Position Paper on Part One Industial/Corn (Omnivore Dilemma) - Book Report/Review Example

In The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Michael Pollan examines one of the most fundamental issues humans deal with, what we eat. The basic problem is that humans, as omnivores, can eat basically anything we want. In this our evolution works against us, because industrialized food production has made access to all kinds of food simple and easy, and so what is best for our bodies is not necessarily what we want to eat. In Part One: Industrial Food, Pollan examines the industrial food production that has become the main way most North Americans feed themselves.

The industrial food production of corn is both a blessing and a curse, as it provides the food needed to sustain the planets massive population while being bad for the environment and food security. The industrial production of food in North America usually means one thing: Corn. The high-fructose corn syrup in soft drinks, the grains that feed the animals that produce eggs and milk and meat, all of this comes from corn (Pollan 10). In some ways this production of corn is a good thing – corn is by far the easiest crop to grow in North America, being able to adapt itself to almost any climate, and has incredibly high (43).

It produced almost three times the calories per seed grown than other cereal grains, and with population worldwide continuing to boom and ever increasing consumption of meet, humanity cannot afford to grow anything less than the most efficient grain. The industrial production of corn helps feed the world; without corn there would be many more people suffering from starvation or malnutrition than there currently are (though this would also be the case if people stopped eating as much meat and used the those grains to feed people) and currently we have almost no other option than to grow corn in an industrial fashion.

While the industrial production of corn may be the only way for humanity to effectively feed itself at the moment, this does not mean that it is an entirely good thing by any stretch of the imagination. One of the biggest problems with the industrial production of corn is the environmental degradation inherent in any type of industrial food production. Every time corn is produced, it sucks valuable nutrients from the soil which it needs to grow (62). Sustainable farming practices would usually alternate corn and other plants such as legumes, which re-supply the soil with the nutrients other plants require to grow (62).

In some forms of industrial farming, however, plants are not rotated because growing corn earns so much more money than growing other things, leading to the “risky rotation of ‘corn on corn’ becoming predominant (63). Furthermore, every environmental waste scales up with food production. The more corn farmers grow, the more pesticides they release into the environment, the more fertilizer runs off into ground water killing fish populations and ruining wells and so on. So while industrial production of corn may help sustain our massive population, it probably is bad for the Earth in the long run.

The final problem with the industrial production of corn is food security. As mentioned before, almost every single thing Americans eat relies entirely on corn (43). This means that if something were to disrupt a single crop, a corn virus or whether effects that hurt corn more severely than other crops for instance, it would cut out a gigantic chunk of the food produced in the United States each year. Food security demands an eating economy based on a wide variety of different cereals, vegetables and fruits, so that no part of the food population is too genetically similar to another and any disruption will be unlikely to shut down more than a small part of the overall food production.

The industrial production of corn is an evil, but probably a necessary evil. Without this production it would be impossible to feed the number of people and enjoy the quality of food (such as lots of milk, cheese and meat) that Americans do. But industrial corn also has a darker side, because it pollutes terribly and endangers everyone’s food security.