From Amber

Reading these two chapters has left me with many different perspectives. Most people have no clue as to what goes on. Patel identifies what really goes on in the global food system and we should all just be thankful and appreciate what we have, because the struggles are major. I’m just highlighting main points that stuck out when reading these chapters.

While reading I found that many countries can join together to create amazing ideas and doings but not all will be acknowledged and some will fall off while, the other gains power. It’s really mind blowing when I think about how multiple countries work together only for something to get little or close to nothing for any of the hard work given. To highlight on one country, Britain has put many countries in the shadow and is now reigning from power.

One other note that caught my attention is how the slaves did labour for it all, “International trade transformed the world and, in it’s high capitalist form.” Although the world is changing and becoming more diverse, issues arise because the entire focus is power and money. Commonly used in the United States as well as European countries, slaves were put to labour, in sake of money. “Slave labour was an integral part of provision of cheap food.”(pg.81)

Also suffering were the poor, numbers became higher and the poor became poorer. Often the poor were farmers and labourers, which were the people who were doing all the work and receiving no profit. So who was benefiting? All hope was lost for most people. “The rural poor found themselves without access to common land” leaving them to do nothing more but labor hoping to survive. Others found ways to survive by working or searching for jobs in the city, which even then didn’t make them enough money to survive unless extra shifts were made.

This stuck to me because, although Britain pretty much gained major power; there was still a handful that were living with pretty much nothing. This shows that money has a huge role and back then if you were landless you were nothing. In fear that the poor would fight back and create war, Rhodes had a plan to avoid this. He figured that if the poor remained happy, peace would be kept, but how was he going to keep the poor happy. The numbers were raising and more and more became hungry. “Other country’s can feed them,” he said. This strikes questions for me. Why isn’t there enough food being made in this country that they have to satisfy the poor with the help of other country’s? Has the drama of the global food system stopped? How can money and power always be the leading issue?

The readings and the information in this book always leaves me with what if things were different and everything were done the correct way so that everyone were happy and healthy. In the end we see that farmers suffer and don’t really benefit from the foods being produced. Its really mind blowing that these things are going on. I’m really disturbed by some of the things read.