SvennoJ said:
pokoko said:
I would like to point out that comparing today's market to that from decades ago just doesn't work. Farms did well because there was more demand, both home and abroad. Now, because of much more efficient techniques, better equipment, and agents like pesticides, we produce far more than we need. Most countries have the same problem and it's driving down all the markets. All the farmers I know are trying to find products with more favorable demand.
Some farmers got paid to not grow certain crops, though I don't know if they're still getting checks now.
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True. When I grew up supermarkets were still a relatively new concept. You got your vegetables and meat at specialized stores, with a lot of stuff simply not available out of season. Nowadays everything is available year round in perfectly shiny uniform looking fruit and vegetables. Everything that doesn't look perfect doesn't even make it to the stores. Local produce actually looks less desirable than stuff from the other side of the world, as for local foods they'll sell more variable looking produce. It tastes better yet in today's society looks > taste.
For example strawberries from South America, look pretty, taste bitter, rot in less than a week. Local strawberries look ugly, taste great. Direct from the farm, taste heavenly. Transport costs are too low. It's kinda rediculous to ship most foods back and forth accross the world before it reaches the stores.
What I would like to see is farmer's markets integrated with supermarkets. Supermarkets are simply very convenient and won't go anywhere. So why not make them sort of mini malls with produce sections integrated in the main store.
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I'm from southern Ontario btw, so our experience isn't identical to the U.S. but its pretty close. Truthfully the States has it better overall and especially in terms of subsidies.
The system has changed, correct, but the excess food has much less to do with new techniques and technology, and a lot to do with open markets and cheap higher quality food from around the world. Now that other countries are growing much more food, and are able to offer acceptable quality rather than the junk they used to have, it pushes the prices of food way down in North America, leading to a fairly stagnant industry. The rise of large food chains, has made the industry lop sided because they have most of the power now, since there are many "small farms" that are all separate businesses, yet there are few large stores. It's partially the farmers fault for allowing it to happen, but without the large chains today, it would make it much harder for the cities to have quality and quantity of food at a convenient local location for super cheap.
Regulations are another big issue. Little does everyone know what a lot of that cheap food thats coming in from other countries, is sprayed with chemicals that have been banned in North America for years. Theres a lot of ways they get away with this, but they do. When farmers here, have to use the newest most expensive "green" chemicals, it costs them WAY more money to produce that same product, making less money again. Companies are also aloud to use food from other countries, and slap a made in America or Canada sticker on it, as long as the can is made here. People have no idea how flawed the system really is. All of these problems never used to exist when the system was more closed. That's why everyone could constantly grow slowly because the money always circulated and stayed in our countries in smaller divided amounts. Not giving some away to other countries, and having the money made here all go to one big corporation who keeps most of it to themselves.
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