Industrial Food Production
Most food in the United States is grown on an industrial agribusiness model that relies on huge ‘factory farms’ that are highly mechanized and make extensive use of artificial chemicals. Livestock farms crowd huge numbers of animals into confined spaces that cause or promote disease and poor health, not to mention being incredibly cruel to the animals.
Chocolate: The Bitter Truth
Fair Trade isn’t just about coffee. Many commodities are subject to abuse by large trading corporations and large growers. Coffee is perhaps the largest volume, but tea, chocolate, sugar, bananas, and many others are also important. Chocolate is subject not … more
Youth Food Bill of Rights
Declaration of Youth Food Bill of Rights July 30, 2011 We demand respect for mother earth, for the Food Justice and Food Sovereignty culture, and for the indigenous cultures that are working to establish their own autonomous food systems. All … more
Do campus food services contribute to sustainability and health?
Campus dining services, like other institutional food-service operations, prepare large volumes of food every day, most of it the product of the industrialized agriculture system, not grown sustainably. It is often served in ways that produce large volumes of waste, … more
Sustainability & Public Health
Let’s look at sustainability in terms of how our practices affect human health, both immediately and over the long term. Whether we call them health problems or environmental problems, though, the prescription for corrective actions is almost identical. The health lens is … more
“Their Food”
In this section, we will be looking at the so-called food being provided by industrial ag. Commercial agri-business systems are organized to grow profits. They use such unsustainable approaches as: mono-cropping factory-farming use of laboratory-created chemicals for insecticides, fertilizers, and … more
Lehigh Dining
As part of an Alliance internship, a Lehigh University student completed a report on dining services there. Lehigh Dining, operated by Sodexo, has made many improvements in the area of waste reduction, including phasing out Styrofoam and replacing it with reusable take-out … more
The Problem with Industrialized Agriculture
According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, industrial agriculture ‘views the farm as a factory with “inputs” (such as pesticides, feed, fertilizer, and fuel) and “outputs” (corn, chickens, and so forth)…’1 Many of the ‘inputs’ used to maximize production are … more
You are what you eat: Impacts of Sustainable and Industrial Agriculture on Human Health
Following is a summary of some of the key findings of a project by a Moravian College student, who looked beyond the various industry and advocacy positions to see what is really known about the health impacts of the ways … more
Is Meat Consumption Sustainable?
Raising animals for food requires enormous amounts of food and energy and contributes greatly to global warming. The production of factory-farmed animals is extremely inefficient in providing the food needs of the world’s peoples. More than 70% of our home-grown … more