Manifestos on the Future of Food and Seed
How do economic factors like gentrification and subsidies shape the food we receive and how we get it? A particular incisive book, Manifestos on the Future of Food and Seed, edited by Vandana Shiva, tells us how.
Let’s spare the flowery words and cut right to the chase: this book, edited by noted scholar and activist Vandana Shiva, will change the way you look at food. If the early selections focused on the Terra Madre and Slow Food endeavors are confusing or put you off, don’t let that stop you from continuing through this brief but revelatory political document. Shiva and a constellation of writers, from bestselling author Michael Pollan to Prince Charles address the totality of food justice issues. Shiva and Pollan are, as you might expect, most on point; their analyses are hard-hitting, though you sometimes wonder what if any of the solutions they suggest could be viable, given how tightly powerful business forces are bound to the political elite globally
Manifestos on the Future of Food and Seed is such a revelatory book because it is not your average food book. There is a small section of books on food as a social issue, and many focus on livestock, animal rights and factory farms. Fair discussion? Certainly, though singular targets seem to miss the totality before us. Manifestos rightly points out the depth of this problem. Globalization has turned business efforts not into delivered nutritious fruits and vegetables, but ones that can travel long distances. Foodstuffs once considered exotic are mass produced, and local farmers cannot hope to compete with agribusiness’ ability to conduct mass harvests that thwart biodiversity; mass livestock slaughter that would otherwise bankrupt a small farm; and fund scientific research bent on trademarking even more durable food. One can only hope Manifestos on the Future of Food and Seed gets into the hands of more people this election year — enough to make food justice a campaign issue.
