogenisation of diets = flattening of biodiversity.
• 1.3 billion tonnes of food waste globally (Evans et al., 2017)

Question 6

Solutions to food + agriculture in the Anthropocene:

Answer 6

EAT-Lancet Commission Report (2019) -> reset the global food industry -> driven by scientists -> 18 co-authors and 16 countries contributed

Question 7

shifting diets

Answer 7

decrease in meat consumption, veganism etc… -> very polarising with lots of opinions (Safran, 2019)
but will meat become privileged to the elite?

Question 8

good consumers (Goodman, 2016)

Answer 8

Biopolitics -> perpetuates consumer responsibility -> ‘Fair Trade’ -> idea of a ‘good eater’ (Beacham, 2018)
celebrity chiefs -> further perpetuate this -> act as intermediaries in ethical via food consumption (McGregor and Houston, 2018) e.g. Jamie Oliver (Barnes, 2017)

Question 9

Eco-modernist = sustainable intensification (McGregor and Houston, 2018)

Answer 9

Increase land efficiency.
Improve the genetics of animals.
Changing methods:
- Feed cows red algae -> main food source = 80% drop in methane emissions (McGregor and Houston, 2018).
Black soldier fly… (Siddiq et al., 2022).
Hydroponics, aquaponics and aeroponics forms of ‘zero acreage farming’ (AlShrouf, 2017)

Question 10

criticisms of eco-modernist view in anthropocene

Answer 10

does not lead to any change in system -> inequality of food system persists -> nature/culture binary in which animals are exploited

Question 11

regenerative agriculture -> nature-based and aims to produce targets which meet net zero by caring for environment

Answer 11

Agroecology -> used in GS and urban regions = permaculture and biodynamics -> ethics of care and focused on non-capitalist production

Question 12

Anthropocene -> system change = move away from anthropocentrism (Alberts, 2011)

Answer 12

Doughnut economics -> center a safe space for food and diets -> equal distribution of production within the boundaries (Raworth, 2017)

Question 13

Alternative proteins (Sexton, 2018):

Answer 13

o Non-meat sources of protein which have been designed to mimic meat e.g. Quorn (Sexton, 2018).
o Proteins produced via the lab -> via scaffolding, organ printing or nanotech (Hopkins and Dacey, 2008)
o Insects -> smaller footprint
o Production produced via the lab -> viewed as chemical components e.g. bottom up approach to creating milk (Bio Based Press, 2015).
o Protein form high-tech processes e.g. Solar Foods

Question 14

criticisms of alternative proteins

Answer 14

 AP -> lots of ethical and controversy -> ‘playing God’ -> is cloning ethical (Hopkins and Dacey, 2008)?
 People may be uncomfortable consuming lab-based products (Hoskins and Dacey, 2008)

Question 15

Anthropocene + more-than-human ethics of care

Answer 15

o Alternative Food Networks e.g. Flourishing Flare -> community-run subsistence farm = organic material and funds itself via the farm shop -> all elements of nature respected and value not only the ones that yield economic value = planting legumes for nitrogen fixation and long root drops to allow upper nutrients to replenish -> farming as a relationship not form of production (Beacham, 2018).
o Producing a post-natural epoch in which humanity dwells with other species through productive collaborations (Lorimer, 2015)

Question 16

criticisms of more-than-human ethics of care in anthropocene

Answer 16

 organic farming – 95% confidence level – produces lower yields than conventional methods (Steufert et al., 2012).
 Ethical consumption = streamlined -> more people turn to fair trade, at what points does it become unethical (Clarke, 2008) -> fair-trade productions increased in revenue from £16.7 million in 1998 to > £712.6 million in 2008 (Adams and Raisborough, 2010)