What is the Food System
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Texas is a big state that is obsessed with big flavors from the mix of cuisines that one can enjoy. If you think about it, your favorite dish is basically a set or mix of ingredients that have either been cultivated or raised on farms.
This makes you look at how much time and effort it takes before the moment you enjoy hefty servings of smoked briskets or even the sides of slaw and salads.
Tracing back our food happens to be a very important thing to look at because it will tell us how much nutrients we receive. This is what’s called a food system.
The Food System Simplified
Put simply, the food system is the process or cycle that food follows from the time it is cultivated until the time that it is digested.
Because of the sprawling food industry in Texas and how many families are engaged in cultivation or cattle-raising, there is a mind-boggling breadth when tracing our food system in the Lone Star State. This applies on an individual level, but also on a society level. The food system deals with how a population receives its sustenance.
Factors to consider in a food system include environmental impact and pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, nutritional value, and population change, along with factors such as soil fertility, land degradation, climate change, animal treatment, food security, and more. Also worth considering is the packaging and transportation of food.
A good food system has three key outcomes. Environmental welfare, social welfare, and food security. The first two are self-explanatory, but let’s take a closer look at food security and what precisely that means.
Areas of the world where the amount of food is outweighed by the population or where food is hard to come by/attain are areas where there is a lack of food security.
A strong food system that succeeds in providing food security means that food is prevalent and easily accessible by those who need it. It also means that the food that is present, is utilized well, and overabundant spoilage is avoided.
What Makes Up The Food System
Not all foods within a community are part of the same food system. The healthy whole foods you find at farmers' markets are typically part of an entirely different food system than the foods you find at the grocery store.
The overall food chain exists at both the local and global scales. Climate change, poverty, starvation, disease, illness, malnutrition, food security, animal cruelty, wealth inequality, and more serious global concerns are all tied to the food system.
Understanding your personal food system, especially in Texas, is the first step in making a positive difference. Change ultimately start with your own individual effort. Always ensure that your local food system is robust and beneficial for both the consumers and producers.
Environmentally Safe
Food production methods that are environmentally friendly strive to coexist with the planet while inflicting the smallest amount of damage feasible. They provide support for biological systems that are varied, complex, and in equilibrium.
Humane
A food system that is considered to be humane is one in which natural resources and living creatures, including both humans and nonhuman animals, are not exploited in any way. It might be challenging to locate food production processes and systems that are kind to animals.
As per United Nations, a significant portion of today's food supply chain is dependent on enormous industrial farms that violate the rights of Human Resources, abuse animals for their meat and secretions, and cause damage to the environment. Small animal farms and farms that portray themselves as more humane do little to address many of the most important issues associated with animal agriculture.
Viable
An economically successful food system is one in which food producers and growers can pay their production expenses while also generating enough money to generate enough money to earn a livelihood and keep the production of food flowing smoothly.
Fair to Society
When deciding how food should be structured, a food system that is socially just taken into consideration the needs of people, plants, animals, the earth, and the communities where food is produced. These types of systems maintain their production techniques as cruelty-free as is practically feasible, respect the rights of employees, facilitates healthy diets, and strive to make it possible for everyone to have access to nutritious food.
Types of Food Systems
As was just discussed, there are plenty of distinct varieties of food systems, each of which may be classified in various ways. However, there is much discussion around a specific divide: the gap between traditional and alternative food systems.
Traditional Food Distribution Networks
The United States operates under a traditional food system. Still, many smaller groups and people have decided to live differently and adopted alternative food systems. In addition to their various characteristics, these systems often contain elements such as being local, organic, cooperative, and fair trade.
Alternative Food Systems
Is there an alternative food system in place in the community in which you live or in your home? Alternative food systems are gaining popularity as environmental concerns, worries for the welfare of animals, and concerns for human rights continue to develop.
The Community-Based Food System
Local food systems strive to maintain everything related to food production inside the local community. This includes the farmers, the processing facilities, the retail at grocery stores, and the customers themselves. Keeping things local or inside a certain community helps a community's businesses and farmers by preserving the wealth produced within that town. You can support the local Texas farmers market this way.
When individuals labor within the confines of a local food system, they immediately reduce the transportation, waste, and packaging necessary to produce, store, and bring food to the locations where it is sold. Local food systems should only utilize products that are currently in season.
This will help reduce waste and the amount of petroleum needed for transportation. A farmer's market is an excellent illustration of how a regional food system operates in practice. In this marketplace, regional farmers and businesses come together to buy, sell, and barter the wares produced in their region. Fresh food just harvested is available for purchase by the general public.
Organic Food Distribution Networks
Organic food systems rely on organic foods, foods produced without conventional pesticides, fertilizers made with sewage sludge or synthetic ingredients, bioengineering, or ionizing radiation. Organic foods can also be produced without the use of ionizing radiation that impacts greenhouse gas emissions. The farm must pass inspection by a certifier the government has granted permission before a product may be branded as "organic."
Industrial Agricultural and Food Systems
A grocery store owned and operated by the same people who shop and work there is known as a food co-op. Members can choose what kinds of goods and products are stocked, where those things are acquired, and the quality requirements that sellers are expected to achieve. In general, co-op aims to provide reasonably priced food of adequate quality.
Fair Trade
A customer who purchases a product that has been certified as the result of fair trade will be assured that the item was exchanged more morally than other items. This will help improve working conditions, safeguard the environment, and boost living standards.
Novel Agriculture Technologies
Many innovative agricultural technologies have been created in recent years to feed the world's growing population while at the same time doing all possible to combat climate change and other environmental issues. The development of new farming techniques for food production, alternative plant proteins, and packaging materials that help lower the carbon footprint of goods are just a few examples of recent food trends in this area. Many international organisations such as United Nations also promote novel agriculture technologies.
Advantages of Environmentally Sustainable Food Systems
There are no two communities anywhere in the world that has the same food system .However, an increasing number of people are participating in conventional food systems, and many of these people will share the trait that they are unaware of the harm that is being done to both themselves and the people around them as a result of how their food is delivered.
Climate Change
Each food system affects climate change, whether positively or negatively. Some have a detrimental influence on the environment around them and speed up the process of climate change. One such system is the traditional food system, which places a strong emphasis on animal meat and secretions and is primarily dependent on food that is imported. This is also alarmed the food security concerns globally.
Welfare of Animals
A global food system dependent on animal husbandry to generate foods such as meat, eggs, and dairy products causes unnecessary suffering and death to billions of animals yearly. Animals are subjected to brutal treatment, horrible living circumstances, and ultimately, horrific killing, whether kept on a large-scale Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO) or a small-scale family farm.
Societies and Economies
People who reside in locations negatively impacted by the breach of planetary limits are put in harm's way as a direct result of our traditional food system's fast-paced nature and high production level. People not authorized to work in the United States frequently find employment in concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs).
Human Health
The detrimental impacts on public health caused by the traditional food system based on the consumption of animal meat and animal fluids are widespread. A diet consisting of meat, eggs, and dairy products is the standard American diet. This diet contains foods that promote inflammation and are laced with artificial ingredients.
This diet can impair brain function and increase the risk of physical and mental health problems. In contrast, consuming a diet mostly composed of plant foods may enhance renal function, decrease the chance of developing type 2 diabetes, lessen the risk of developing cancer, and have many other public health benefits.
Environment
Conventional food systems, such as the one on which most people in the United States depend, are responsible for significant environmental destruction. Large-scale animal operations like CAFOs generate excessive animal feces, which pollutes the air, water, and land.
The processes we utilize to produce food use limited resources without restocking those supplies. In addition, how we produce and consume food directly contributes to the current state of the global climate.
Challenges and Obstacles Facing the Food System
Some people are currently living under a conventional food system. Still, they would like to switch to an alternative food system so that they can live healthier lives, keep more wealth in their local community, reduce the amount of suffering that animals go through when they are used for food, and have a smaller impact on the environment. People struggle to do so because there are obstacles in their way, such as the existence of food deserts.
Food deserts are geographic areas in which residents have very limited access to nutritious foods that are also reasonably priced, such as fresh fruits and vegetables. It is essential to consider that a disproportionate number of food deserts are situated in communities of color and low-income areas.
People who reside in food deserts may be geographically far from grocery shops, have personal obstacles in obtaining food, or be unable to access dependable public or private transportation options. Additionally, some persons who live with carers cannot make judgments about the food they purchase and the foods they eat.
Conventional food systems are often maintained and even sponsored by the government, even though these systems are destructive to the earth, people, and animals. The current system of government subsidies makes it easier for people to get their hands on unhealthy and processed food while making it more difficult for them to get fresh and nutritious food.
Future
Our global food systems are being put to the test by a variety of pressures, including rapid population growth, urbanization, increasing wealth, and consequent changes in consumption patterns. Global environmental situation clubbed with other sustainability concerns must be kept in mind when determining the public policy for sustainable food system.
These pressures are putting a strain on our ability to provide nutritious food and contribute to increased livelihood opportunities in an environmentally sustainable manner.
Extreme weather events related to climate change, land degradation, and the loss of biodiversity are both contributing to and being impacted by our food systems. To effectively address these difficulties, a systems-based strategy that takes into account the variety and complexity of the issues in a holistic and long-term way is required.
A sustainable food system is considered to be sustainable if it provides food security and adequate nutrition for all people while at the same time ensuring that the economic, social, and environmental foundations necessary to ensure food security and adequate nutrition for future generations are not jeopardized.
This means that it is profitable throughout, ensuring economic sustainabilityt has broad-based benefits for society, securing social sustainability; and it has a positive or neutral impact on the natural resource environment, ensuring environmental sustainability. All three of these factors are necessary for something to be considered sustainable: economic sustainability, social sustainability, and environmental sustainability.
The United Nations Food Systems Summit of 2021 set the stage for global food systems transformation.
Concluding Thoughts
Humans, nonhuman animals, and the environment are all harmed by conventional food systems that heavily emphasize the consumption of meat, dairy products, and eggs, monocultures, large-scale production of produce, and animal agriculture.
We will have a better future if we transition to alternative food systems that promote fair trade practices, cooperatives, farmer's markets, foods and proteins derived from plants, organic farming, and local practices.
Sources:
https://www.futureoffood.ox.ac.uk/what-food-system
