Exploration Six

Fresh Review

     Fresh had many different ideas and factors within the film but the theme that stuck out to me the most was the negative side of  the convenience of cheap food. When you think about it, at least for me, I find myself going thru fast food drive thru's during a day where I'm always on a time crunch and have a budget. Farmers, who are on a budget and have a schedule to follow, make our food fast by using antibiotics on our animals, chemicals in fertilizers-- cheap and easy ways to keep their farm running and up to pace with their schedule. Although it comes natural for humans to want to save a buck with cheap things that we believe satisfy our needs, in some cases particularly food, sometimes going with cheaper meats and produce can hurt our body and not give our bodies all the nutrients it needs.. costing us more in the end. Joel Salatin helps us understand that "we can buy honest priced food or irresponsibly priced food".

      Joel Salatin had a lot to say (speaking on behalf of farmers) about the importance of dedicating oneself to the lifestyle of a farmer. "Respect the design of nature," Salatin said this and followed it up with an example of how herbivores should be taken care of, "they're always on the move, they never eat meat". Herbivore's naturally never eat meat, but the farming industry that believes in the food fast farming feeds their herbivore animals what they call cheap feed, in the video Salatin gives us the example "feeding dead cows to cows". Conducting a farm in this manner is where we see pesticides, and are put at a health risk when intaking produce from these farms. A healthy farm's farmers Salatin says, "needs to look at nature as the template. Treat herbivores like the herbivore first and other stuff will fall into place. Nature needs to re-sanitize for herbivores to stay pesticide free". The video mentioned that there are many farmers who have done things and continue to do things that they know they need to do in order to survive in the farming business, and unfortunately this is where our cheap and convenient foods come from. "Society doesn't think of the costs of H2O pollution, antibiotic resistance, food-borne illnesses--this is what makes cheap food seem cheap" said Salatin. This quote really grabbed my attention because so often we hear that many people think clean food is the most expensive food but Salatin was right when he said it's the cheapest you can buy.

     Overall this film was very informative over what goes on inside the farming industry.  Although I personally didn't find it very attention grabbing for those of us who aren't very interested in the agricultural world.