In 2014, I predicted “Desert Greening the Next Big Thing”,[1] would be led by green investors. I’m still waiting for this shift from humanity’s single minded focus on traditional agricultural crops (glycophytes) relying on the planet’s three percent of fresh water. Why so little shift to more sustainable, nutrient-richer, salt loving (halophyte) plant foods, such as quinoa? Because vested interests in the vast incumbent global agro-chemical industrial complex are as powerful and persistent as those in the worldwide fossilized sectors. Corporations like Cargill and ConAgra dominate, along with agro-chemical giants Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer, BASF, and DowDupont, selling fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides, fungicides and genetically-modified seeds, as well as those selling farm machinery, Deere, Caterpillar, Yamaha and their thousands of dealers around the world.
In 2014, I predicted “Desert Greening the Next Big Thing”,[1] would be led by green investors. I’m still waiting for this shift from humanity’s single minded focus on traditional agricultural crops (glycophytes) relying on the planet’s three percent of fresh water. Why so little shift to more sustainable, nutrient-richer, salt loving (halophyte) plant foods, such as quinoa? Because vested interests in the vast incumbent global agro-chemical industrial complex are as powerful and persistent as those in the worldwide fossilized sectors. Corporations like Cargill and ConAgra dominate, along with agro-chemical giants Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer, BASF, and DowDupont, selling fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides, fungicides and genetically-modified seeds, as well as those selling farm machinery, Deere, Caterpillar, Yamaha and their thousands of dealers around the world.
Industrial agriculture’s global scale requires monoculture of a small group of food crops as tradable commodities: corn, wheat, rice, soybeans, along with cotton and others for fiber, fuel and animal feed. These narrow monocultures risk susceptibility to blight and they deplete soils while producing high-calorie, low-nutrient diets — exacerbating Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and obesity, as described by endocrinologist Robert H. Lustig in “The Hacking of The American Mind” (2017). This global agro-chemical industrial complex is reinforced by the vast marketing, branding and advertising sector which influences content of media and consumer choices. Later this article describes today’s rising food activism: the organic, vegetarian, vegan choices, alternative vertical urban crops, fresh local growers and farmers’ markets.
Read more at Green Money Journal
Image: This is Hazel Henderson. (Credit: Green Money Journal)
