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The Seven Myths
of
Industrial Agriculture

At the beginning of the 21st Century, we have been led to believe that technology can solve all our ills and challenges and if we just sit back and let the smart people run things, life will be good. Nowhere does this myth manifest itself more completely and more dangerously than in the food we eat and the way that food gets to our table.

We in the industrialized world are captive to a few large industrial agriculture corporations. Don't believe it? The next time you sit down to a meal, ask yourself: "Which items on my dinner table were produced within 25 miles of my home?" And the answer will be NOT ONE. Everything your family is eating came from hundreds or thousands of miles away, often from another country -- carried by truck, train, boat, or airplanes all of which burn petroleum -- grown on big industrial farms that use huge machines, all of which burn petroleum -- and fed with petroleum-based fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides, all of which are serious poisons.

We are, in fact, victims of the seven myths of industrial agriculture. Here is a very brief discussion of these seven myths. I recommend you go to this website:

http://www.keepmainefree.org/myth1.html

On that site you'll find a lengthy discussion of Myth 1 and links to equally-detailed discussions of the other six myths.

Here are the Seven Myths of Industrial Agriculture:

THE MYTH:
Industrial food is safe, healthy, and nutritious.

THE TRUTH:
Industrial agriculture contaminates our vegetables and fruits with pesticides, slips dangerous bacteria into our lettuce, and puts genetically engineered growth hormones into our milk. It is not surprising that cancer, food-borne illnesses, and obesity are at an all-time high.

THE MYTH:
Industrial food is cheap.

THE TRUTH:
If you added the real cost of industrial food - its health, environmental, and social costs - to the current supermarket price, not even our wealthiest citizens could afford to buy it.

THE MYTH:
Industrial agriculture is efficient.

THE TRUTH:
Small farms produce more agricultural output per unit area than large farms. Moreover, larger, less diverse farms require far more mechanical and chemical inputs. These ever increasing inputs are devastating to the environment and make these farms far less efficient than smaller, more sustainable farms.

THE MYTH:
Biotechnology will solve the problems of industrial agriculture.

THE TRUTH:
New biotech crops will not solve industrial agriculture's problems, but will compound them and consolidate control of the world's food supply in the hands of a few large corporations. Biotechnology will destroy biodiversity and food security, and drive self-sufficient farmers off their land.

THE MYTH:
Industrial agriculture benefits the environment and wildlife.

THE TRUTH:
Industrial agriculture is the largest single threat to the earth's biodiversity. Fence-row-to-fence-row plowing, planting, and harvesting techniques decimate wildlife habitats, while massive chemical use poisons the soil and water, and kills off countless plant and animal communities.

THE MYTH:
Industrial agriculture will feed the world.

THE TRUTH:
World hunger is not created by lack of food but by poverty and landlessness, which deny people access to food. Industrial agriculture actually increases hunger by raising the cost of farming, by forcing tens of millions of farmers off the land, and by growing primarily high-profit export and luxury crops.

THE MYTH:
Industrial food offers more choices.

THE TRUTH:
What the consumer actually gets in the supermarket is an illusion of choice. Food labeling does not tell us what pesticides are on our food or what products have been genetically engineered. Most importantly, the myth of choice masks the tragic loss of tens of thousands of crop varieties caused by industrial agriculture.

Schlatter Family Site

The Seven Myths of Industrial Agriculture

Here are the Seven Myths of Industrial Agriculture:

Further reading:

The Seven Myths
of
Industrial Agriculture