Pollan - The processing plant

(p.85-99)
Category Module 3

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Lecture Slides

Property Reading

Text The omnivore's dilemma (2006)

1. What happens to most of corn grown in the US? (p85)

a. it is broken down into different substances (fructose, corn syrup, ethanol, etc.)
and then reassembled into feed for beef, chicken, or pork, or made into soft
drinks, breakfast cereals, or snacks.

2. How is breakfast cereal the prototypical processed food? (93)

a. because it's basically "four chents worth of commodity corn" that gets
"transformed into four dollars worth of process food." Multiple corn products are
combined together with vitamins and minerals, food coloring and taste, to make
a product that is attractive to customers.

3. From a capitalist point of view, how are the farmer’s field and the human organism
less than ideal? (p94)

a. The farm

i. vulnerable to the elements and pests

ii. prone to crises of over- and underproduction

iii. rising raw material prices cut into profits

b. Human organism

i. Humans will only consume so much food thus rendering the perk of falling
prices of raw material useless. ("fixed stomach")

Pollan - The processing plant (p.85-99) 1

 1. rendering the perk of falling prices of raw material useless. ("fixed
stomach")

2. limits the natural rate of growth for the food industry to 1% (the same as
the annual growth rate of the American population).

4. Why does complicating food make economic sense to the food processors? (p95)

a. because at that point of complexity, "substitutionism" becames viable without

altering the taste or appearance of the product. "The further ta product's identiy
moves from a specific raw material—that is, the more processing steps involved
—the less vulnerable is its processor" from nature's vicissitudes.

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