12-10 IAT Farmland

"Controlled primarily by a handful of multinational corporations, the global food production business - with an emphasis on the business - has as its unwritten goals production of large quantities of food at low direct inputs (most often subsidized) resulting in enormous profits, which in turn results in greater control of the global supply of food sources within these few companies. Health and safety (of the food itself, of the animals produced themselves, of the workers on the assembly lines, and of the consumers actually eating the food) are often overlooked by the companies, and are often overlooked by government in an effort to provide cheap food regardless of these negative consequences. Many of the changes are based on advancements in science and technology, but often have negative side effects." The above comments come from a synopsis of the film that came out a couple of years ago called Food Inc. I have another film for you to consider with a little bit more positive message for US consumers. The U.S. Farmers and Ranchers Alliance has a role in a new documentary film called Farmland. National Pork Board CEO Chris Novak sees this film as an opportunity to tell agriculture's story: "It will give consumers a new glimpse of agriculture that they have not had before. There have been a lot of movies that have come out of Hollywood, Food Inc. and others, that were put together with an agenda, whereas James Moll, the director of this documentary, truly and simply wanted to explore farming and agriculture and farm issues from the standpoint of a producer and so I am tremendously excited to see a preview of this movie in the near future."