Season’s Change
This week marks the vernal equinox—spring, to most people in the northern hemisphere. The sun will rise directly in the east and set equally in the west. Prior to the advancements of science, much of civilization viewed the return of longer days as magical, a gift from the gods for another season of life, the return of fresh food. As modern humans, the transition from winter to spring is often lost in the hangover of Saint Patrick’s Day.
No longer held as a day of significance in our non-agrarian society it passes unadorned, just another day of the week. In some conservative school districts any reference to the first day of spring has been banned citing it’s pagan roots. These are the people who confuse astronomy with astrology. They also get their news from social media instead of legitimate journalists.
This polarization has infested every aspect of our global culture to the point we no longer accept what is an unalienable fact, like an equinox, instead relying on popular opinion of those with whom we associate.
Unfortunately, that divisiveness has seeped into our food system. Sure, we’ve squabbled for years over issues like industrial versus organic, grass-fed versus grain fed, GMO versus open pollenated, local versus global, and fair trade versus slave labor. We take sides by voting with our dollars, including how our government allocates funds that have huge impacts on the farming community.
But lately it seems like our government has decided to take a wrecking ball to our food system, the tsunami of effect yet to truly wash over our economy.
As a rural denizen in a very conservative area I’m subjected to opinions much different than my own and that of the urban customers I serve. In rural and small town communities they cheer the dismantling of USAID. Afterall, it doesn’t affect us, a common response to the changing season in our country’s political structure. They want change, but I don’t think they understand exactly what the fallout will be.
Less than 2% of the nation’s population raises food and out of those numbers less than 1% are the folks who show up at farmers markets. The ignorance of the economic impacts beginning to affect our food supply is staggering.
When the gutting of USDAID was cheered, I asked what about the $2 billion in food that is purchased each year from American farmers?
Well, that’s all the more for us now, isn’t it?
But what about the USDA cutting two federal programs that purchase $1 billion from American farmers, ranchers, and dairies to provide food to schools and food banks? That’s $3 billion that’s been stripped from rural agricultural economies. That’s going to put a lot of people who raise food out of business along with all the businesses who supply the goods and services needed by the farmers. No wonder economists and the rest of the world is giving the side eye.
Kindergartners don’t care who is president or what political party is the majority. Like the young of any species, one of their main concerns is getting fed. I’m going to put on my livestock farmer hat here to explain to the non-farming population—the other 98%--that if young do not receive proper nutrition as juveniles, they don’t grow up to be healthy and productive adults. Humans, with our big brains that require a heck of a lot of calories to optimally operate, need to have nutritious food on a regular basis in order to thrive.
But today we’ll blame our children’s health issues and learning disabilities on everything from modern medicine to drag queens instead of their diet. And now we want to take those critical calories away from the most vulnerable in our country.
Adults who haven’t been well-fed as children and have ongoing limited access to nutritional food fare even worse.
It doesn’t take long to experience the fallout from poor nutrition—nutrient deficiencies that lead to increased chronic diseases and mental health conditions which will lead to increased public healthcare costs.
Want to take a guess at which programs will get cut next?
While our government may not be vested in the nutrition of our children, more now than in all my years of selling at farmers markets I am beginning to see parents make their children’s nutrition a priority. There’s hope for the future.