Food, Inc.: Article Analysis

The food industry is a multi-billion dollar industry in the United States. In just the past 100 years the food industry has changed dramatically, and not always for the better. Now, there are large, multinational corporatious, monopolies and government subsidies of crops, like corn. There is also a lack of regulation for the welfare of animals bound for human consumption. Often, the animals have poor and unhealthy living conditions and to counter this effect there is antibiotic overuse in the animals which humans ingest. All these points, and more, are described in the article, Food, Inc.: What the food industry doesn’t want you to see. In this article, the author, James Brewer, highlights key claims from the movie Food Inc. These claims are disturbing and eye opening; I agree with every single one of them.

In an additional article “Food monopolies take over the supermarket shelves” by Andrew Freeman, Freeman explains that it may seem as if one has a variety of choices between thousands of different products, but in reality, one is just choosing between different products from a few parent companies. For example, PepsiCo alone owns Taco Bell, KFC, Pizza Hut and big named products like Doritos, Mountain Dew, Quaker Oats, and even Naked Juice. In order to maintain an image, major companies have started moving in the direction of seemingly “health foods”. Nestle is the owner of Gerber baby products, the Power Bar and the classy sounding carbonated water brands Perrier and San Pellegrino. Even the meat industry is affected. Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation, pointed out that in 1970 the top five beef packers controlled about 25% of the market, and today they hold over over 80%. Today, 60% of the U.S.’s chickens are owned by Pilgrim’s Pride, Tyson, Perdue, and Sanderson