Thursday, May 31, 2007

Chews Wise helps you navigate food issues

Another great blog to recommend, Chews Wise

Chews Wise aims to shine a light on the food system and discuss where our food comes from and what we really want to eat.

We are opinionated without being simplistic, smart but not condescending, and we will try to consider issues from multiple angles, since food choices are never one-dimensional. Think of these articles as Chews You Can Use.

This news and blog site was started by Samuel Fromartz, a longtime journalist and author of Organic Inc.: Natural Foods and How They Grew

This is relevant stuff. The organic food industry is more mature than the sustainable seafood movement, and we seafood people can learn a lot from looking at the growth of the organic food movement.

From a Q & A with the author, Sam Fromartz:

So why is the organic movement conflicted?

Many organic farmers and consumers have had trouble with the industry's growth, especially with the entry of big companies into the sector. For many, this kind of corporate ownership chafes at the ideals of local and small-scale foods, such as farmers' markets. They also worry these companies will loosen organic regulations, a process many think is underway.

What I found was that the demand for organic food proved so robust that the small-scale system couldn't quite meet it. Ironically, an anti-industrial movement needed an industry to support its growing success. So small distributors merged to form bigger ones. Whole Foods Markets, the largest natural and organic grocer, gobbled up regional supermarkets. And smaller companies sold out to get the capital to expand and win larger distribution.

And what fun to find this, since Sam is an old college buddy, we played together on our college basketball team way back when!

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