FOOD THAT IS GOOD, CLEAN & JUST.
PART I – WHY FAST FOOD IS BAD FOR YOU & ITS IMPACT ON THE ENVIRONMENT
We’ve all heard about Fast Food. Delicious, quick, on-the-go, easy-on-the-pocket, large portions, high carbs, high fat, high sugar, low nutrition, incredibly tempting.
What is the Slow Food movement? Why did it come about? How did it come about? Is this the answer to Fast Food addictions and the devastating effect Fast food has on health and the environment?
Slow Food is a movement built around three tenets-
- To make people aware of the effort, time and passion that goes into cultivating fruits, vegetables, greens and grains. Turning the Consumer into a Food Co-Producer.
- To produce food that is Good, Clean and Just. High-quality, pesticide-free food that is good for the local economy.
- To build a Community around food – a chain that connects producers, co-producers, family, friends, neighbours and communities.
This video below gives you an idea of what the Slow Food Movement is and why it is gaining momentum across the globe.
WHY NOT: FAST FOOD
The Slow Food Movement came about in protest to the first McDonald’s in Italy. In 1986 Carlo Petrini led a protest in the Piazza de Spagna in Rome, home to the first McDonald’s. The protest was against processed food that sought to replace local flavours with standardized tastes, food prepared without much thought into what goes into it and food that did not support the local producers.
Why does food have such a bad rap?
For one, fast food is high in fat, sugar and starch causing insulin levels in the body to spike, leading to diabetes, premature ageing and bad cholesterol buildup in the body among a dozen other health issues.
Two, fast food has a standard recipe that picks only certain foods manufactured in certain countries. It does not support local economies, local communities and produce, thus replacing native fruits, vegetables and greens that have grown over hundreds of years with foreign fruits and vegetables with little regard for climate, tradition, culture and the native ecosystem thus destroying lands, crops, livelihoods and signature recipes unique to certain communities. Fast food chains thus have a huge monopoly over what is cultivated, and what goes into the food with no regard for health, nutrition or local flavours.
Besides being high in fat and sugar, Fast Food is loaded with pesticides and herbicides since lots of them are required to mass-produce ingredients for various dishes. This means that in addition to vast amounts of salt, sugar and fat that are already very unhealthy for the body, we are also exposed to pesticides, herbicides and fungicides every time we eat fast food. Fortunately, most schools have replaced fast food counters in cafeterias and canteens with healthier options, but kids addicted to burgers, pizzas, chips and other fast foods in and around schools or universities are malnourished, obese, have skin and digestive problems, lower metabolism and less energy to lead an active life so necessary for their growth and development.
SUPER SIZE ME – The effect of fast food on our daily lives.
This movie is based on one person’s experiment with eating McDonald’s foods 3 times a day. While this may be crazy and one could argue that nobody eats at Mac thrice a day, there are, however, people who eat at Mac once a day or at least two or three times a week. The documentary explores the devastating effect of fast food on the human body – BEYOND obesity. This documentary explores the question – Are the consumers to blame for the ongoing global obesity crisis or do Fast-Food chains have as much responsibility for people’s worsening health?
Fast food culture is directly responsible for enormous quantities of food being wasted. People who do not know or understand the labour-intensive growth process are more likely to throw food away and be less concerned about the impact of fast food chains on the environment. There is little awareness or consciousness about nature, the growth process, indigenous fruits and vegetables and the effort required to produce food for entire communities.
RUSSET POTATOES – The secret behind those long, delicious French fries you’re addicted to!
Fast Food & the Environment
The fast food industry has a deadly impact on the environment due to its high dependency on natural resources like water, land and livestock food.
Modern agriculture is now the number one contributor to the destruction of the environment owing to an increase in methane and CO2 production rates, overconsumption of water that could be used to sustain entire communities but is instead diverted to meat farms, overuse of land resources, deforestation, and species extinction. Australia and the United States have the highest levels of meat consumption in the world.
Let’s take a look at some of the environmental impacts of the fast food industry.
GREENHOUSE GASES
Greenhouse gases accelerate an increase in global temperatures through the greenhouse effect. Carbon dioxide, nitrous oxides and methane are some of the most potent greenhouse gases being released into the atmosphere today. Methane is estimated to be 86 times more destructive than carbon dioxide in terms of global warming potential and is released primarily from waste from livestock. Animal agriculture is responsible for about 18% of greenhouse gas emissions, a far greater percentage than the transport industry.
IT IS ESTIMATED THAT GREENHOUSE GASES FROM ANIMAL AGRICULTURE WILL CONTRIBUTE TO AS MUCH AS 70% OF THE ALLOWABLE LIMIT FOR EMISSIONS BY 2050 IF THE WORLD IS TO LIMIT GLOBAL WARMING TO LESS TAN 2°C.
OVERCONSUMPTION OF WATER
The animal agriculture industry uses about 80% of water in the US. This water is used to grow crops consumed by livestock, their water requirements, scalding the carcass and processing the meat for marketing and distribution. Scientists and investors in companies like Pizza Hut, McDonald’s, KFC, Burger King and other fast food chains are working together to create more efficient methods to use water such as drip irrigation systems and devising stricter requirements concerning greenhouse gas emissions and water consumption. There is still a long way to go, however, before the animal industry can sustainably produce meat for fast-food chains and reduce its carbon footprint.
LOSING RAINFOREST COVER
Local farmers in various countries have been chopping down rainforests and other tree clusters to make way for cattle farms, which are more lucrative and economically sustainable. Once they have produced enough meat, they sell this to giant fast-food chains like Burger King or McDonald’s.
What is being done to counter the effect of the Fast Food Industry?
Read the article here, to understand how the world is fighting back against the destruction caused by the Fast-Food industry and animal farms, as well as steps taken by Fast-Food chains to adopt more environmentally friendly practices.
References :
https://cases.open.ubc.ca/environmental-impact-of-meat-consumption
https://sites.evergreen.edu/ccc/other/page-for-borja
The challenges that I write about are based on my reading, the issues I see on various blogs and websites and what I hear about from friends and family.
If there are similar issues that need writing about, I would love to know about them.
I hope that this blog helps those committed to protecting the environment find useful products, services and initiatives that aid in their daily lives we well as help bring about awareness about global issues that we are all facing owing to our carelessness, lack of awareness and apathy.
Sustainability is a collective responsibility and we must make clear, conscious choices to Keep Our Planet Beautiful
