What are They Doing to Our Food?

Our food may look amazing, but looks are intentionally deceiving. Often, our favorite foods are processed, brightly colored, garishly packaged, and sold far above the cost to produce them. There are some hard truths we need to recognize about the food we eat./p>

Processing food to the point it is unrecognizable does not make it more nutritious.

Highlights

By Marshall Connolly (Catholic Online)
6/13/2023 (1 year ago)

Published in Home & Food

Keywords: Home, food, corporate, industry, packaging, additives, nature, danger

LOS ANGELES, CA (California Network) - Everyone loves treats from the store. Almost everyone has a favorite sugary snack, or cereal, or some other terribly processed food they equate with joy. We aren't total fools. We know those foods aren't very good for us, but they're hard to resist, and as long as we enjoy them in moderation, whose business is it?

These are the things we tell ourselves to make it okay to enjoy one cookie after another, but there are some tough truths about our food that we need to be aware of.

TRUTH: Major "food" corporations don't produce food. They produce packaging.

The best example of corporations that produce packaging, not food are those corporations that sell bottled water. They don't make water. They make plastic bottles and labels, and sell it to you in a convenient package. Likewise, all the food you enjoy is produced by farmers and ranchers. Your food is purchased by middlemen, is sent to a factory, and is processed, packaged, and shipped, sometimes an incredible distance, to reach you. Your favorite fruits may be grown in your backyard, but often that fruit cup contains processed chunks of fruit from halfway around the world.

The brands you see in the store produce packaging. Yes, they process the food into its final form, but that does not mean they grow it. They buy it, sometimes from your local farmers and ranchers, process it, package it, and sell it to you at an inflated price.

TRUTH: Farmers get only about 15% of the price you pay for the food they produce.
On average, farmers and ranchers get only 15 % of the price you pay for an item at the store. That means 85% of every dollar you spend actually goes to the corporation that processed and packaged the item, as well as the store from which you bought it. The majority of that money ends up on Wall Street, passing through the hands of investors who produce nothing. They get these dividends just for owning stock. That's how capitalism works, but it also means people who aren't growing anything are inflating the price of your food so they can be paid for simply owning stocks. Meanwhile, the farmers and ranchers must accept low prices for months of labor just to stay in business.

TRUTH: Processing food is about profit, not helping you.

Although it is convenient and delicious to enjoy processed food, the entire operation isn't about helping you to eat nutritious meals. It's about profit. When food is processed, it is cut, mashed, blended, or otherwise made malleable. It may be bleached, or artificially colored. Often, nutrients are removed by these processes. Sometimes, the process is so harsh, nutrients must be added back into the food by artificial means (enrichment). Other chemicals are then added to increase the volume of the product, to preserve it, and to odorize it so it smells better. Finally, it is packaged to be enticing to you.

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The purpose of these activities is to stretch the food product so more can be sold, for a longer duration of time. It has nothing to do with giving you nutrition. That's just lip service. The simple fact is, food generally cannot be made more nutritious by processing it. We are not God, and we cannot improve upon what He has provided.

Profit is the purpose for the messed up food systems we have, the prices we pay, and the overall poor nature of our diet. If we want to fix this problem, we need to buy locally from farmers and ranchers themselves. Or we need to visit stores and markets where we can buy as close as possible to farm fresh foods. We should avoid processed foods as best we can. Only by changing our grocery habits and eating habits can we reverse the trend to turn food into processed products that are barely fit for long-term human consumption.

To learn more about your food, visit the North American Food Forum.