The big why of fake food

November 2021

 

If you've just been reading about the plan to save the world by feeding people very strange burgers grown in vats on even stranger buns so that all the land we've destroyed with agriculture can be left to re-wild [1], you may well be asking yourself some 'why' questions.

Why would we consider junking the entire historic basis of human provisioning?

Why, when we're already suffering unprecedented chronic disease from our novel, over-processed, corporate-led diet, would we head off down a path which takes all these aspects to new extremes?

Why, when millions go hungry due to poverty, bad cultural influences and bad politics, are we concentrating on technofixes to our food chain?

Why, when there are more farmers in the world than in any other single job, would we scrap farming?

Social scientist and small-scale farmer, Chris Smage, points out our tendency to "mis-specify the problem as a technical one of overcoming resource limits rather than a sociopolitical one". This leads to a losing game of techno-fixery and piecemeal solution-mongering. He suggests the proponents of lab-grown food-like substances "looked long and hard at the future to which we're hurtling and got very, very scared". Now, they "are desperately clutching at whatever darned thing they think might just conceivably save us in the last chance saloon we now inhabit", be it lab-grown eco-gloop or whatever.

The US Organic Consumers Association points out that such "reductionist scenarios are attractive to citizens, businesses, politicians and policy makers who yearn for simple solutions".

To food journalist, Joanna Blythman, "we've lost the plot when arcane imports of genetically modified fake meat burgers dreamed up by venture capitalists in Silicon Valley are portrayed as more acceptable than a lamb chop from a British hillside".

One blogger calls the bioreactors in the desert delusional techno-fixery run amok.

OUR COMMENT

So, it looks like the possible answers to the 'why' questions are:

• we've mis-identified the problem
• the people in power like simple solutions
• we're so scared we're clutching at straws
• it suits venture capitalists
• we've lost the plot
• we're delusional
• all of the above

We can't help noticing that all of these answers apply equally to the question of why are we genetically modifying our food (which is also supposed to save the planet).

Chris Smaje has his own refreshingly down-to-earth, experience-based thoughts on how we can survive in our messed-up world: " ... smallholding, small-scale farming, peasant farming, agrarianism - call it what you will ....(is) the most likely way for humanity to see itself through the numerous crises we currently face both in richer and poorer countries". You might find his blog interesting: https://smallfarmfuture.org.uk


Background

[1] CANCER BURGERS IN BACTERIAL BUNS - November 2021

SOURCES:

• Chris Smage, Of chancers and last chancers, https://smallfarmfuture.org.uk, 12.01.20

• Chris Smage, No farm future, no growth future, no farmer future, https://smallfarmfuture.org.uk, 3.11.18

• Will lab-grown food really save the planet? GM Watch, 14.01.20

  Photo: Creative Commons