State of the Food System

Perhaps one of our greatest vulnerabilities in the U.S. is our fragile food system.

Decades of prioritizing convenience and profits over health and common sense has left us in a pretty dark place.

But there is hope!

Today I want to give you a better grasp of the situation we’re in and what you can do on a practical level to alleviate it.

The Bad News

Supply Chains

We’ll start by addressing the issue of our supply chain.

In the U.S., we get a fair amount of our food imported into the country. It’s actually a lot lower than other countries, but we’re a long way from resilient.

Over the decades America has developed a complex chain of producers, distributors, processors, and retailers. This system has been designed to emphasize efficiency (a good thing) and convenience (also a good thing) but has sacrificed flexibility and safety to do it.

For one thing, we depend heavily on cross-continent transportation to ship food to other states, labor availability at almost every stage, lines of credit to fund the farmers so they can stay in business, fuel prices and supply, and the ability of processors to keep up with demand assuming they pass inspections and audits.

If one single piece of that chain goes down even temporarily, the squeeze is felt everywhere else down the line.

This is not only extremely dangerous for the average person, but could be potentially catastrophic in the case of war, economic downturn, or civil unrest.

Food Quality

The worst part is that the “food” we are supposedly producing can barely even be classified as food.

Not only are most of the crops grown in the US either corn or soy, but most of that is for fuel, industrial materials, manufacturing, and a tiny fraction of it is animal feed.

Combine this with constantly importing food from either other nations (including our occasional enemy) and shipping it places where it could easily be grown locally (Garlic comes to mind) and you can start to see how messy it’s getting.

There are a lot of more qualified people giving talks about the dangers of GMO crops, constantly spraying pesticides and herbicides on our food, and the effects of highly-processed foods so I won’t speak on that much.

I will say that you should be concerned about all of those things and take a look at the ingredients on the back of your next snack or gas station beverage. A recent look at Nature Food’s research suggests that up to 73% of the American food supply is now considered “Ultra Processed”.

If you didn’t know any better, you’d almost think someone is poisoning us on purpose! (Only half-joking there).

Inventory

A lot of people are surprised when I tell them that the average big grocery store in the area only has 3 days’ worth of food in it at all times. There is no large inventory for “just in case”.

This is because most stores operate on a “Just-In-Time” inventory schedule. This is generally supposed to keep food fresh, so stores don’t sell old products, but it’s a scary thought in a time of famine. We saw a light example of this during COVID.

We also do not generally have food banks or any sort of stockpiles in the average city which leaves citizens on their own, and the emphasis on convenience has slowly eroded the desire for a home pantry.

Susceptibility

If the chain gets broken, that food will be gone in a manner of hours. Let that sink in. One significant break in the chain and famine will occur in days (maybe weeks if we’re especially fortunate).

Let’s look at a few examples of what could go wrong:

• Extreme Fuel shortage: Farmers can’t farm, transportation can’t transport, and distributors can’t distribute meaning your local store is out of luck.

• Civil Unrest: In the case of civil unrest, stores will be raided, and no one will be there to import or export food.

• GMO Collapse: It is very likely that within our lifetimes pesticides and GMO crops will slowly stop working all together. The crops that have been so dependent on them for decades will suddenly not be able to grow meaning there is no more produce.

• Economic Collapse: If the economy swings too far, any number of problems could occur but one could easily be farmers not being able to afford to farm, material and fuel prices spiking, food prices spiking, or all of the above.

That’s pretty scary stuff but I really want all of you to be fully aware of this and be prepared. I want a nation that is secure and resilient in times of hardship, not one that suffers.

The Good News

The good news is, there are practical things you can do to defend yourself and your community from this kind of danger!

I’m not here to sell you any special course or product that can magically make the problem go away, I’m writing all of this for free and because I care.

Here are the actionable steps you can take:

Eat Local

Start going directly to the person who produces your food and buy from them. Go forage. Grow your own food. This sounds simple, but it’s really quite powerful.

When you take the food system into your own hands (we call this “food sovereignty”) you suddenly bypass the entire supply chain and all of its issues!

Build Community

As I’ve discussed before in my article on homesteading, you cannot do it all! You absolutely need friends, neighbors, family, and locals who you can rely on in hard times.

Suddenly you don’t have to produce 100% of your own food, and neither does your neighbor. Now the entire community produces what they eat together and can do so with minimal inputs from outside sources!

Encourage your neighbors and friends to band together and start learning important skills to become more resilient. Support your local farmers and defend them from government overreach.

The most stable communities are the ones that work together.

Vote With the Dollar

Every time you buy processed junk food, every time you go out for fast food, you’re telling those places you want it and you are supporting the broken food system.

That said, it’s a journey that is very hard to be perfect at (shoot, I still don’t produce or forage all of my own food! I still go out to eat sometimes). This is not a guilt trip, it’s just the reality of what you’re doing and a tip to be more mindful.

Start a Pantry

Each time you go shopping, buy a little bit extra for a pantry. I like to start by getting an entire 3 months’ worth of food as a minimum, and if you can eventually bump that up to 1 years’ worth of food.

Also consider starting a community food bank! This is something you can start with family or fellow church members, or people in your neighborhood.

The good news is that all of us will be okay if we are generally more prepared and can cut out the middlemen all together.

I hope this comes across as sincere because the entire goal of this newsletter and my foraging workshops is to help more people to care about their food and to stay alive when the bad times come (and they will).

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