Michael Pollan On Vilsack, Agriculture — And Food

[Mary Lou Lamonda]

Please keep responding to the Agricultural Policy and nominations in the Obama administration!

Michael Pollan On Vilsack, Agriculture — And Food

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=98417440

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Morning Edition, December 18, 2008 · When President-elect Barack Obama
nominated former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack as his secretary of
agriculture, he praised Vilsack's knowledge of both agriculture and
energy. But author Michael Pollan says the incoming administration's
focus should be on food and the people who eat it.

Obama announced his selection Wednesday and touted Vilsack's credentials.

"As governor of one of our most abundant farm states, he led with
vision," Obama said, "promoting biotech to strengthen our farmers in
fostering an agricultural economy of the future that not only grows
the food we eat, but the energy that we use."

Pollan, author of In Defense of Food and a leader in the sustainable
food movement, said Obama will not make progress on climate change or
energy independence — or health care, for that matter — unless
America's food system is included in the plan.

"The food system is responsible for about a third of greenhouse
gases," Pollan told NPR's Renee Montagne. "It is responsible for the
catastrophic American diet that is leading 50 percent of us to suffer
from chronic disease, and that drives up health care costs."

A secretary for food, Pollan said, could put the focus on diversifying
America's farms and using local food sources around the nation.

But those topics weren't in the spotlight when Obama chose Vilsack to
be agriculture secretary, said Pollan, who also wrote The Omnivore's
Dilemma and The Botany of Desire.

"I was very disappointed in that news conference," he said, "not to
hear Vilsack use the word 'food' — or 'eaters.' And the interests of
everybody except eaters was discussed: farmers, ranchers, people
concerned about the land."

And so, he said, it's difficult not to see Vilsack's selection as
"agribusiness as usual."

In the months before Vilsack was named to the post, Pollan wrote an
article urging the president-elect to rename the Department of
Agriculture as the Department of Food, led by a secretary of food.
That did not happen Wednesday.

Pollan also saw "reasons to be cautiously hopeful" about Vilsack,
pointing to his suggestion to cap subsidies and use the money gained
to fund conservation efforts. Vilsack also has urged more food
production on the local level.

But under the former governor, Iowa's feedlots expanded — and some
localities lost the power to control where those feedlots are located,
Pollan said.

"I'm hoping that now he will take a broader view," Pollan said.

As for the possibility that a change in America's agriculture
priorities could raise the cost of food, Pollan said that other
factors can also lead to higher prices.

"It's the embrace of corn-based ethanol that has driven up all food
prices," Pollan said. "It's not making agriculture more sustainable."

And changing the food system could bring savings, he noted, citing
Obama's recent mention of federal subsidies that are paid to wealthy
farmers.

"I think if we could back off on ethanol, that will buy us a lot of
wiggle room," Pollan said.

Although Obama and Vilsack have supported corn-based ethanol
production in the past, a challenge may come from elsewhere within the
new Obama administration, Pollan said. "The new secretary of energy,
Steven Chu, is a pretty fierce critic of corn-based ethanol," he said,
"and I would imagine will be arguing for moving away from corn as a
feedstock for ethanol, toward other crops.

Pollan says he hopes those crops won't compete with food crops. Viable
alternatives to corn-based ethanol could include trees and crop waste
— even grasses, he said.

"And whether Vilsack and Obama are ready to go there remains to be
seen," Pollan said. "But certainly, Steven Chu will be pushing them
that way."

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