But the one part of his comment that stuck to my mind was when he referred to the impact on the poor of the world. I confess I know next to nothing to what extent North American food production impacts the rest of the world beyond the nefarious health effect of the growing popularity of western fast food in many parts of the world. I’ve since learned of two examples of the devastating effect that North American agribusiness have had on the developing world. The first one was in India. In the 1970s and 1980s biotech companies convinced Indian cotton farmers that their patented seeds would result in higher yields and more profits. Entire regions switched to these genetically-modified cotton seeds only to witness year after year their yields plumetting and their costs soaring as they were obligated by contract to buy the seeds and pesticides from companies like Monsanto. Over 1,500 farmers committed suicide in that country because of the trap they found themselves in. There’s lots written about it, and campaigns have spread to get rid of Monsanto in India. Cases related to it have reached the Supreme Court in India.

Now a similar thing is happening in Iraq. Following the US invasion of Iraq, American policies there have compelled Iraqi farmers to abandon 10,000 years of agricultural practice to use Monsanto’s seed and plant products if they wanted to do business with the US. This has generated all kinds of concerns and fear that what happened in India will repeat itself in Iraq. This seems entirely the wrong way to get the Iraqi people to understand the Americans are on their side.

If you are interested in these issues, I highly recommend this recent article on Vitality magazine by Helke Ferrie. A physical anthropologist and a medical science writer, Ferrie draws attention to Prince Charles’ campaign against GMOs for its negative impact on the world:

Prince Charles, ignoring the pressure to shut up exerted by Prime Ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, called for an end to biotech farming, quoting Mahatma Gandhi’s warning against “commerce without morality” and “science without humanity.” He was referring to the suicides among Indian farmers, terminator technology, and recent research conducted by Syngenta which used children for GM food trials – sponsored by Bill Gates and the Rockefeller Foundation.

The Prince also called attention to the lie that biotechnology is necessary to feed the world. In fact, according to organizations studying hunger and food shortages, the world produces annually about twice as much food as required – through non-biotech farming. Organic methods consistently outperform conventional and biotech, methods: Brazil and Ethiopia increased their yields by 250% when they switched to organic methods.

For years, the Prince was made fun of for his views on the environment. His concerns have been proven justified time and time again. The problem is that most people assume that technology, anything that is “modern”, is better than traditional of common-sensical approaches. If it doesn’t involve technology and some form of fancy gadget, it is somehow old-fashioned and in need of “modernizing”. Let’s hope we shed this assumption and make more careful choices. The implications are vast.

Read the review in the NYT.

I lived in the US when I was 6 years old and fell under the spell of Ronald McDonald and his friends. The year after we returned to Brazil, Rio de Janeiro had its first McDonald’s and my brothers and I were in heaven. We loved it, as many children do. In Brazil, North-American fast food franchises is not really the cheap food of the masses – there’s plenty of cheaper, healthier alternatives around – but rather, it is considered a treat to go to McDonald’s or Pizza Hut. My brothers still consider it a big treat, take their children to it, and speak of McDonald’s lovingly whenever they happen to live in a city without a franchise. I slowly weaned out, becoming more suspicious of the kind of food served in fast food restaurants here in Canada. I would spend over a year without going to McDonald’s and then when I did, my stomach always hurt afterward. And after watching the video mentioned above, my suspicions only get solidified.

I have nothing against eating hamburgers, french fries, muffins, etc, but I’d rather make those at home or eat them in places where you know that french fries are simply potatoes that have been cut that day and fried. Not some freak of nature that has conquered aging and looks unspoiled after three years.

Click here for an interview with Michael Pollan