Pollan, author in campus-wide reading program, draws farmers interested in his message
Jan Shepel
Associate Editor
MADISON
Several hundred farmers gathered last week to be part of an audience estimated to be about 7,000 listening to author Michael Pollan on the University of Wisconsin (UW)-Madison campus as he talked about the U.S. food system.
Pollan’s appearance, and the selection of his book, In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto, as part of a campus-wide reading program, had drawn fierce protestations from many farmers and ag groups. Some in agriculture had criticized UW Chancellor Biddy Martin for selecting Pollan’s book for the first-ever “Go Big Read” program (a play on the “Go Big Red” chant for UW athletic teams.)
Others were happy about it. John Peck, executive director of Family Farm Defenders said his organization applauded Martin for bringing Pollan to campus. Holding one end of a sign outside the Kohl center before the speech, Peck said he welcomed the discussion about the U.S. food system. He said he was disappointed in all the farmers and ag groups that were critical of Pollan and his appearance in Madison.
“Fearless sifting and winnowing for truth is part of UW-Madison’s legacy as a land grant college, and the campus needs to seriously discuss its role in supporting a more sustainable agricultural future for the state,” Peck said.
In dairy the fastest growing and most profitable sector is small-scale, organic, and grass-based, Peck said, “yet the lion’s share of university research dollars and state taxpayer subsidies continue to go towards expanding livestock confinement operations. We need more farmers rather than less.”
Other farmers came more or less as a protest against the selection of Pollan’s book for the campus-wide reading program and his speech on campus.
About 200 farmers donned green shirts, emblazoned with the slogan “In Defense of Farming. Eat Food. Be Healthy. Thank Farmers.” A Madison-based feed company had organized a meeting place and buses to take farmers to the lecture at the Kohl Center.
Sue Crane, a Burlington dairy farmer, was one of several farmers who organized the green-shirted farmer brigade. She is concerned that many people who might be influenced by Pollan’s books have never visited a farm and have no idea where their food comes from.
“It is so important that farmers and others involved in agriculture provide an accurate picture of how we carefully care for animals, and that we are good stewards of the land. Our good care is why our crops are large and yields are high,” she said.
“We do such a good job of feeding the world, now we must also do a good job of telling people how we feed them,” Crane said.
Talking to Wisconsin State Farmer before Pollan’s speech Crane said she helped organize the attendance of a group of farmers because it was a good opportunity for them to talk about their personal commitment to agriculture. “We tend to be a silent group,” she said.
Having read Pollan’s book, she said parts of it were good – when he talked about how people should think about what they eat. “But he was very inaccurate when describing production agriculture. Advances allow us to have healthy well-cared-for animals and grow more crops, allowing us to use less resources to produce more food,” Crane said.
“I don’t think of it as ‘us versus them’ but it’s so important for us to tell the story of how we produce food,” Crane said.
Farmer Tony Schultz drove from his farm in Marathon County to hear the Thursday night speech (Sept. 24) and support Pollan’s views. Outside the Kohl Center before Pollan’s appearance, Schultz held a sign – “Michael Pollan, a hero to family farmers.”
Schultz said he grows organic vegetables, beef and chicken on his farm and operates a community supported agriculture (CSA) farm. “A lot of people joined my CSA after they read The Omnivore’s Dilemma,” he said. “I think he’s doing good things for the food system with the issues he’s bringing up.”
Schultz said it would be a good thing for the food system if CSAs were more than niche marketing.
Dairy farmer and veterinarian Dr. Jim Mlsna from Hillsboro, helped organize the green-shirted group because he felt that Pollan’s book attacks modern agriculture. “The book is based on the opinion that farmers should farm the way our parents did in the 1950s. Pollan claims we are dependent on chemicals, antibiotics, hormones, carcinogens, pesticides, pharmaceuticals and industrial waste. Obviously this is not true,” Mlsna said.
Mlsna said some farmers reading the book might think it’s not too bad, but he is concerned that farmers must tell their own stories. “If we let the thoughts prevail, and seep into the mainstream without telling our stories he has the chance to sway many readers against all the things that we as farmers have spent a lifetime doing right,” he said.
Mlsna farms with four of his children, all in their 20s. “I worry about Pollan’s writing because he leaves out the story of family farms like ours where we use science and technology to do a better job of caring for our animals and land each day. Pollan’s ideas cause non-farmers to believe regulations are the only way to have healthy food,” Mlsna said.
Pollan, speaking from a stage set up in the center of the UW-Madison’s hockey arena, was respectful to the farmers in the audience, saying there was much he and they could agree on. He said he could agree with the slogan on their shirts.
Chancellor Martin said she was happy that the first-ever event had drawn such attention. “I hope we’ll always be able to pick a book that generates this much excitement, but I doubt it seriously,” she said in her introduction to Pollan.
The program required about 4,000 students in 125 courses to read the book. “It’s hard to imagine an issue that matters more to people than food,” she said.
Martin ticked down the list of Wisconsin’s leadership role in food production – notably cheese with 25 percent of the market share – and thanked the farmers in the green shirts for attending.
The lecture drew an estimated 7,000 people, filling the Kohl Center arena to well over half full.
As Pollan took the podium, he pulled out what he called “edible food-like substances” – sugary breakfast cereals and plain bread made from highly processed grains. Looking around at the crowd he said that he was humbled to see so many people who wanted to be involved in the discussion about food.
Pollan said he knew that not everyone in the audience was pleased with his point of view and his appearance but he thanked them for being there and said he would have no problem wearing the t-shirts they wore that said “Eat Food. Be Healthy. Thank a Farmer.”
He said he believed that American farmers hold the key to three important issues facing the nation – obesity, health care and climate change. It is an American paradox, he said, that people spend a lot of time thinking about food and yet have such high levels of obesity, heart disease and diabetes.
Pollan said that in recent decades, Americans have taken to eating for nutrients but have lost the idea of eating for community, for enjoyment and for its social dimension. At the same time, science has dubbed “evil” certain nutrients while others have been “blessed” – and these have changed over time. First cholesterol was bad, then it was trans fat; now it’s high fructose corn syrup.
He summed up how people should eat this way – “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” He advised his audience to avoid foods that their great-grandmothers wouldn’t recognize and those with more than five ingredients. That would include all the foods he brought with him and placed on the podium. He also encouraged people to avoid eating foods they have seen advertised on television.
Food processors, he said, will substitute one ingredient for another, based on the current “blessed” nutrients. The current fad is to replace high fructose corn syrup with cane sugar, he said.
Pollan criticized the U.S. food system for giving too little of the food dollar to the farmers who grow the food. In 2006, he said, U.S. consumers spent $881 billion on food, but farmers got $59 billion, less than 10 percent. Of that grand total, $717 billion went to processors and marketers and those making the packaging received $10 billion more than the farmers who grew the food, he said.
“Our health and the health of our farms is intimately linked,” he said.
After the speech, dairy farmer John Vrieze told Wisconsin State Farmer that he found the speech interesting and felt it had diffused a little bit of the controversy the “Go Big Read” program had raised. But he said a lot of people would go hungry if everyone had to eat the way Pollan suggested.
Vrieze said he and his wife are involved in a church vegetable garden program. “There’s a lot of enthusiasm at first, but it’s amazing how fast people realize how much work it is to grow their own food,” he said.
Dane County dairy farmer Pat O’Brien agreed. “I think it’s unrealistic to think that every farmer could be a marketer of his own product,” he said.
Richard Gorder, a dairy farmer who is vice president of the Wisconsin Farm Bureau, said after hearing Pollan that there are very few who would disagree with certain things the author said, like the fact that consumers eat too much processed food.
But Gorder felt that Pollan attacked monoculture agriculture and that he had discounted the work of Norman Borlaug, the father of the Green Revolution who recently died. Gorder said that thanks to the ideas of Borlaug, more people around the world have more food to eat. He said he found some of Pollan’s ideas “elitist” but was glad he came.
“I found him entertaining and there were points we could all take home. There were parts in there you wouldn’t disagree with,” Gorder said.
