Food Inc, opinion paper Essay Example for Free

Food Inc, opinion paper Essay Question 1: Based on your viewing of Food, Inc., how does your view of â€Å"farm-fresh† and other marketing messages that suggest a more organic flow of food products relate to the realities of 21st-century marketing channels for food? The American Marketing Association defines marketing as â€Å"the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large† (https://www.ama.org/AboutAMA/Pages/Definition-of-Marketing.aspx). The marketing mix consists of product, price, place, promotion, which means that a company needs to sell the right product at the right price and in the right place, using the best promotion. Because of all of this, â€Å"farm-fresh† and organic foods must fight in the marketplace against traditionally farmed foods. Looking at the product: what exactly makes a food organic? Organic can mean different things to different people, and even has a different meaning between companies. According to organic.org, the USDA defines organic food as that which is produced with emphasized use of renewable resources, plus conservation of soil and water. Organic food is produced without conventional pesticides, fertilizers made with synthetics or waste, bioengineered, or ionized radiation. â€Å"Organic meat, poultry, eggs, and dairy products come from animals that are given no antibiotics or growth hormones† (http://www.organic.org/home/faq). A government-approved certifier must inspect farms where organic foods are grown to assure that the farmer follows all USDA rules and meets organic standards. Price is a large factor when most people go grocery shopping, especially during these tough economic times. Many, including myself, can argue that organic or â€Å"farm-fresh† foods are just too expensive to buy on a regular basis, or even at all. Personally, I will buy whichever brand is cheapest, without paying attention to where or how it is produced. According to organic.org, one should consider the following facts when wondering why an organic product might cost more than it’s traditionally grown counterpart: Conventional farmers receive federal subsidies, while organic farmers do not, so the price of organic food reflects the true cost of growing. Environmental cleanups, that we pay for with our tax dollars, is not reflected in conventional food. Organic production is more labor and management intensive. And finally, organic farms do not benefit from the economies of scale that larger, more conventional farmers receive. The placement of organic foods is generally next to conventional foods in most grocery stores. Some stores may have a separate organic section, or the organic product could be placed next to its conventionally grown counterpart. Some grocery stores, such as Natural Grocers, only sell USDA approved organic or naturally grown produce and meat, and would not be concerned with placement. Organic foods are generally promoted as being more nutritious than conventional foods. Although, organic.org admits that there is not research to back this claim, at this time, there are studies that show that organic food has a higher nutritional value. This makes since, considering they are grown more naturally, with less chemicals. This film does expose something about organic or â€Å"farm-fresh† foods: the American food industry is supposed to be protected by the USDA and FDA, but they have been allowing these suppliers to focus on profit and put aside consumer health, the environment, and worker safety. Question 2: Based on your answer to Question 1, are you likely to change how and where you procure your foods (i.e., grocery stores, farmers’ markets, fast-food outlets)? Please explain your reasons. I have never been concerned about how my food was made or where it came from. I have never paid attention to organic foods, GMOs, all-natural, or anything related to the production of the foods I eat. As far as I know, my parents never paid attention to these things either. Because of this, â€Å"farm-fresh† and other marketing of organic foods has not affected me. I just purchase the foods that I want and pay no attention to whether they are â€Å"farm-fresh†, organic, locally grown, etc. I will buy whatever is cheapest,  not whatever is healthiest, most natural, or whatever. My opinion and food purchasing habits will most likely not change after viewing this movie. This question reminds me of high school health class, where we had to watch â€Å"Supersize Me.† Everyone started saying how gross it is, that they are never eating at McDonalds again, or whatever other promises they were making. All I could think was that I could totally go for some McNuggets after school that day! I guess it is just because I have never worried about where the food I eat comes from. However, I have always paid attention to salmonella and E. coli recalls. I remember not eating beef or spinach or peanut butter when there was an outbreak in their plants, because why would I want to get sick? So, I would say no, I will not change where or how I procure my groceries. I will not say that I did not get sad watching those little baby chicks die, or the chickens getting slung around. And those poor cows getting slaughtered, and that one that had that hole and the guy was digging around in her stomach, and said that she was not in pain†¦how does he know?! He’s just cut a big hole in her and is sticking his hand in her stomach, and she cannot tell you that she is in pain! Question 3: Finally, do you think there are any ethical and/or social responsibility issues that confront marketing channels for food distribution? Chicken are manipulated to grow bigger breasts, tomatoes are genetically engineered to not go bad by being picked while they are green, then ripened with chemicals. Tens of thousands of Americans get sick from new strains of E. coli every year. Levels of obesity are shooting upwards, and diabetes in adults and children have reached epidemic proportions. If Americans knew how corporations used subsidies and exploited laws to make more money, would they think more carefully about what they are eating? The truth is, most people have no clue where their foods come from. Below, I will list secrets and other things that the public should know about the food that they are putting into their bodies. I found a list on www.takepart.com (http://www.takepart.com/photos/food-inc-facts/the-impact-of-food-inc-lives-on-) of 18 â€Å"Food, Inc.† facts that everyone should know, which I have compared  with my notes and compiled the following paragraphs. I feel that if everyone was aware of these facts, it would increase the social responsibility of these companies, and people would have trust in them. These facts pertain to the slaughterhouses and meat packers. In the 1970s, the top five beef packers controlled about 25% of the market, while today, more than 80% of the market is controlled by the top four. In the 1970s, there were thousands of slaughterhouses producing the majority of beef sold, while today, there are only 13. In 1972, the FDA conducted 50,000 food safety inspections. Approximately 32,000 hogs a day are killed in Smithfield Hog Processing Plant in Tar Heel, NC, the largest slaughterhouse in the world. In 2006, the FDA only conducted 9,164. These facts pertain to Monsanto and the USDA. Prior to renaming itself an agribusiness company, Monsanto was a chemical company. In 1996 when Monsanto introduced Round-Up Ready Soybeans, the company controlled only 2% of the U.S. soybean market. Now, over 90% of soybeans contain Monsanto’s patented gene in the United States. In 1998, the USDA implemented microbial testing for salmonella and an E. coli strain so that the USDA could shut down the plant if they repeatedly failed these tests; the USDA no longer has this power after being taken to court by the meat and poultry associations. These facts pertain to the FDA, USDA, and congressmen. During the Bush administration, the head of the FDA was the former executive vice president of the National Food Processors Association. Also during the Bush administration, the chief staff at the USDA was the former chief lobbyist for the beef industry in Washington. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas was an attorney at Monsanto from 1976-1979; after his appointment to the Supreme Court, Justice Thomas wrote the majority opinion in a case that helped Monsanto enforce its seed patents. The SB63 Consumer Right to Know measure, requiring all food derived from cloned animals to be labeled as such, passed the California state legislature before being vetoed in 2007 by Governor Schwarzenegger, who said that he couldnt sign a bill that pre-empted federal law. The rest of these facts are just interesting. The average chicken farmer (with two poultry houses) invests over $500,000, but only makes $18,000 a year. The average American eats over 200 pounds of meat each year. The modern supermarket stocks, on average 47,000 products, most of which are being produced by only a handful of food companies. About 70% of processed have some genetically modified ingredients. According to the American Diabetes Association, 1 in 3 Americans born after 2000 will contract early onset diabetes. Among minorities, the rate will be 1 in 2. E. coli and salmonella outbreaks have been more frequent in America. In 2007, there were 73,000 people wicked by the E. coli bacteria. Organics is the fastest growing food segment, increasing 20% annually.

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MegaCities Essay Essay

Mega Cities are cities that have a population of more than 8 million and are characterised by the challenges they face, including issues involving the informal economy, unemployment, poor sanitation and shelter. These issues are largely prominent in these cities due to rapid urban growth and a lack of resources. In many cases action has been taken by national governments and non-governmental organisations (NGO’s) to combat and reduce the impact of these issues, however In order for these strategies to be effective they need to fit 3 primary criteria, the solution must be community based, cost effective and sustainable economically and environmentally. Strategies such as micro financing.. Etc. have been adopted to resolve these challenged. A primary challenge facing many mega cities is the population’s heavy reliance on the informal economy as a means of income. The informal economy is a sector of unregulated work and with this comes high unemployment rates and a lack of jobs to support the ever-increasing population. Jobs in the informal economy are particularly prominent in Dhaka, Bangladesh, where 65% of all jobs are found in this sector. Jobs in the informal economy pose a threat to mega cities and their population as workers are not protected and are open to exploitation (e.g. Child labour) and people employed informally pay no tax (e.g. Street vendors, rickshaw drivers) leading to a reduction in the governments revenue. A number of strategies have been undertaken in order to transform informal work into the formal economy, including Micro financing. Micro financing involves NGO’s giving out small loans (approximately $US200), which provide people with money to formalise their business. There are a number of NGO’s that undertake this strategy, including Opportunity International, which is an Australian charity, operating in manila, targeting particularly impoverished communities. Access to these loans is based on a persons standing in the community and once the business begins to sustain itself loans must be repaid. The outcome of this process is a formalised business, which then contributes to government  beneficially by providing it with revenue. This strategy to combat the prominence of the informal economy has been particularly successful, adheres to the three evaluation criteria and provides users with lifetime skills and an income, which could potentially improve their living standards/quality of life. Another challenge faced by a large majority of mega cities is access to shelter, due to population growth in mega cities being too extreme for sufficient supply of housing. This in turn leads to the creation of informal housing, such as squatter settlements, which are generally formed on unoccupied unwanted land, such as next to rail lines or sewerage systems. Informal housing is extremely prominent in developing countries such as India, where 500,000 people live on the pavement in Kolkata with at least 4 million more living in squatter settlements; as well as 1 million people living in cemeteries in Cairo, and  ¼ of the Philippines population residing in slums. This informal housing creates a number of problems for its residents and government; it lacks basic services (sewerage, electricity, water), leading to unsanitary living conditions. There is a lack of tenure, which is the legal right to occupy land, which stops residents from wanting to improve property, insecurity for people and also extremely high crime rates particularly in the Favelas of Rio de Janiero where the police are unable to patrol, due to extreme gang violence. NGO’s and governments have undertaken strategies to improve the issue of lack of access to shelter, including the Kolkata Bustee Improvement Project, a joint initiative between government and non-government organisations. This is a site and service program meaning that the project takes an existing site and provides it with necessary services, such as sanitation, electricity etc. This program in turn reduces the cost burden on local government and creates jobs by incorporating the local community into the work. This movement has tried to stop India’s slum clearance policy, which frees up NGO’s to be able to assist the extreme urban poor. This movement has proved to be extremely successful in improving the shelter situation in Kolkata as it improves the living standard of squatter settlement dwellers, provides jobs and skills to the local community (therefore adding to the formal not informal economy) and also allows NGO’s to be able to assist the poor as they were previously  restricted by government policies. Another benefit is that it is cost effective because it aims to improve existing settlements and creates tenure. Access to sanitation is another key challenge faced by many Mega Cities that is, providing safe food and drinking water and sewerage management. Due to increasing populations, inadequate and ancient sewerage systems and also lack of access to fresh water many Mega Cities face sanitation issues. This issue is particularly prominent in cities such as Manila, where only 11% of people have access to a sewerage system, Karachi at 20% and Dhaka at 18% of the population. Water Borne diseases are particularly prominent in megacities, such as Cholera, Dysentery and Typhoid. Furthermore the disposal of solid waste in Mega cities has lead to issues involving contamination of groundwater and creating Vernon, this is common of Jakarta where only  ¼ of all rubbish gets collected. To combat the issue of sanitation, local governments and NGO’s have established very effective, low-tech strategies, such as the Pour Flush Toilet. This initiative is a relatively cheap response to the needs of unplanned urban settlements in mega cities. A pour flush toilet has a water seal that avoids the problems associated with odour and insects. However its effectiveness is limited by the fact that the system is not suitable in cities where the groundwater table is close to the surface, which is the case in many mega cities, including Mumbai and Kolkata in India and Dhaka in Bangladesh. Also, pour flush toilets can produce substantial quantities of heavily contaminated wastewater which can require substantial downstream infrastructure to avoid severe environmental and public health problems. Despite the disadvantages of this strategy it has proved to be a very successful short term solution to the issue of sanitation and is widely used in Mega Cities around the world, due to the fact that they are simple to use and can be kept clean fairly easily. Mega Cities face many challenges; largely due to their high population increase rate. They therefore need to develop a number of solutions and strategies to combat these prominent issues, such as the informal economy, access to shelter and access to sanitation. If action is not taken to confront these issues they will only become more consequential, leading to more deaths and further environmental and land degradation. Governments and  NGO’s continually need to create strategies to solve these issues and their efforts so far have proved to be extremely beneficial in improving the quality of life of residents of Mega cities, as they fit the three primary criteria needed for solutions to be effective.

Looking at the similarities and context of the plays; The...

Looking at the similarities and context of the plays; The Crucible, St. Joan and Antigone I shall be comparing the following three plays: The Crucible, St. Joan, and Antigone. I will be analysing the plays contents so that I can look at the similarities between the three of them and communicating the ideas that each of the three main characters have similar characteristics. The Crucible was written by playwright Arthur Miller and was first produced in 1953. The play is set in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692 and looks at the witch hunt that surrounded America in the seventeenth century. Miller used his own views of McCarthyism to look at the sheer madness that had surrounded this so called witchery, and so the play was seen as†¦show more content†¦She did not feel that the kingdom was being run properly and decided to oppose this by setting up an army and sending it into demise, she was then caught by a group of French civilians, tried and later burnt at the stake. St. Joan confessed to the charge of being a heretic but later decided to change her mind and insist that she was innocent, this meant that she was indeed burnt at the stake. This is an historical play that is based on facts that had happened in the past. Although these three plays were centuries apart, all three had contemporary themes that are still relevant today. All three show the authors own views on what was happening at that time. The main character of The Crucible, John Proctor, is similar to the character of Antigone. On-stage there is a scene where Antigone is having an argument with Creon What sort of game are you playing, at which Antigone replies, I am not playing games. This chapter of the play shows us that Creon does not understand what kind of point Antigone is trying to prove as he wants her to live, and that Antigone has a determination and good opinion to want to give her brother a proper burial. 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