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When I was a kid, one of my favorite books was the Dr. Seuss classic “If I Ran the Zoo,” in which young Gerald McGrew decides he wants none of the humdrum lions and tigers and bears. Instead, he’ll fly to Ka-Troo and bring back an It-Kutch, a Preep and a Proo. My fondness for that book-length Seussian fantasy of control was an early indication that I like being in charge — which could explain why I am a freelancer and an atheist. As a nod to Dr. Seuss, I wanted to write my “If I Ran the Food System” column in anapestic tetrameter, but nothing rhymes with “crop-neutral insurance,” so I had to stick to prose. Over the past couple of years, I’ve gotten ideas about food from a lot of people who grow it, regulate it, supply it, cook it, study it and just think about it. And the list of potential improvements, from farm to table, is long. But making the changes necessary to fix the problems in both our agriculture (pollution, greenhouse gases, soil erosion) and in our diets (too few vegetables, too many calories) requires a fundamental shift in attitude. We all have to pay attention to things that haven’t been on our radar. And so, although there are many smart suggestions floating around, I’m focusing on 10 that have a ripple effect: changes that, with luck, will beget other changes that, ultimately, can change the zeitgeist. Because some problems began decades ago, with government incentives that rewarded production of just a few commodity crops, I’ll begin with what government can do and follow with ideas for manufacturers, consumers and farmers. Develop a best-practices standard. Right now, the only USDA-certified standard defines organic crops. And, while that’s an important way for producers with a focus on naturalness to find customers, every agricultural expert I’ve spoken with says it’s not an optimal standard for environmental health. Farmers are experimenting with cover cropping, no-till, precision agriculture and lots of other strategies to reduce runoff, conserve water and cut greenhouse gas emissions. If we can codify best practices, and certify the crops of farmers who use them, those farmers can attract customers willing to pay more for foods grown that way. Move to crop-neutral insurance. We are disproportionately subsidizing crops that form the backbone of what public-health experts are telling us to eat less of: processed foods and meats. We should keep helping farmers reduce risk through insurance premium help, but eliminate the supplemental programs that support commodity crops, primarily corn and soy. [A rallying cry for a crop program that could change everything] Overhaul SNAP. If we want to move away from subsidizing farmers for growing what’s not healthful, we should consider the same idea at the consumer level as well. Scrap the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (a.k.a. food stamps), which is a cash subsidy for buying foods — almost any foods, even unhealthful ones — and reinvent it as a program that ensures Americans have access to healthful foods in their time of need. (That’s how the Women, Infants and Children program — WIC — works). And, along with it, perhaps recruit some food people — lots of us either write about or cook food for a living — to volunteer to teach classes. Let government food assistance be a ticket not just to the healthful foods we all should be eating more of, but also to help with figuring out what to do with them. That would also create demand in some “food deserts,” where wholesome foods are less available — an important step in righting that imbalance. Teach food in schools. Over and over, I’ve heard that it’s very hard to change adults’ habits but not quite so hard to change kids’. Start ’em young, learning what’s good and what isn’t. Consider bringing back home ec, which helped generations of kids ( mostly girls) learn to cook. How about making farm visits a standard part of the curriculum? And a slaughterhouse visit a standard class trip for high school seniors? Food manufacturers do a lot of things I take issue with. I’d like to see more-healthful products on the market. I’d like to see kids exposed to less advertising and less nutrition-free food. I’d like to see fewer products marketed as healthful when they aren’t; the new Cheerios Protein, with 18 percent more protein but seven times the sugar, stuck in my craw. But consumers have an obligation, too. At the end of the day, someone has to buy it. If we all buy what’s bad for us and balk at what’s better, it’s tough for even well-intentioned manufacturers to change. And so I’ll confine my wish list to two: Use sourcing as a selling point. This is beginning to happen, as more companies ask farmers to reduce antibiotic use, let chickens out of cages and eliminate gestation crates, so they can give concerned consumers a way to support those practices. Unilever is one of many companies going further, looking to source from farmers who comply with a more rigorous set of standards; it hasn’t been easy, and it won’t be easy for other companies. If there’s a best-practices standard (see above), though, and companies aren’t left to develop their own, perhaps it’ll get easier. Consumers can’t vote with their wallets unless there are better choices to be had. Label everything. The only way consumers can vote for those better choices is if they know what goes into products. How was the broccoli grown? How was the pig treated? The Grocery Manufacturers Association recently announced an initiative that would put QR codes with hundreds of product attributes on tens of thousands of products, and I’m cautiously optimistic. I also hope the QR solution will put the ongoing debate about GMO labeling — something I’ve long supported — to bed. Knowing that something is genetically modified isn’t particularly helpful unless you know how it’s genetically modified. Disease-resistant or herbicide-tolerant? Boilerplate language on the box can’t get into such detail, but information accessed via QR Codes can. And codes can be made accessible by putting scanners in stores.
