byndoo blog

Fostering Goodbyns =)

I’m writing this blog to bring you up-to-date, but also to share some of my own experiences with the Goodbyn lunchbox. Yes, we do have two in our home now…they aren’t the final product but they are eliminating our need for baggies –awesome!!!

We know that everyone is anticipating the arrival of the Goodbyns… Our team (Cascade Engineering, Emerald City Graphics, Rob, Miguel, Soni and myself…) is working as hard as possible to bring the best product we can to market and we really appreciate your patience and enthusiasm.

The night that I brought the babies (Goodbyns) home the girls were super thrilled. They have been waiting for a year-and-a-half to get these things. Last fall I wouldn’t let them get new lunchboxes, saying, “The Goodbyn is coming!!!” You can imagine how pleased they were when the two arrived via Fed Ex.

I wanted to share some photos from our first shopping where we were specifically thinking about putting food in the Goodbyn. I’ll provide captions to explain what’s going on and share insights that I had and that I believe most people will have when they experience the shift of going from baggies to Goodbyn!

I love this image. "Can we take watermelon in our Goodbyn?!" Yes! 

How about cucumber? Sure. As we walked around the produce section the girls were really excited thinking about the new items that we'd be able to pack in their lunches. 

Previously we had been buying small, individual sized yogurt containers. When we got to the section the girls asked if they could get their usual, Yoplait Key Lime... The answer was no. I told them about the extra packaging waste, extra cost and how, now that they have a Goodbyn, we can make our own flavors of yogurt. We can add honey, blueberries, strawberries... They quickly got it and chose a large container of vanilla. Of course, because they are so close to this project they are already aware of the benefits of the Goodbyn but I noticed how much they were learning while deciding what choices were the right ones...

I swear I didn't put her up to this, just took the picture. Like I said, the girls have been living this idea for a while now. They get it. Your kids will too. I think it's great. 

When we got to the cheese section we talked about how we don't really need to buy cheese-sticks anymore. The weird thing is that most of the time the cheese-sticks came home unwrapped, warm and gross anyways. So I suggested maybe we should buy a larger, single package of cheese that we could cut up and send with crackers or on a sandwich too. And maybe, it'll get eaten from now on instead of ending up in the trash?! 

"Mom, can we take hot dogs in our lunch???" Hmm, probably not the smartest food choice, but what the heck, why not once, for the inaugural lunch?

This shopping experience was really fun. The girls were very much engaged in making the choices would be the smartest and most environmental. They were walking around looking at things we would previously buy and saying, "oooh, too much packaging..." and I would ask them what our other options could be. They totally get it and were proud to be a part of the good-decision-making process. 

I have to say that we did buy drink boxes. The bottle is still being finessed over the next week so we don't yet have one for the girls' Goodbyns. We designed the Goodbyn with the busy consumer in mind. While it has a drink bottle, we realized that sometimes you just might not want to use the drink bottle...who knows, but the section for the drink bottle also fits most standard drink boxes. We went with Juicy Juice this week. Hopefully one of the last times I'll have to buy these...

Another post coming on the decorating process...

-Erin

The Certification Circus

We haven't written too much about the business lately, but I thought I'd clue you in to an issue that's affecting a lot of small business owners that create, manufacture, or even resell items that will be handled by children. 

In 2008, Congress passed an extremely broad bill entitled the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA), under the direction of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. This bill was written hurriedly in response to scares directly related to toy manufacturing and lead content in 2007 (many imported from China). It requires all materials being used to make children's products be tested by their end creator for lead content in both materials and paint, as well as phthalates (substances added to plastics to increase their flexibility, transparency, durability, and longevity). Sounds logical, right? 

We know that regulation is necessary, but there's a few giant, hidden, unresolved issues here:

1) All certifications must be done by a third-party lab accredited by the CPSC. These labs use specific testing methods approved by our government, including gas chromatography, that requires the destruction and pulverization of said materials in order to be tested. This means you will not get your product back (and you'll need to eat the costs).

2) Because of it's sweeping conformity requirements that all materials be tested, it applies to not only people like us, but also to people making handmade things in their home. A person crafting mobiles for children's cribs, for example, needs to get every ribbon, string, metal or fabric swatch tested by these labs... not to mention those materials will be destroyed.

3) The cost of these third-party labs vary, however, it can easily run into the thousands of dollars. These costs are simply prohibitive for anyone making handmade items. Remember, the law also applies to resale, which means that (technically) the Goodwill, Salvation Army, and resale clothing stores are also required to comply.

4) The fines are massive. Up to $100,000 per incident and/or jail time.

5) The financial implications for mom-and-pop operations is absurd, but imagine what the larger manufacturers will end up doing with all of the existing inventory on their shelves if the materials used don't comply with the law? I would venture to say, in the end, most of this will end up in the landfill. 

6) There are options for testing that cost much less money, one of which is XRF (X-Ray Flourescence). It's essentially a tiny X-ray gun that measures the chemical and mineral content. It does not test for phthalates, unfortunately, but does test for lead and gets most business owners moving in the right direction—for a lot less money ($5 per substrate), and does not destroy the product. You get it back, to keep it in a safe place with your test results in case anyone comes to question your conformity.

7) A lot of people are asking the same question: why aren't the makers of the original materials (i.e. the ribbon maker, the fabric manufacturer, the plastic pellet factory) required to do this up-front? There's no clear answer here, but the result is a reverse funnel, wherein making the crafters, manufacturers and retailers absorb the entire cost of testing. The case could be made that the people at the end of the chain alter these materials, and therefore are responsible for the make-up of their products, but I would also argue that much of the legwork could be done at the top of the chain. If you look at it like a funnel, all of us are required to test the same materials thousands of times, whereas the material manufacturers could do it once.

8) The really sad part of all of this is two-fold: first, there are currently no regulators, besides rogue organizations going into stores and publicly identifying "bad" products. In terms of the CPSIA laws, no one is enforcing them. Secondly, many of the third-party labs accredited by the CPSC are, guess where... China! Isn't it our problem to solve, and to regulate?

Byndoo's lucky. We are on the initial cusp of launching a product as these laws have begun to be enforced. We are also lucky to have the foresight to be making a simple product made out of one material, #5 polypropylene. We did it for reasons of easy, responsible disposal at the end of the lunchbox's life. As long as the company is aware of it's materials' chemical and elemental properties, as we are, it makes the process much easier and less expensive in the long haul.

We've had our materials tested with a local XRF facility ($25 total!), and are pleased with the results (we'll publish on our new website once it's live). We will still need to subject to destructive testing for phthalates, which will have to be done after the first products come off the assembly line in Michigan, but we should know ahead of time from the plastic specifications that there will be no phthalates present. 

We're thankful that we've chosen to produce domestically... I can't imagine having to navigate all of these issues with an overseas manufacturing firm, much less finding the materials that we have chosen to use and validate.

There's surely more to come. Specific laws are being slowly rolled into the larger CPSIA, at different times over the next three years. Our hope is that Congress recognizes these smaller shops, and decides to enforce (and regulate) from the top-down, instead of making all of us absorb the costs of useless, duplicitous testing.

additional reading:

Essco, our local XRF guys

Green Mama via The Little Green People Show

Frugal Hacks

Independent Blog on CPSIA / XRF

The Law

Annie Leonard's "The Story of Stuff"

In a 20-minute video, “The Story of Stuff,” Annie Leonard gives an animated talk exposing the true lifecycle of American consumerism from production to consumption and the pollutants and social costs that come along with it. She highlights the linearity of the consumption pattern: from extraction, production, consumption to disposal and demonstrates that it cannot go on forever with informative statistics and clever diagrams. The website provides a wealth of information on how to get involved and ‘green your routine.’ Yesterday,  The New York Times ran a cover story on “The Story of Stuff” and how it is being used by teachers across the United States to teach about climate change because there isn’t information in our text books. They are currently accepting contributions of any level to put together more resources for teachers. So check it out and tell a friend!

Children’s Health: A Mother’s Day Cause for Celebration!

American mom’s were able to celebrate this Mother’s Day with a little relief, as it seems the threat of swine flu that temporarily took 172,000 children out of school has passed. With all these bombastic news titles, we thought mom’s and families might appreciate some news to celebrate, specifically, with regard to children’s health. Among a laundry list of accomplishments on part of Obama in his first 100 days were a few paramount steps for children’s health. The current list includes an extension and expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (S-CHIP), increase in federal tobacco tax, movements towards safer food system, and a re-expansion of the 2010 budget for family planning. Collectively, these movements symbolize a reprioritization of the U.S. Government toward our collective future and a movement away from the bombastic, egocentric legislation from the days of yore (hopefully). So, take a moment to sit back and celebrate the small victories for children’s health!

We kicked off the year with a great leap for children’s health with the passing of the expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (S-Chip).  Originally created in 1997 to reduce the population of uninsured American children by providing subsidized insurance to children of the working poor. As of January 2009, this program will continue to cover these children and be expanded to cover another four million uninsured children. This round’s passing also eliminated a highly debated five-year waiting period imposed on immigrant children. This bill has been sitting on Capitol Hill for over two years… GOBAMA!

Ironically (and quite intelligently), we are paying for the extension and expansion of the S-CHIP with an increase in taxes on cigarettes. This Federal tobacco tax increase is projected to generate $31. 2 billion over the next four years.  And just maybe, if we are really lucky, this tax will also discourage the purchasing of cigarettes by minors, and decrease children’s exposure to second hand smoke via decrease in use on part of their parents and relatives.

When it comes to healthier and safer foodways for kids, we are coming at it from two angles. The first being a general revamping of FDA and USDA food regulation bodies, which will hopefully have a tighter grasp on where, how, and by what safety measures our food is being produced. And second being the proposal of several bills to re-evaluate our nutritional standards that haven’t been reviewed since the 1960’s.  These steps will not only decrease the chances of possible exposure to contaminated food, which can be especially dangerous for children, but will also bring about health promoting nutritional guidelines for schools to combat obesity.

As for expansion of family planning funding, the proposed budget for 2010 ends funding of ineffective abstinence-only programs, while also providing $178 million for evidence-based comprehensive sex education programs that will prevent teen pregnancy. Imagine that? Research based sex education. Who would have thunk it?

In honor of Mother’s Day, it’s nice to sit back and celebrate our victories as mothers, tax-payers, and good citizens. It’s a breath of fresh air for mom’s, families, and the general public, when we look back on the somewhat backwards politics of the past eight years. But, seeing as it is now Monday, we must get back to paying close attention to how we can enable future generations to thrive. After all, what is good for one child is good for the future of all of society. If we take this proverb a little further, the health dangers facing children globally, such as war, tuberculosis, malaria, access to clean food and water must not be forgotten. Disparities in health and health-care become even more apparent when threats of pandemics arise —as we just experienced in the case of Swine Flu. And in this global age, for better or for worse, one nation’s vulnerability is a vulnerability (and cause for concern) to us all.  

Unpacking the Pre-Packed Lunch Food

In our previous entry Americans and Their Food, we discussed the possibility of having the price of food reflect its health, environmental, and social impact. One obvious way to do this would be through taxation. We tax cigarettes and alcohol; why can’t we tax junk food? According to a New York Times story, we aren’t too far off from this pipe dream becoming reality. In this story, Zeke Emanuel (Rahm Emanuel’s older brother), who is joining the Obama team under the title Special Advisor for Health Policy, “has expressed interest in the idea of taxing junk food or banning it from schools to combat obesity.” Although this seems like a no-brainer, politically speaking it’s a difficult plight to take on (especially when we hear about food giants taking in profits of $120 billion annually). With such profits these companies may have a few more bargaining chips than the “Special Advisor for Health Policy.”

The guidelines for such taxation could follow something akin to the “Rule of 1900.” This rule proposes that anything containing something we would not recognize as food in the year 1900 should not be eaten. Therefore, processed foods containing ingredients listed as “TBHQ” would be subject to taxation. To demonstrate this rule, we have decided to unpack the pre-packaged lunch, which is by far the greatest violation of  the Rule of 1900. To illustrate just how far this product is from the rule of 1900, we have listed some of the ingredients below and done our best to describe what they actually are. In general, food additives are either completely man-made through a combination of once-natural chemical extractions, or extractions and altered byproducts of edible oils or plant matter.

Just reading the ingredients doesn’t really help you if you haven’t taken a course (or twelve) in chemistry, so we’ve asked a chemist to help us out with a few of the highlighted winners… here are descriptions of some of the more unidentifiable ingredients:

High Fructose Corn Syrup: Corn syrup that has undergone enzymatic processing to increase its fructose content, and then it is mixed with more pure corn syrup (100% glucose). So basically, high fructose corn syrup is refined corn sugar with corn sugar extract sauce.

Pear Juice Concentrate: Aside from not being the most ideal way to get your vitamins, all concentrated juice is derived from an energy intensive process. Juice is commonly concentrated with a piece of equipment known as a Thermally Accelerated Short-Time Evaporator, or TASTE for short. TASTE uses steam to heat the juice under vacuum and force water to be evaporated. Concentrated juice is discharged to a vacuum flash cooler. The pulp is separated from the juice by ultra-filtration and pasteurized. The clarified juice containing the ‘flavorings’ is concentrated by reverse osmosis and the concentrate and the pulp are recombined to produce the appropriate juice concentration. It's then stored in refrigerated stainless steel bulk tanks until is ready to be packaged or reconstituted. That’s a lot of heating, cooling, transporting and storing for something that doesn’t really taste anything like it did originally, or provide even close to the same amount of nutrients it may have at one time contained.

Calcium Disodium EDTA: Man-made salt product. ZING!

Modified Cornstarch: Cornstarch is, by nature, starchy and sticky. But when you extract the starch from corn and use it as a food ingredient, it quickly loses that stickiness and can actually cause bakery products to become stale. So they have to chemically modify it to keep things "together".

Sodium Lactate: Produced by chemically modifying (neutralizing) lactic acid (which is produced by fermentation from a sugar source). Sodium lactate is commonly used in meat and poultry products to extend shelf life and increase food safety because it is effective at inhibiting most spoilage and development of pathogenic bacteria.

Sodium Phosphate: Added to foods as an emulsifier to prevent oil separation. Or, in layman’s terms: keeps your food from becoming a gloopy mess-o-funk.

Potassium Lactate: Commonly used in meat to extend shelf life and increase food safety due to its potent antimicrobial action that inhibits spoilage and pathogenic bacteria. This stuff won’t break down in nature so what do you think happens when you put it in your body? Why bother with the refrigerator?

Sodium Acetate: May be added to foods as a seasoning, and to alcoholic beverages to decrease the risk of a hangover.

Sodium Erythorbate (made from sugar): When used in processed meat such as hot dogs and beef sticks, it reduces the rate at which nitrate reduces to nitric oxide, thus retaining the pink coloring. Oink Oink!

Sodium Nitrate: Serves a dual purpose in the food industry since it both alters the color of meats and also prevents growth of Clostridium botulinum, the bacteria which causes botulism. Important, but c’mon, do we really need more salt with our modified salty sauce?

Sodium Citrate: Really, more salt? Sodium citrate is used in ice cream to keep the fat globules from sticking together. It’s apparently slightly flammable and handled with gloves, goggles, and a coat in the lab. Talk about titillating texture!

Paprika Oleoresin: A color additive that is “exempt from certification." While it may occur naturally, oleoresin is also used in tear gas.

Annatto: Very common color additive to cheese, butter, margarine, rice, smoked fish, and microwave popcorn. It is often used as a substitute for the expensive herb saffron. And guess what? It’s imported all the way from Central and South America!

Lactic Acid Esters: Produced from monoglycerides reacted with lactic acid. They improve aeration and stability of products. Two thumbs up for aeration!

Palm Oil: Saturated Fat! Saturated fat = heart attack. Many packaged cookies now boast that they contain zero grams of trans fat. However, this may not be the great news that it seems to be. In order to minimize or eliminate the use of trans fat-laden partially hydrogenated oil, some food manufacturers have replaced it with saturated fat-laden palm oil and palm kernel oil—which may not be much better for you! Numerous health authorities have warned against the use of palm oil in packaged foods which put people at risk for heart attack or stroke.

Soy Lecithin: An additive emulsifier that keeps things from separating.

TBHQ: tert-hydrobutylquinone!  You know that delicious prepackaged meat smell? Right here baby… this stuff is aromatic. And it's a phenol—often a precursor to unhealthy estrogen release.  It’s technically considered an antioxidant, but not the good kind. It keeps fats from going rancid, so you see it in a lot of foods requiring a long shelf life. You can also find it in varnish! In high doses, it has some negative health effects on lab animals, such as precursors to stomach tumors and damage to DNA. A number of studies have shown that prolonged exposure to TBHQ may induce carcinogenity.

Sodium Nitrite:  Same as above, keeping meat lookin’ fresh. A super preservative, preventing the loss of electrons and subsequent degeneration involved in aging meat.

Sodium Phosphate(s): Just another preservative. Notice how much sodium is being metabolized?

BLUE 1: Any blue or green food on the U.S. market gets its coloring from certifiable colors FD&C Blue No. 1 (Brilliant Blue), Blue No. 2 (Indigotine), or Green No. 3 (Fast Green). Blue No. 1 and Green No. 3 are petroleum-derived triphenylmethanes.

Hydrogenated Palm Kernel Oil: Trans Fat!!!  The heating process (hydrogenation) brings about isomers (tasty fats) of this molecule. The big problem with Trans Fats is that they have a much higher melting point than regular unsaturated fats. Structurally speaking, they are straight molecules, which have a higher propensity to stack on top of each other oh-so-nicely  IN YOUR ARTERIES. But to humans it's oh-so-delicious. F.Y.I., the WHO(World Health ORG), U.S., and Europe all have conducted research indicating that palm oil promote heart diseases.

Milk Protein Concentrate (MPC): MPC is not an approved food ingredient because there is not enough research for it to be classified “generally regarded as safe.” The FDA does minimal monitoring of MPC as it enters the U.S. because MPC is imported from around the world (read: countries where food regulations are iffy). Big food processing companies save money by buying the less expensive MPC and using it instead of real milk. God forbid they use real milk and would be able to call their product “cheese” instead of “American cheese product.”

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Aside from the unbelievable number of hands, cooled storage facilities, and processing this lunch item needs to pass through in order to get it to its edible form, it only costs $2.50, and is awful for children. The sodium content alone consumes 75% of the recommended intake per day (based on a 2000-calorie diet). Some days, it may be the only option, but its cost should better reflect it’s ecological and health impact. Let’s be honest: it’s cheaper to buy these ingredients and pack a lunch than it is to buy it pre-made.

What we're really buying here is convenience. But convenience at what cost, especially for kids? It seems if we all take a deep breath, and examine more closely what we consider food, especially for our kids, we may ponder to live closer to the Rule of 1900. It would save us money, drastically reduce the expenditure of fuels, carbon and waste—and certainly make us all appreciate the food with which we've chosen to sustain our bodies.

Farm fresh? Sure, but what about Seaport Fresh?

The fight for sustainable and healthier foodways is happening in our very own backyard or, to be more specific, the Fishman’s Terminal near the Ballard Bridge on the Westside of Seattle.

Pete Knutson, a local fisherman with a doctorate who teaches Anthropology at Seattle Central Community College has been fighting to keep developers out of the Fisherman’s Port for years. This time around the Port commission is threatening to impose a $25 daily tax (read: $750 a month) on businesses like Knutson’s Loki Fish for selling fish directly out of the terminal, and has threatened to disrupt business by removing valuable storage space for port fisherman, under the guise that the buildings aren’t fire-safe.

The Port and its commissioners should support local industry and culture instead of posing a threat. These fishermen, already competing with farmed salmon (a much less sustainable, but cheaper source of salmon), are being faced with potential fees and sanctions that discourage and disrupt the healthy flow of businesses. These fees not only discourage the growth of sustainable food industry as whole, but this slow shifting of priorities away from the fisherman threatens a precious livelihood to which Seattle owes much of its charm and appeal. Suspicions about the Port slowly being turned over to developers may seem a little far-fetched, but as the fisherman are the only stakeholders left in the Port who are preventing further development, it can easily be seen why inching them out slowly over time through lack of support could look a little—dare I say—fishy.

Unfortunately the effects have been showing for years. Fourteen years ago, the state Department of Fish and Wildlife issued 1,132 salmon gill-net licenses for Puget Sound. The number dropped to 204 in 2004. The Port is one of the last remaining homes in the state for these fishermen. Supporting local businesses as well as sustainable agriculture should be a priority for all major cities. It is apparent that new policies are needed to simultaneously promote environmental health, economic profitability, and social and economic equity—not discourage it. This change occurs when we get involved in our local politics. 

I must admit, having tasted the superior quality of the salmon from Knutson Family-owned company Loki Fish, I am pretty biased.  But I’ll let you be the judge of the issue:

Click here for an interview with Pete Knutson.

For information published in Seattle Times, Seattle P-I, and other local Seattle Papers go to the scrapbook at Loki Fish website click here. 

It’s simply delicious, sustainably caught salmon from a family-owned business that makes you feel good, is good for you, and is good for the earth…sound familiar?

Americans and Their Food

Recent study exposes complexity of America’s relationship with food.

Researchers found that obesity rates were 5 percent higher among the ninth graders whose schools were within one-tenth of a mile of fast-food restaurants— even after accounting for income, education, and race—compared with students attending schools farther away from fast-food stores. This research demonstrates the real challenges of developing healthy foodways. While becoming more conscious of where, how, and with what consequences our food is produced—we must also remain cognizant of the factors that really come into play: marketing, convenience, and the undeniable price factor.

A change in American food culture would require pretty drastic efforts. However, a restructuring of our overall healthcare system, as proposed by Obama, seems to be a huge step in the right direction. As Obama puts it, it’s not just about health insurance or improvements to medical care, it’s about supporting preventative health measures across the board. Among these measures should be the increased availability of affordable, sustainable and healthy foods.

America’s notorious misconceptions about food are wrought with fears and frenzies that take us further and further away from forming a healthy relationship with food. Our views have, been shaped by scientific theories and political circumstances, with which we have also lost touch. A New York Times article called “unhappy meals” by Michael Pollan provides a concise historical account of how we got here, and summarizes the key to healthy eating with the following opening: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” But if it were really that simple, what’s the problem?

Blaming advertising firms is pretty easy. A recent study published in The Journal of Law and Economics found that childhood obesity rates could be reduced by as much as 18% with the banning of fast food TV ads. Such steps have been taken by Sweden, Norway and Finland, who have banned commercial sponsorship of children’s programs.  While the authors of the study originally acknowledged that such a ban in the U.S. is unlikely in 2008, our new administration’s penchant for change may warm more quickly to these concepts.

Foodways are established through culturally embraced value systems. Our classic American value system is ‘value,’ or the idea that we are getting a good bargain. Often, people blame individuals for their poor choices in food purchases.  Once I overheard someone say: “A pound of bananas is cheaper than a value meal; why are ‘these people’ so fat?’” This statement is completely over-simplifying the situation.  In fact, a recent University of Washington study found that calorie for calorie, junk foods not only cost less than fruits and vegetables, but also were much less likely to rise as a result of inflation. Further, the disparity in obesity rates by zip code has been found to exceed those associated with income or race/ethnicity. It’s not just about disposable income and ‘culture’… sometimes it comes down to land zoning.

So what does eating right really look like and how do we get there? Most research suggests that generally eating less and eating more vegetables is good for both our health and the environment. It’s not unusual for our government to get involved in pricing of foods through subsidies, programs and other means. Why can’t we devise some way to do this for the health benefit of our country? Not only out of sheer altruism, but also for savings in healthcare costs and perhaps an improvement of our living standards. Why can’t at least some food prices reflect the true “cost of food”; what is the ecological, social and health cost of our foods? (We will provide an example of the true cost of a pre-packaged kid’s lunch in our next blog entry). The answer is pretty hard, because there isn’t much money to be made in the truth, and society’s preference for what’s currently available gets strengthened with every fried chicken-nug we consume. As Pollan points out, “you should probably avoid food products that make health claims…health claims on a food product are a good indicator that it’s not really food, and food is what you want to eat.” Still some find all the information to be overwhelming and resign to largely ignore it.

Consumer awareness does, of course, come into play. Unfortunately, current trends don’t make me feel all warm and fuzzy. For example, a program called Nuval is coming to market soon, where foods are assigned a number based on their nutritional value calculated by the sum of it’s nutritional benefits (foods containing low sodium, high fiber, and high vitamin content get rated higher than potato chips). However, the system seems a bit arbitrary and is not even close to the kind of transparency we really need to improve our populations’ health. For example, typing in two different brands of organic milk gives you completely different values with no explanation. Strangely, the larger company has a greater value. I have been called a conspiracy theorist before, but this is just too obvious.

We need to demand more transparency in farming practices, safety regulations, and availability of affordable healthy foods. Transparency in farming practices would expose the use of GMO’s, and unsustainable farming tactics, perhaps allowing more consumer awareness—and hopefully promote more responsible food production practices, moving all of us toward healthier foodways.

What will the food revolution look like? I’ll tell you one thing…it probably won’t be televised. So, get out to your local farmer’s market, sign up for your CSA’s, spend a little more on a little less and embrace eating the change you wish to see in the world.

 

 

 

Role of Government in Our Foodways

Thinking twice about slathering that peanut butter on your child’s sandwich these days?

Last week, President Obama expressed deep concern for the safety of our food system. During his weekly online video address he sites recent increases in cases of contamination as a result of a financially crippled, outdated, understaffed, and over-expansive Food and Drug Administration (FDA). While all of this may be true, contamination is only the tip of the iceberg when we consider the true “safety” of our foodways. While 5,000 people dying of food contamination yearly should not be ignored, the 652,091 people who die of heart disease and are crippled by its predecessor obesity (which has also been linked to five of our nations top killers), may be a cause to consider the other dangerous implications of our nation’s foodways. Regardless of the reasoning, a restructuring of the FDA, which seeks to prioritize consumer interest is long overdue.

Safe is one thing, but healthy and sustainable is a whole other question. Unfortunately, most government policy and planning surrounding management of our foodways have been reactionary policy and not the result thoughtful planning.

Over the last 100 years, the American population and the complexity of our food production have increased exponentially. It is interesting to note the danger of possible contamination was one of the reasons for founding the FDA. In 1906, President Theodore Roosevelt formed the initial Food and Drug Act prohibiting the sale of food that had been “adultered” and appointed the FDA to create proper guidelines and standards.  At this time, this term referred to the addition of fillers of reduced “quality or strength” or coloring which concealed “damage or inferiority,” or “filthy decomposed, or putrid” substances. That founding act still stands today, but the FDA now watches over $17 billion worth of domestic food and $49 billion worth of imported food each year—everything we eat except for meat, poultry, and some egg product—which is regulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Over time, the organizations priorities have slowly shifted away from safe and healthy food as they have taken on new responsibilities. These new responsibilities expand as far as blood transfusions to the purity of mascara. The vastness of their jurisdiction (and recent contaminations) has lead many to demand restructuring of the organization.

Fortunately, Obama is one step ahead of the game with his new budget proposal and nomination of former New York City Health Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, MD, as FDA commissioner. In addition to leading the country towards more sustainable food sourcing by supporting the development of an organic garden at the White House, Obama has earmarked $1 billion for the FDA’s food budget. This would double what the agency received two years ago, which will go directly to improving the safety of our food system.

From an environmental and health standpoint, this is a big step in the right direction. As a part of a larger food trend of conscious consumption, the move to prioritize food safety speaks to a growing demand for transparency of our foodways. This trend is best exemplified in a new campaign by McDonald’s to let their customers “See what they’re made of.” With more transparency comes better—and perhaps sustainable—practices.

United States agricultural industry is responsible for 8% of the 20% total, of global agricultural emissions. Rising consumer awareness about this issue is apparent in the “eat local” and organic food movements, but are far from being widely embraced. Additionally, standards for what actually qualifies as “local” and “organic” are questionable. Therefore, if and when this becomes an issue that the FDA wishes to oversee, they have a lot of work cut out for themselves.  For now, campaigns like Cool Foods, who provide information about how our food choices can affect global warming are joining the fight to raise consumer awareness. 

To conclude, a refocusing or possible restructuring of the FDA is long overdue and hopefully in our midst. While the safety of our foodways should be a primary focus of our government’s role in food production, the promotion of healthier more sustainable foodways should not be restricted to the recommendations of the Center for Disease Control. Food—and healthy foodways—should be a part of the American Healthcare system’s overhaul. Because, as Obama himself was quoted saying, “healthcare is not just health insurance.”

Monocropping: The Perfect Food?

Believe it or not our shared desire for the best looking, flawless fruit has devastating effects on the development of frankenfoods. 

With the innumerable blessings of the Industrial Revolution, also came the industrialization of agriculture and the development of our nation’s current foodways. Foodways, as discussed in the previous blog, is a term used to describe the cultural, social and economic practices relating to the production and consumption of food. Due to the expanding of the world economy, foodways have become internationalized: spreading our nation’s agricultural practices around the world. Among these practices is the concept of monocropping, which is the practice of planting the same crop year after year. In more sustainable agricultural practices, farmers rotate fields to give soil time to rest, but this practice has less yield. While monocropping is efficient, it has few other redeeming benefits, none of which seem to outweigh its huge environmental and social costs.

The saving grace of monocropping is its efficiency. But of what, exactly? By growing a single crop, farms are able to invest in equipment that can streamline the processes of seeding and harvesting. Unfortunately, and ironically, monocropping is actually chemical—and energy —intensive, and is an all-around outdated way of going about large-scale agriculture. Planting the same crop on a single plot of land year after year causes mineral depletion in the soil— necessitating fertilizers—and can quickly become a liability to farmers and industries in cases of a sudden drop in demand or spread of pesticide/herbicide resistant maladies. Eventually, land can become so depleted that it is simply cheaper to abandon.

As an assessment of risk, the practice of monocropping lacks any bit of sense. Anytime an entire region is dependent on a single crop for food or income, that population puts itself in an incredibly vulnerable situation. Monocropping is by its very definition unsustainable. Did we learn nothing from the great famine?

In Americas foodways a few crops that are infamously monocropped: corn, bananas, and soybeans. While each of these exemplifies a unique problem with monocropping, they all share the environmental problems of mineral depletion, requiring expensive fertilization and use of harmful pesticides/herbicides to prevent widespread crop failure.  Corn, as mentioned in the previous blog, is so pervasive in our foodways and potential energy sources that a crop failure or contamination could be economically devastating and politically destabilizing.

The banana industry, however, is a unique case. Unlike corn, bananas are not grown domestically, and remain the most consumed fresh fruit by the American populous, far surpassing apple consumption for the past twenty years. Therefore, bananas are double-trouble when it comes to the environment, because they are both imported (traveling vast distances) and their agricultural practices cause excessive environmental damage. 

Bananas have been to hell and back, historically speaking. Their long and complex history of cultivation has inspired a wealth of socio-political literature, too intricate for the purposes of this exploration.  However, one noteworthy element when we consider the difficulties with monocropping is the banana’s characteristic over-perfection.  The banana industry and 15,000 years of human cultivation has perfected its look, taste, and texture while eradicating its ability to fight disease.  The once coined “world’s perfect food” has become too perfect.  The genetic diversity that naturally protects a crop from disease no longer occurs in the current banana gene pool. This makes bananas highly susceptible to crop failure that can wipe out entire industries, and has.

In the 1960’s, a banana apocalypse occurred in which Gros Michel banana variety (also called Big Mike) was destroyed by a fungus called the Panama disease. Millions of dollars were spent in infrastructure changes, rainforest destruction, and mechanical updates to accommodate a new variety dubbed Cavendish. This variety is a smaller and less-sweet variety, but as a monospecies still faces the same dilemma. In fact, a new strain of fungus called the “Panama disease Race 4” has already wiped out plantations in Indonesia, Malaysia, Australia, Taiwan and is expected to wipe out the rest of the remaining crops around the world—erasing the banana as we’ve come to know it (or at least make them really expensive).

To prevent the spread of these potential apocalyptic diseases, bananas require a battery of harsh pesticides/ herbicides, which have negative human and environmental impact. While touring a banana plantation in Nicaragua in 2006 with a class on Central American Health Care, we were introduced to a dozen women who had suffered miscarriages and gave birth to children with physical and mental developmental issues, which correlated to exposure of these pesticides. Many large banana firms and other organizations have taken action to minimize risks of exposure, but the threat is still sprayed on acres and acres of land every day.

There is no simple solution in sight. The debate has stirred up even more controversy about “safe” food practices. Scientists have proposed everything from conventional hybridization to genetic modification. Current public opinion seems unlikely to support the modification of the banana—despite its potential to completely eliminate the need for harsh herbicides and pesticides.

Genetic modification of crops has long been considered a solution to the problems with monocropping. Unbeknownst to many American consumers, most pre-packaged foods and large percentages of produce in the U.S. are already genetically modified. For now, notions of “frankenfood” and the unknowns surrounding potential damage to the earth, the animals and our bodies have thus far halted the widespread development of genetically modified foods, but not completely.

In 2007 the worldwide soybean industry, for example, was estimated to be 58.6% genetically modified. And this is where it gets really complicated. For example, whereas the soy you are eating may eventually be labeled as genetically modified in the future, you can’t really tell if genetically modified materials have somehow entered foodways via stock-feed or by other means. This brings up the issue of government regulation in an already powerless Food and Drug Administration (an issue we will discuss in the following blog).

It is said efficiency is doing things right, while effectiveness is doing the right thing. Unfortunately, there are no clear solutions to these problems, but consciousness is a start. While many have committed themselves to eating more locally and supporting sustainable foodways, we must take note of the economic privileges that have enabled us to do so. For example, spending ten more cents per organic banana at Trader Joe’s is not that big of a sacrifice for many (in fact, it’s really important that we vote with our dollars in this way). However, making the trip to Trader Joe’s is not an option for all. When we look at the larger world economy, there are entire nations who don’t have this bargaining power. Responsible consumption takes on a very literal meaning when it comes to foodways. Food is a global issue, and the lack of transparency is purposeful. It is incredibly important that we keep track of the impact of our cultural practices surrounding food for the preservation of our collective health and the earth.

An Introduction to Foodways

Eat the change you want to see in the world. 

When we hear about the excitement surrounding the green industry on NPR , we can’t help but be enthusiastic about our coming launch. Any success in this economy is worth celebrating, although real sustainability isn’t about the green (either reference). Green business is—and must be—a force of change. Across the globe, green businesses like ours are turning what seemed an “inconvenient truth” into an exciting design challenge. In our case, it’s resulted in a well-designed, functional, and fun lunchbox. Our flock is growing as we join millions in taking on the world like lean, green, innovation machines, leaving few rocks unturned and few issues un-hashed, because true sustainability takes social and environmental factors into account—not just economics. That’s why in the following series of entries we are going to discuss what should and maybe shouldn’t go IN your Munchbyn lunchbox—and why. So, you too might be in for a challenge: starting with the denial of the all-American burger. Burgers are in pretty high demand right now because they're cheap, tasty and hard to mess up, but from an environmental perspective they have been referred to as the SUV of foods.

In the following blog, we will go beyond food trends and debates of vegetarian vs. omnivore, organic vs. conventional, and the grumblings of local vs. organic to understand what the real problem with beef is. So, challenge yourself, as so many of these businesses have, to embrace the un-burger challenge.

“Foodways”, according to Wikipedia, are defined as the cultural, social, and economic practices relating to the production and consumption of food. Similar to the means by which we acquire electricity and water, our foodways aren’t without a cost, source, consequence, and are intrinsically tied to larger economic and social factors. This blog will be the first of a series of entries addressing the ecological and social implications of our nations foodways.

Imagine your standard burger. In order to get that burger, a cow is birthed, raised, fed, slaughtered, cleaned, sold, shipped, packaged, processed, resold to you the customer via restaurant or grocery store. Every stage of this process requires a bit of energy, human intervention, and resources that come from somewhere. This entry will address the problems with the beef industry, and why we might reconsider beef as a staple of the American diet (beyond the obvious health reasons and food trends).

What’s the beef with beef? It is generally understood that reducing our consumption of meat, particularly beef, is a good idea for reducing greenhouse gases and may even have potential health benefits. But how does a burger every once and a while actually impact the environment? The answer: Cow gas—specifically cow burps—are estimated to contribute anywhere from 26 to 53 gallons of methane per day to the atmosphere per cow, per day. Cows are member of a particular type of mammal called ruminants, equipped with multiple stomachs in which they digest their food.  In order to extract nutrients from the food they consume, cows eat, regurgitate and then re-swallow into four different stomachs while tiny microbes assist in the digestion process. While these microbes go along with their business of breaking down food into usable energy, they produce large amounts of methane, which in turn cause the excessive gas production. This quantity of pollution is comparable to the amount of pollution produced by a car in a day. Methane is a particularly potent greenhouse gas; some estimates suggest it has a warming effect that is 23 to 50 times greater than carbon dioxide. Several experiments have sought to solve this problem through different dietary restrictions, antibiotics and other means. One study in Argentina found that cows that eat mostly grain produce 20 to 25 percent less methane than grazing cows, and adding tannin to cow feed could lower it further.

Why cattle, and not other animals too? All livestock have become the target of environmentalists not just because of slaughtering, land requirements, waterway and ground pollution but also lack of crop diversification. Biodiversity is important to healthy foodways because in cases of drought, other weather extremes, disease, or any other problem that may result in crop failure, some plants will still thrive. This allows us to have a continuous supply of food, and prevents famine. Additionally, most evidence suggests that a diet rich in a diverse range of vegetation is good for health and well-being. Biodiversity is important when we think about cows, because they not only take away from precious land that could potentially support more biodiversity, but they also promote less biodiversity by means of their diet. Although cow’s digestive tracts are designed to be able to digest grass, they are usually fed corn. Unfortunately, cows don’t naturally eat corn and therefore have problems digesting it. They are fed corn because it is more cost effective way to raise cattle, growing to “optimal” market size faster and can be raised on less land. Corn feed is cheaper and more cost effective than buying grazing land. Because they can’t digest it, it causes a laundry list of health complications that are treated with antibiotics and other things you don’t really want pumped into your protein. Juiced up cows aside, the real problem with the cow diet is the uniformity of their foodway. What happens when the price of corn increases? The price of raising cattle will also increase, costing you more in the supermarket —or worse—farmers find something else to feed their cows for cheap. Watch this video by the Washington Post last summer about what  our cows subsist on when corn prices increase (spoiler alert: it ain’t grass). This presents a new challenge to our food safety administration. Dependency on a single crop throughout our foodways means higher risk of widespread contaminants: economic and risk of famine as well as a long list of problems(all of which will be picked apart in our next blog entry on monocropping).

With cows and other animals contributing to estimates as high as 20% of global methane emissions, we all might actually want to consider cutting back on our meat consumption. So far, there is no magic pill or garlic concoction that can reduce the gaseous exchange, but some research looks promising. How we get the entire world to switch over to a new feed is another question. In the mean time, challenge yourself, and moooooooove on to greener pastures and away from cows and corn.