Committed to Food Co-Op Ideals?

Unions and food Co-ops, are they the way of the future? A look at Co-ops 50 years later.

The very idea of a food cooperative (co-op) is not new; it is based on the age old principle of the community working together and sharing the rewards for the betterment of all. It's an idea popularized in the 1960s embracing the ideals of a democratic, self-run association of individuals with an orientation to serve the community, in a sustainable and eco-friendly manner, to name a few of the goals which many food co-ops express.

This has however, sometimes, engendered the politicalization of food, or food politics. Many wish to participate in food cooperatives with the intention that they may also express their political will and social bonefides in addition to filling their grocery cart. It is also as a community activity, one which naturally fulfills a social need for some to congregate, and to support others with various needs.
In the early years many food co-ops were faith-inspired initiatives whose bounty of good will flowed to the communities that they served. Often churches and other civic organizations sponsored or fostered the local co-op. They were focused on the social and community aspects of food distribution, seeking to eliminate poverty and inequities of access to wholesome food products.
Some simply spurned what they viewed as a defunct capitalist system; co-ops were a way around this. The member-supported and directed co-op became a boon to those who wished for lives more free from the interference of commerce, embracing ideals of sharing, togetherness and ecology for example.

However it seems in many areas of the country today food co-ops are perhaps suffering from their own success. Once one of the few ways to obtain organic, fair-trade or local produce at fair prices in urban areas, many co-ops now find themselves threatened by competition from bigger, national chains who have recognized the desire for wholesome organic foods for the masses. For example Kroger, the nation's largest dedicated food retailer, now routinely offers similar or same organic and fair-trade items in its stores at prices more favorable than the local co-op can match. Other stores and traditional retailers have jumped on board with similar offerings. If the local food co-op is to survive, in many areas, they have been forced into a more traditional, commercial role.

The Bloomington, Indiana magazine, The Ryder has recently taken an extensive look into the local co-op there and some are now finding it problematic. There is the intense scrutiny of the organization as a business. Many feel corporatization is necessary to  survival in today's world. Some say that co-ops which today are not run like a traditional business, aren't likely to survive to foster any revolutions or see the light of any social justice initiatives.
And there's more; the necessity of the corporate structure has come to many co-ops today leaving those associated with them feeling that there is a two-tiered system of owner-operators, and employees on the second tier who have few capital resources but labor day after day in the co-op stores themselves.
These persons feeling at the second tier, feeling dis-respected, unappreciated and often taken advantage of; a number have invited and even agitated for unionization of their co-op. Yet some founding, long-time members point out that the co-op model was not imagined to be a worker's collective; rather its focus was as a member owned entity.
This member owned ideal is at the heart of many collectives; indeed a food co-op conceived as such would be included here, but what's in it for those who don't join or those who work diligently but don't have the resources to buy into the co-op as a business or corporate entity?

For many the answer has come in the form of unionization of the local co-op, and organizers for the United Food and Candy Workers Union (UFCW) see a definite role for themselves here. For Bloomington, Indiana's Bloomingfoods, UFCW local 700 has become the answer. Now the workers may vote, be represented, strike and negotiate for better pay, training and working conditions.

If the local food co-op is to survive many are now seeing that it must be more than a local icon, a  branded destination, it must take its social initiatives seriously, making its mission a journey of the spirit and not simply the congregating point for the well-heeled consumer on Saturday mornings.

Ethanol Update

THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT HAS ANNOUNCED IT WILL NOT EASE THE MANDATE TO PRODUCE ETHANOL DESPITE THE LIMITED CORN SUPPLIES RESULTING FROM THE GREAT DROUGHT OF 2012. 

It's official. 
The government in full knowledge that world supplies of corn are critically low, that there is also a poor crop forecast for South American producers which is negatively impacting world grain supplies, has sided again with the big business of American agriculture.
When supplies are low, prices are high and now going higher. Our farmer continues to benefit at the expense of the less fortunate the world over. So much for brotherhood of mankind.

Posted here previously:
"In these days of rising concern of stewardship for the air, the land and the water, do we suppose that we have relinquished all that to the approximately two percent of the population who (feeds more than 98 percent of Americans and a vast percentage world-wide,) are indeed the oligarchs? Are we okay with that, or should we react? How we react depends a lot on us and our current lifestyle.

Some while never thinking about it, work like vassals to a "state of consumption" in which they participate. Yes, we are called consumers, but aren't we more than that? And what if the farmers rebelled, went on strike and demanded their homage? Could we starve? And how easily, like the recent hurricane Sandy has demonstrated! It won't take much. Will others world-wide starve too? In the face of a serious threat like that, then what are we? While in a civil society something in just that form may not occur, many other potentially damaging disruptions may well be affecting our daily lives in myriad, subtle ways.

Take for example, the price of sugar, oil, wheat and corn. These commodities have been greatly on the rise the past few years. Why? Agricultural economists explain it in several ways: weather, market "forces," export demands, domestic consumption and yes, things like ethanol driving up prices. Farmers as a group are notorious for growing crops which bring the highest return. Who can blame them?

And when they all do, an over abundance may result, actually depressing prices. Then they are on to the next "big thing," and lately that has been corn. Remember there is only so much land for all crops produced. A balance of supply and need produces price stability; overproduction in one crop results in shortages in others. You pay the difference.

Corn may be used to produce many, many foodstuffs and meats. Most recently it is used to produce not just grain alcohols such as whiskey but also a product they call "ethanol," a less efficient, grain alcohol used to fuel gasoline powered engines. The result is that millions more acres are now being taken to produce this product and not grain to feed you or produce meats or oils for your table. Did you ask for that? Did you clearly know that certain demands for a better environment would be answered by big business in this way? Did they ask any of us? Well, yes and no. Regardless, we all now pay ever increasing prices to those who grow for us. This topic is ongoing. It's another chapter in the politics of food"

Food and the Politics of Eating

Eat this Bread  by the Taize Community, France
CHANTED: "Eat this bread, drink this cup, come to him and never be hungry;

Eat this bread, drink this cup, trust in him and you will never thirst."

This song, a very simple chant to be sung during meditation calls our mind to a basic human need and desire, to be fed.Yet it isn't always so simple. We presume because we have enough others must too, and often they do. Except when they do not. But, doesn't the world produce more than enough to feed one and all. Well, yes it does, but no, it doesn't feed all. They call it food politics. In food politics a very complicated and messy issue becomes more obviously an issue of social justice, of equity and parity for all.

We all have a right to clean water and healthful food the world over, no matter what our status, but not all have the income or the access to obtain what they need, or they cannot produce it themselves. In my simple world there is a place in the country with a garden, an orchard, some livestock, and maybe some chickens-- all on a few acres. Producing good, organic foods for family consumption is as old as the Bible. True enough, but what if you produce food to sell your excess, or produce strictly for sale. Who do you sell to, what is their income and personal resources? Do you sell so that everyone comes to the sale on equal ground, with equal footing. Can the rich man pay the price for home grown, organic foods? Most likely he can and purchases what he chooses. Can that same seller afford to sell to the economically disadvantaged? Can they give to a monk in his begging bowl? Moreover, will the seller even consider to do this?

On a world scale, there is said to be enough land and food production to feed the world, yet millions go hungry. How can this be? Again enter food politics. Control and access to food stores is an old tool, and an ancient weapon. Political factions, party alignments, political will and might often conspire acting together, producing man-made hunger and famine. Again it's as old as the Bible. One group favors or disfavors another and in food politics, very often the losers starve. There seems to be no easy answer to a wide spread problem. And it happens in our backyard, in our town too. Everyday.