By Dominique Gilbert, Christina Gold, Zachary Greening, Noa Hechtman, Jacob Wolfe
Sustainability is avoidance of the depletion of natural resources over time in order to maintain an ecological balance. Essentially, it’s making sure that the natural resources we have now are available for our future generations. One of the most essential things we need to do is to have our food production and our consumption be more sustainable, so to speak, Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), insecticides, and factory farming which continuously take a toll on the environment and can prevent us from giving our children and their children the opportunity to have the same food resources.
According to the University of Michigan’s Center for Sustainable Systems, nutrient runoff from the upper agricultural regions of the Mississippi River creates a hypoxic “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico. In 2017, the hypoxic dead zone was the largest measured since 1985, at 8,776 square miles. The agricultural runoff polluting the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico can be anything from pesticides being sprayed on plants to keep bugs from eating them, to animal waste like manure. This runoff waste pollutes our environment and would make it more difficult for future generations to produce their own food and it would cause them to continue to destroy the environment because of inherited agricultural practices. We are setting a dangerous precedent.
A potential solution to the pollution caused by agricultural runoff is to buy and eat organic. According to the Center for Sustainable Systems, organic farms don’t use chemicals that require lots of energy to produce, pollute soil and water, and present human health impacts. Sales of organic foods were 6.4 percent higher in 2017 than in 2016, and organic food accounts for 5.5 percent of all food sales in the U.S.
The production and consumption of organic foods won’t entirely stop the production of foods that are genetically modified or sprayed with pesticides, but it can slow them down and make the industry think twice about unsustainable farming practices. It’s also important to know your “dirty dozen” foods as a consumer buying groceries at your local market. The Environmental Working Group’s 2019 list of the dirty dozen includes strawberries, spinach, kale, nectarines, apples, grapes, peaches, cherries, pears, tomatoes, celery, and potatoes. Be aware of these, buy them organically, and wash them thoroughly before consumption.
Some people even choose to go on a vegan diet because the amount of energy and water needed to produce one serving of beef is significantly higher than that of vegetables. According to the same study, one serving of beef is more associated with greenhouse gas emissions than 20 servings of vegetables. 20 percent of Americans cause half of the food- related greenhouse gas related emissions, and a diet shifted away from meat could reduce this up to 73 percent.
Going on an entirely plant- based diet reduces the total meat consumption and contributes to the reduction of the production of greenhouse gases. However, this is not a perfect or entire solution because of pesticides and agricultural runoff that ends up in the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico, as discussed earlier. It is very difficult to find sustainable and “perfect” alternatives to our flawed food production and consumption habits, but if we can find ways to reduce our waste and emissions, we can slow our environmental destruction down for future generations.
Another major waste problem unsustainable food production can cause is plastic waste. This isn’t something most people think of off the top of their head. When you go to the grocery store, how often do you see fruits and vegetables packaged or wrapped in plastic? Or meats on Styrofoam trays and wrapped in plastic? Or the plastic bags people put their produce in to hold it before buying it? Those all contribute to our carbon footprint because of the sheer amount of plastic waste we produce.
Fruits have peels for a reason, to protect them from the outside elements. Instead of buying apples in a plastic 6- pack holder, bring a reusable produce bag and transport your fruits and vegetables that way. Some potatoes come individually wrapped in plastic, even though they grow in the ground. They are already dirty! Before cooking with your potatoes, wash them thoroughly with water to get the dirt off before peeling. Avoid buying individually wrapped potatoes.
As for buying meats, it’s hard to avoid buying meats on the Styrofoam trays wrapped in plastic. Instead, you can buy meat at the meat or deli counter of some grocery stores like The Fresh Market. That meat will come wrapped in sustainable, recyclable paper instead of wasteful plastics. When it comes to our role as food consumers, small and subtle choices can create a big and more sustainable difference.
In conclusion, we will struggle to set our future generations up for success and give them sustainable ways to produce and consume food if we as the current generation don’t change our practices to make them more sustainable. Sustainable food production and consumption is essential to making sure we have natural and food resources for future generations. If we can make these changes, big and small, we can set ourselves and our future generations up for success.
Group 3 Colloquium 