RE: slow food prices

**"John Verin" j*@Pennhort.org**

> Until you create the demand the Cheese will be $13/lb.  However, this
> past year I saw organic cabbage, squash and various other 
> greens priced
> at the same price a "conventional" grown products.  This is a 
> big change
> in the market place,  you have to start by supporting the change when
> you can and when you can afford it and sometimes making a sacrifice to
> do.
> 

> Ray Schutte
>
The reason "conventional" is cheap is a) is it cheaply grown, concerning techniques of mass production; b) your taxes subsidize conventional agriculture, so you are paying twice for the food. In the early '90, for example, $5 Billion of tax payer money went simply to (highly inefficient) irrigation of industrially grown food.

If "organic" is becoming cheaper, it's because corporate-owned "farms" are co-opting organic and producing it at a scale that has nothing to do with the ethic and soul of the origins of organic farming. 

Traditionally, organic was more expensive because we were seeing the true cost of natural food production, production that was founded first in ethics, then in technique. That organic is becoming cheaper is not to be confused as a good sign of demand. It is a bad sign of industrial production that has a reductionist technique-based approach.

In terms of making sacrifice, yes, it's part of the picture. I eat the industrially grown organic carrots from California when I have none that I've grown. I put most of my post-bills-n-rent money into food, with organic and local as first priorities, most of which is fresh produce.

Ultimately we are moving in the right direction, and no it won't be the ideal we want, at least not instantly. Yet the best we can do is take actions that serve everyone... even those we would call enemies or fools.

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