Articles by Tom Philpott

First Lady promotes 'fresh and local and delicious' veggies at state dinner

I wish I could "friend" Michelle Obama -- in  real life, not on MyFace or whatever that thing is called. 

Last week, she sent a verbal Valentine to community gardens. More recently, she snuck a bunch of  reporters into the White House kitchen, where she sang the praises of local food. According to a New York Times report, the First Lady served up a discourse worthy of the Berkeley sustainable-food doyenne Alice Waters:

When food is grown locally, [Obama] said, "oftentimes it tastes really good, and when you're dealing with kids, you want to get them to try that carrot."

"If it tastes like a real carrot, and it's really sweet, they're going to think that it's a piece of candy," she continued. "So my kids are more inclined to try different vegetables if they are fresh and local and delicious."

Now, some wags might protest that, as the Times reports, Wagyu beef appeared on the menu that night. Was it imported all the way from Japan? Fed on grass -- or industrial corn? Why isn't the White House sourcing beef from celebrated, pastured-based nearby farms like Polyface?

All legit questions, but ... when can we come by and perform a perfection-check on your fridge and larder?

I like Ms. Obama, not just because she can wax Waters-esque about carrots. I also admire her sharp critical edge -- the one she displayed during the campaign, when she made her famous speech about being proud of America for the first time in a while.

She got pilloried by cable TV hosts and muzzled by campaign handlers, but she had a point: 30 years of stagnant wages, a Ponzi-like financial system reliant on a series of absurd bubbles, a hollowed-out education system, the buildout of a high-profit, low-nutrition, high-polluting food system, the willlful refusal to address vital issues like climate change...

As Ms. Obama finds her sea legs aboard the good ship White House, I hope she continues to explore her inner locavore -- and season it with a dash of critical political/economic thought.

Two visions of school lunch square off in the political playground

This year, Congress will reauthorize the Child Nutrition and WIC Act -- which either cleverly directs low-quality industrial food to our nation's most vulnerable population, or ensures the health of our most precious resource, depending on whom you ask.

Like the Farm Bill, the Child Nutrition Act comes up for review every five years. It encompasses the School Breakfast and the National School Lunch Programs, the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP), the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP), and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC).

If you ask me, it's geared pretty precisely to fit the needs of the processed food industry; "child nutrition" has little to do with it. That's why I was thrilled to see the recent NYT op-ed by Alice Waters and Katrina Heron called "No Lunch Left Behind." Surveying the wreckage of the school-lunch program -- declining childhood health metrics, hollowed-out school kitchens that have become centers for reheating pre-fab chicken nuggets, etc. -- Waters and Heron conclude that:

How much would it cost to feed 30 million American schoolchildren a wholesome meal? It could be done for about $5 per child, or roughly $27 billion a year [vs. current spending of $9 billion] plus a one-time investment in real kitchens.

"Yes, that sounds expensive," they continue. But does it really? The Treasury and Federal Reserve hand that much cash over to insolvent mega-banks like Citigroup before the first coffee break some days. And unlike propping up "zombie banks," a robust school-lunch program offers plenty of positive synergies, as the authors make clear: healthier children and future adults, stronger local and regional farming economies, etc.

While Waters and others push to transform school lunches, some of our nation's largest corporations and trade groups aim to keep it just the way it is. From the American News Project, here's a great video documenting lobbying efforts from the likes of Pepsico and the National Pork Producers Council.

Obama taps a real reformer, Kathleen Merrigan, for deputy USDA secretary

Last time a president had the occasion to name a deputy USDA secretary, I had a rhetorical cow, man. Back in 2005, President Bush chose Chuck Conner, a man who had previously worked as a flack for Archer Daniels Midland, for that position. Could Bush have made a more explicit bow to the gods of agribusiness? 

President Obama suddenly seems intent on blazing a new path for USDA. Sure, he picked a farm-state governor with ties to the ethanol and biotech industries as USDA chief. But that's almost reflexive in our political system. The key question became: who would he pick as the deputy -- the official who typically gets things done and sets the tone for the department? Would he pick a corn-fed flack, like Bush did? Another go-along to get-along type in the Vilsack mode? Or a real reformer? 

Obama chose Kathleen Merrigan, director of the Agriculture, Food and Environment Program at Tufts. From what I can tell at first blush, she's a real reformer.

Why is the FDA unwilling to study evidence of mercury in high-fructose corn syrup?

Paging Erin Brockovich! There’s mercury in our water soda pop! Courtesy Universal Pictures, Inc. High-fructose corn syrup doesn’t just deliver a jolt of sweetness to thousands of processed food items consumed by tens of millions of Americans each day. It also may add a touch of mercury, a powerful neurotoxin that may not be safe […]