Four myths the food industry wants you to believe…and why they are wrong!
Debunking four of the most damaging myths holding back the development of a truly sustainable and fair global food system
Small-scale farmers survey their harvest in Bangladesh
The current food system is not sustainable. But you wouldn’t think so if you listened to the multinationals that hold most influence over the food system.
Because the reality is that the current system is both inefficient and damaging. Agroecology has been shown to work and is actually far more efficient in the long term.
In this report, we take a close look at the received wisdom on the global food system, and tell the far more complex story of how things really are.
What are the four myths holding back a fair global food system?
An urban farmer in her community’s vegetable garden in Liberia
Myth one: “Intensive industrial agriculture is always more efficient than the alternatives”
In farming, there is a common perception that big is beautiful. To feed a fast-growing world population, we’re told that we need to squeeze more food out of less land. We need to ’modernise’ (code for intensify) agriculture to make it productive and efficient enough to feed ever more people. That means fewer, bigger, corporate farms rather than “inefficient” smaller-scale food production.
The model here is often based on large-scale US industrial agriculture. Mile upon mile of intensive monoculture, with proprietary multinational-produced chemical fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides applied to ensure ideal conditions. Modern equipment is used to save on expensive labour inputs. All of this, the argument goes, has been so successful in maximising crop yields that it has made the USA the world’s biggest food exporter.
But now this model is not just being sold to us as a way of feeding the world cheaply. It is also being promoted as the greenest, most sustainable way to do so. Buzz phrases such as ‘climate smart agriculture’ and ’sustainable intensification’ are used to argue that if only we could further increase the efficiency of industrial agriculture, this model (and the huge multinationals who profit from it) can be part of the solution to climate change and environmental degradation, as well as feeding the world’s growing population.
Combine harvesters and tractors in a wheat field (photo by Darla Hueske on Unsplash)
What's the reality about intensive farming?
Intensive farming is not efficient once you factor in the huge energy, water, and soil resources it needs to work.
Intensive industrial agriculture benefits multinationals but is harmful for people and the planet.
There is an effort to pretend that new technologies have made intensive farming sustainable.
Industrial agriculture only works with support from huge subsidies and at the expense of environmental degradation.
Local market, Marsabit, northern Kenya
Myth two: “Agroecology can’t feed the world so there is no alternative to corporate agriculture”
The dominant discourse peddled by multinationals regarding industrial agriculture largely implies that there is no alternative to the status quo. When alternatives like agroecology are discussed, they are often caricatured as being against progress.
Kip Top, agribusiness tycoon and Donald Trump’s envoy to the FAO, often displays this attitude.
He has described agroecology as “an explicit rejection of the very idea of progress – extolling ‘peasant’ farming and promoting ‘the right to subsistence’ agriculture” and as an “endless cycle of back-breaking labour and low-yield production.”
There is also a perception, strongly pushed by advocates of the status quo, that agroecology is somehow anti-science and ideologically motivated. They point at the focus on social justice underlying much of the discussion around agroecology as evidence that it is more about ideology and politics than the bread and butter of delivering higher crop yields.
Hydroponic farming in Lebanon
What's the reality about agroecology?
Agroecology isn’t a one-size-fits-all, pre-packaged solution. What it looks like will depend on the local context.
Alternative agricultural approaches have been shown to be more socially equitable than the mainstream industrial model.
Agroecology is not ‘anti-science’ or ‘anti-technology’ but instead seeks to find ways technology can be used to work with nature rather than against it.
Agroecological approaches work in practice and are often highly productive.
Local farmers in Kambia district, Sierra Leone, with their harvest of tomatoes and peppers
Myth three: “Local farmers need global markets to escape poverty”
The idea that access to global markets is the key to prosperity for food producers has become an article of faith for many governments, development consultants, and international institutions.
The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) defines agricultural transformation as a process by which individual farms “shift from diversified, subsistence production to more specialized, market-oriented production” and achieve “increased integration of agriculture with other sectors of domestic and international economies.”
The idea here is that by specialising in specific, high-value ‘cash crops’ and selling to the global market, producers can make more money and escape poverty. In this view, highly diversified, less commercial, organic farming is more difficult to turn into a large-scale export industry.
However, in a world in which the agricultural sector is more globalised and integrated than ever, it is obvious that this has not always benefited small-scale producers, many of whom remain in poverty. This has led to the idea that ‘inclusive’ global value chains must be set up to ensure that smallholder farmers benefit. But the broader idea that the path out of poverty must run through global trade and integration into global value chains is rarely challenged.
Cacao pods harvested in Sierra Leone by small-scale farmers
What's the reality about global food markets?
Global trade in food is not a level playing field, with rules skewed in favour of multinationals and rich countries.
Access to global markets can be beneficial to some farmers if the terms are right and it is well-managed.
Sometimes integration into global markets can actually harm smallholder farmers.
Trade must be balanced with food security and alternative approaches that strengthen local markets.
Local market, Marsabit, northern Kenya
Myth four: “We need cheap food to feed poor people”
Cheap food sounds great in theory. And one might assume that cheaper food would lead to less malnutrition and hunger in the world. After all, food makes up a far higher proportion of the budgets of the poorest households than of the wealthiest so it would be fair to assume that cutting food prices would benefit the least wealthy the most.
Food industry multinationals have taken this idea to justify their own existence. We should be grateful, they argue, for the role they play in making food cheap enough for everyone to afford.
US supermarket Walmart says that their company mission is “to save people money so they can live better…and help customers around the world provide for their families.”
Agribusiness giant Cargill says that it exists “to nourish the world in a safe, responsible and sustainable way.”
This has even been called a “golden era” for cheap food. After all, we can now purchase a range of products (including from the other side of the world) for prices that would have been unimaginable just a couple of generations ago.
A woman in Spain doing her weekly shop (photo by Victoriano Izquierdo on Unsplash)
What's the reality about cheap food?
Cheap food comes with huge environmental and health costs.
Instead of cheap food, we need to prioritise affordable, nutritious, and sustainable food.
Reducing poverty increases access to food far more than cheap food does.
We need to establish a right to food and a better food system, rather than produce more cheap food.
Conclusion and recommendations
These myths did not emerge from thin air. They are repeated and spread in the context of a system that doesn’t listen to farmers and consumers, and tends to serve vested interests such as those of multinational agribusiness companies.
To get our food system to work for all of us, we need to make changes to ensure that the environmental and social impacts of the system are properly accounted for, and not just an afterthought.
This is a huge undertaking, but there are some broad principles we can push for that get us moving in the right direction:
Move beyond yields
Full disclosure of the broader costs of input-intensive, industrial farming
Boost research and development in agroecological methods and technology
Listen to a broader array of voices
Establish and support agroecological institutions
Fair trade, not 'free trade'
Fix the food system
Our global food system is broken. Over 800 million people go hungry, and the way we produce much of our food harms our planet.
Seeds are at the very heart of the food system. They are part of nature and given by God for the benefit of all but increasingly farmers’ rights to choose their own seeds are under threat.