Most of the products that have been recalled I understand were from "organic" farms, processed in "organic" plants. It wasn't at the farm that the problem occured but at the plant where they products were supposedly mixed with other "organic" items to make a better selling product.
Needless to say, you have to be careful where and from whom you buy your produce. What scares me is that this is a perfect way for terrorists to attack America,through the food chain. But we won't worry about that here, there are other sites for that discussion.
It's never too late to get it right.
Posts: 3473 | Location: Central USA | Registered: March 11, 2004
This is a bad time for labor of all kinds in this country, and a good time to be a business owner. So most of us are doing worse while a few people sit back and collect the profits.
----------- Jen
Posts: 2868 | Location: Ohio | Registered: March 11, 2004
Farmworkers’ Plight: No fruits for their labor "As Abraham Lincoln said, 'labor creates all wealth,' but farmworkers get precious little of it. Twenty-five years ago, at the height of the influence of the United Farm Workers, union contracts guaranteed almost twice the minimum wage of the time. Today, the hourly wage in almost every farm job is the minimum wage - $6.75 an hour. And taking inflation into account, the minimum wage is lower today than it was then. Farmworkers are worse off than they've been for over two decades, while the supermarket price of fruit has more than doubled." OpEd by David Bacon, Oct. 11, 2006.
"Success is not the result of spontaneous combustion. You have to set yourself on fire." anonymous
Posts: 4334 | Location: Indianapolis, IN | Registered: March 15, 2004
This all makes me want to live the way my parents and grandparents lived....grow large gardens for fresh veggies and fruits and to "put up" in the freezer. DH talks about us trying to have a large garden every year but we haven't gotten around to it yet. Maybe this coming year will be the year to dive in. Actually we could start this fall/winter by planting some collards
Let's hope you're right! I think that there are so many advantages to smaller farming: ecological, health, and social... We might have to be willing to live with food prices that are a little higher, but maybe we can make up the difference by eating less junk.
----------- Jen
Posts: 2868 | Location: Ohio | Registered: March 11, 2004
Originally posted by TriGirl: It's an inconvenience for us, but think what it is doing to the people whose incomes depend on those crops.
Maybe...I think a lot of the culprits are large farming corporations. Yes, regular people work for them, and if the company doesn't do well, the employees don't have work. Then this all gets into illegal immigration and crack downs on illegal immigration and crops rotting in the fields because of lack of workers to harvest. (That's a whole other ball of wax.)
*Maybe* this is the wake up call we need to go back to (at least to a certain extent) family farming where there was actually interest in providing good quality goods, rather than mass production and large profit.
Dawn
Dawn,
We are already seeing this, somewhat, here locally. The farmer's market and the CSA that I buy from now has business booming in the past year, and I'm seeing poorer and poorer quality produce in the grocery stores (because it is sitting there for so long). I'm also seeing the produce prices in the grocery stores in our county going up higher than neighboring counties (I suspect they are trying to make up for some of the loss of profits being generated due to more local buying). This could all be pure speculation on my part, and wishful thinking, but I have seen a dramatic difference in pricing and quality in produce here reacently. And more and more people at the farmer's market and more and more farmer's markets opening around here. I LOVE it!
Blessings,
Lori
Re-committing myself to a healthy lifestyle that will include regular (and increasing) exercise, and following the baby steps rule on food. 6/17/08
Posts: 3149 | Location: California | Registered: March 11, 2004
Originally posted by TriGirl: It's an inconvenience for us, but think what it is doing to the people whose incomes depend on those crops.
Maybe...I think a lot of the culprits are large farming corporations. Yes, regular people work for them, and if the company doesn't do well, the employees don't have work. Then this all gets into illegal immigration and crack downs on illegal immigration and crops rotting in the fields because of lack of workers to harvest. (That's a whole other ball of wax.)
*Maybe* this is the wake up call we need to go back to (at least to a certain extent) family farming where there was actually interest in providing good quality goods, rather than mass production and large profit.
Dawn
"Success is not the result of spontaneous combustion. You have to set yourself on fire." anonymous
Posts: 4334 | Location: Indianapolis, IN | Registered: March 15, 2004
