Here's a slice of my interview with Stossel about local food that they released on YouTube (which I presume means this portion of the interview got cut from what will appear later tonight on Fox Business).
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Assorted Links
- Friday at 7pm cst I'll be on Fox Business with John Stossel. He asked me about veganism, Meatless Monday, gluten-free, organic, local, and Beyonce. Try tackling all that in 5 minutes!
- I suspect most of you have already seen the FDA's final decision was released that will essentially ban transfats. This article worries about the potential slippery slope set by this precedent.
- Steven Savage writes in Forbes about his concerns over the future of the food supply. I'd be curious to see more research on his claims about "brain drain" in agriculture and about effects of "absentee" owners.
- Effects of bird flu being felt on egg prices
Media Related Items
Kate Murphy wrote a little piece about me for the New York Times Sunday Review. I'm not sure how slow the news has to be before my reading, listening, and watching habits rise to the attention of NYT writers, but I'm happy to be included nonetheless. Here's an excerpt.
“LISTENING I listen to Russ Roberts’s “Econtalk” podcast. He is sort of a libertarian economist but likes to engage with lots of people with diverse opinions and picks up on topics that aren’t necessarily economics. I also really enjoy the podcast “Stuff You Missed in History Class,” which is exactly what it says. It’s like a mini history class. Most of my college courses were biology, math, physics. So this is one way I feel like I can find out about things I should have learned. And it’s just very entertaining and easy to listen to.
WATCHING My kids and I like the technological optimism in the movie “Tomorrowland.” There is a sense today that if we could turn back the clock and eat and farm like our grandparents we’d be a lot better off, and I think that’s just crazy. We’re producing more high quality food than we ever did and it’s a lot more affordable and we got that way from new technologies. I think there are some bad things that have happened and we are working on them, but in a lot of ways we’re really a lot better off. And Discovery’s “Airplane Repo” is an entertaining way to teach my kids not to spend more than they make. As a parent you’re always looking for ways to make a point without being preachy.”
Secondly, on Tuesday I'm slated to film a piece for John Stossel's show on Fox Business on food fads and myths. I'm not exactly sure when it will run, but it regularly appears on Fridays at 7 pm cst.
Food Demand Survey (FooDS) - June 2015
The June 2015 edition of the Food Demand Survey (2015) is now out.
A few notable results:
- Changes in willingness to pay (WTP) for meats was mixed. WTP for hamburger was down almost 10% but WTP for chicken wings was up almost 10%. WTP for both steak and chicken breast was up relative to May.
- Expected food expenditures at home and away from home were down this month relative to May.
- For the third month in a row, the largest percentage jump in awareness for different food issues was for bird flu. Moreover, this is the first time for bird flu to be ranked in the top three issues of awareness and for concern since the beginning of the survey. There was also a rise in concern for swine flu and for mad cow.
- I asked several new ad hoc questions this month, but I'll report on these separately in the coming weeks.
Eating: the new religion
Ever notice the religious fervor that sometimes companies food movements and dietary fads? Well, you're not alone. In fact, it appears there is now an entire academic conference on the subject. This from a Canadian paper:
“McCann is one of several academics presenting papers at next week’s Congress of the Humanities & Social Sciences in Ottawa looking at how the explosion of “clean eating” — whether raw food and juicing, the paelo diet, gluten-free regimens or fervent veganism — has created a moral hierarchy for food.
She argues that the rise in food movements has coincided with a decline of religion in society, with many people seeking familiar values such as purity, ethics, goodness. But these movements also tend to encourage behaviours that have steered a generation away from religion: Judgment, self-righteousness, an us-versus-them mentality. And, she adds, many seek a fulfilment that cannot be satisfied with food.”
and
““If you think you’re the pure, someone else is impure,” she says. The more self-righteous we are about what we eat — because it’s ethical or healthy or local — the more we also tend to judge others on what they eat. Or worse, who they are.
There’s a reason someone says ‘I am a vegetarian,’ rather than ‘I eat vegetarian.’”