Food Presentation

I really enjoyed the food presentation.  I liked how we had to answer questions during the presentation because it was a good way to learn about the topics.  The food industry has so many labels with so many meanings it can be hard sometimes to really figure out who is right and what to eat and for what cost.  For example, organic food can be very expensive.  This is because the farmers have to jump through a lot of hoops in order to be certified organic.  For instance, they cannot use pesticides on their crops, they have to use sustainable methods, they can't use as many medicines like antibiotics for the animals,  and so on.  The presenters talked about a drawback to this.  Since there are so many regulations about the way the organic foods are produced sometimes just making sure that things like e-coli can be a problem because sanitation is not as regulated. Additionally, the presenters talked about how studies about the nutrition of the organic foods compared to regular food.  The studies have mixed results and may be bias, so as of right now there is no reliable information telling us whether or not organic food is actually more nutritious for people. 

The presenters also explained about food miles.  This is a term used to describe how many miles food must travel to get to your table.  It is often a good idea to buy local food in order to reduce one's carbon footprint.  Buying tomatoes in the middle of the winter may not be a good idea because they could be coming from Mexico, whereas in the summer they could be coming from somewhere more local.  One must also consider the impact of not buying food from poor countries as well because while the food has a lot of food miles, it is also helping out the economy of that poor country. 

Finally, the presenters also talked about Whole Foods.  This is a grocery store chain that is dominating the organic food market right now.  This chain can be looked at in both a positive and negative light in that they do sell good, sustainable, and organic food, but they have also been known to run out other smaller organic businesses.  Either way Whole Foods is a company that has definitely found its niche.  The presenters also talked about how Whole foods can be a bit pretentious because of their high prices.  In a way only the rich people can be sustainable and by this better organic food.  Since their prices are so high, people of the middle or lower classes can't really afford to shop there.  One must consider the other side though, Whole foods is a company that must make enough money to stay in business and pay their customers, and organic food is more expensive to begin with.  Whole foods really takes care of it's employees too, paying them well over minimum wadge.