Food From Far Away

I read the labels on the cardboard boxes I toss in the baler at the Market. Beef from Yosemite Valley. Bison from the high plains. Tomatoes, avocados, asparagus, and bell peppers from Mexico. Apples and grapes from Chile. Bananas from Ecuador and Guatemala. Crab meat from Vietnam. Shrimp from Thailand. Fresh fruits and vegetables and seafood year round, a miracle of international trade and commerce for those who can afford it. But do we ever pause to consider the human and environmental cost? Where I live we buy vegetables and fruits and seafood at a relatively inexpensive cost because at the start of the chain of growers, middlemen, brokers, distributors, trucking companies and retail stores, stands a supply of cheap, pliable, exploitable labor. The invisible people who plant, harvest and pack tomatoes and mangoes and celery and whatnot, who perform hard manual labor for hours each day. People with families, stories, a past and maybe hope for a future. Immigrants from neighboring countries with few legal rights. Migrants escaping war ravaged countries. Climate refugees waiting for the wheels of the immigration system to turn. The people growing our food are in many instances living the most precarious lives. 

But we don’t want to see them, do we? Out of sight, out of mind, abstract as our own death. Not our fault, it’s globalization, NAFTA, capitalism, the way it is. I didn’t make the rules. It’s life. I can’t help it if I earn a lot of money. Everyone has to pull themselves by their own shoe laces, bootstraps, and Velcro. 

I read all the labels and ask why some of these products can’t be produced domestically. Perhaps they can, but we’d pay more and maybe have access to less, be forced to wait for the seasons to change and certain fruits and vegetables to become available. Would that be the end of the world? Not for me, personally, maybe, but the possibility of a desire being unavailable is unthinkable to many. We’re conditioned from Amazon to Uber to DoorDash to expect immediate fulfillment; it’s a God-inspired right for certain human beings.  

Capitalism fucked up American agriculture as surely as it created virtual monopolies in banking, insurance, technology, telecommunications, airlines, and grocery chains. What are the main cash crops in the American heartland, corn and soybeans? Duo culture. Bad for the soil over time. Uses a lot of scarce water and pesticides, fertilizer.  Big agriculture, large scale, thousands of acres. Corporate-food. 

Because of our peculiar way of seeing the world, it’s not always easy to recognize that climate change is happening. But don’t take my word for it, just pay attention to the number of stories in the media about weather and water, and the locales where never-in-my-lifetime events are happening. Climate and food and humans are intertwined, like lovers.