Module 10 Videos

Underage Workers

The first video we were instructed to watch was a short video about child workers today in the tobacco industry. As a direct product of the Industrial Revolution, we learned that there must be laws and regulations protecting children. I had thought this was rather self-explanatory across the entire US. We know that awful things are happening everyday in this country, so we tend to desensitize ourselves and as a result give in the enticement of apathy. The video told the story of several children (ages ranging from nine to fifteen) who work alongside with their parents on a tobacco farm. Not only are they experiencing grueling intensive manual labor, they're doing so for twelve hours a day. The occupational hazard of handling tobacco doesn't seem to be a concern for the plantations, as they suffer from absorption of nicotine. It has frightening essence of dejavoo to early plantations in the US. I just wish I knew tangible ways to protest this circumstance, because it is illegal, which deems its continuation a complete mystery to me.

Spelling S-U-S-T-A-I-N-A-B-I-L-I-T-Y

Sustainability is of huge importance from this day forward. We have begun to understand the level of pollution in our atmosphere and have measured what changes need to be made in order to keep our planet as a viable ecosphere. We have to figure out how to simultaneously increase crop yields and reduce the pollution resulting from it, all while the unpredictability of natural disasters increases severely. So how do we create a food system that facilitates the health of the soil and the overall environment ensuring the ability to continue doing so, generation after generation? Enter the National Geographic's panel discussion on "Sustainable Food." Earlier in high school I remember learning about the differences in organic farming, conventional farming and utilization of GMOs in farming. That minute detail on the broad range of practices was recalled as the MC introduced the panel members. The panel's background was impressively diverse. There were agricultural scientists, a representative from Coke, a chef and more. It provided a much needed encompassing nature to addressing some so huge as sustainability. It's easy to forget how big coke is and how they've got their hands in so many different cookie jars. Because they own and operate a multitude of other companies (Odwalla and Minute Maid just to name a few) they are directly involved in the production of food across the globe. That being said, I was pleasantly surprised by what he had to share about Coke's plans in addressing sustainable agriculture. There was a chef named Jose who talked about the incredible, ironic circumstance that we plan on putting human beings on Mars, yet there are still people across the world cooking food in the most primitive means. The fact that millions of people use rocks and wood as their cooking source and not a stove in pretty sad and illustrates the vast inequality that exists in the world. I had never heard someone talk about the stove so passionately, I loved it.