Emily Pia RCL Blog

Greeks living on the island of Ikaria have significantly higher life expectancies and researchers think it may be attributed to the coffee they drink. This coffee is boiled, and is thought to generate the release of antioxidants as well as strengthen the endothlium layers of blood vessels which can prevent arteriosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries.

Coffee is only one of the many host of factors that are thought to lengthen Ikarians lives. They also get eight hours of sleep every night, take naps everyday, have very low stress levels, socialize more, and eat nutrient-rich Mediterranean diets. These diets include many fruits and vegetables, olive oils, and fishes. They also tend to walk more, and garden in their free time.

Greece may be poor, but in my opinion, they’ve got it all figured out! I would rather be poor and be happy and stress-free and healthy than rich and stressed and unhappy. I think other cultures and societies, ours in particular, can learn a lot from the lifestyles of the Greek Islanders.

On that note, I’m off to get eight hours of sleep!

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, more than one-third of US adults are now obese, and more than two-thirds are overweight.1 Additionally, childhood obesity has more than doubled in the past 30 years while obesity in adolescents has more than tripled. In 2010, more than one-third of children in America were obese, as well.2 All of this added poundage has serious health implications, both immediate and long-term. Those who are obese are at increased risk for cardiovascular disease,3 diabetes,4 bone and joint problems, sleep apnea, and social and psychological issues such as decreased self-esteem.5 Long-term effects include the likelihood that an obese child or adolescent will be obese as an adult and increased risk for the aforementioned diseases as adults, as well as many different types of cancer. Overweight and obesity are associated cancer of the breast, colon, endometrium, esophagus, kidney, pancreas, gall bladder, thyroid, ovary, cervix, and prostate, as well as multiple myeloma and Hodgkin’s lymphoma.6
While these statistics are astounding all by themselves, the economic toll that the treatment of these diseases take on our nation’s health care budget are equally astounding. In 2008, medical costs associated with obesity were estimated at $147 billion; the medical costs for people who are obese were $1,429 higher than those of normal weight.1 Heart disease, diabetes, and arthritis alone cost our health care system an estimated $150 billion every year.7 These facts and figures emphasize that obesity is no longer a concern that affects a minimal percent of the population, but an epidemic with far-reaching consequences for us all. Unfortunately, our society currently views obesity as something of a personality flaw rather than a nation-wide epidemic.8 The sheer prevalence of obesity, however, indicates that there is a much larger underlying issue than a “lack of willpower”, per se.
Hunger, it turns out, is actually the underlying issue. It sounds a bit odd to say that obesity strongly correlates with hunger, but hunger is more than the pictures of starving children in Africa we see in the media. Hunger is not just starvation; it is malnourishment, or the lack of access to nutrient-rich foods necessary to maintain a healthy diet. Thus, obesity is strongly related to hunger, as many Americans do not have access to/cannot afford nutritious foods and are labeled “food insecure”. Too many Americans do not think that hunger exists in this country, but far more people are affected by it than one may think. In 2011, 50.1 million Americans, 1 in 6 Americans, lived in food insecure households, including 33.5 million adults and 16.7 million cmhildren.10 These households are generally poverty-stricken households, and simply cannot afford healthy foods as they have become too expensive. Instead, they rely on food stamps and food banks to feed their families, which often do not have nutritious foods like fruits and vegetables available to their consumers. Rather, the selection is often a host of cheap, processed foods with little nutritional value and extremely high fat, sugar, and salt contents.12
In the 1980s, hunger was nearly eradicated. During that time, there were only 200 food banks in the United States, and our nation was well-fed with nutritious foods.13 Today, however, there are over 40,000 food banks, soup kitchens, and pantries in the US. The irony lies in the fact that we have more than enough food to feed our citizens, yet 50 million Americans are food insecure. How is it possible that a nation with so much food has so much hunger? The answer is quite simple. Our government subsidizes farms that produce mass amounts of the basic ingredients in processed foods rather than farms that produce fruits, vegetables, and whole grains.14 This imbalance in subsidies has driven up the costs of our produce and whole grains, while the price of processed foods is at an all-time low.15 Thus, impoverished families can no longer afford healthy foods and resort to foods that provide the most amount of calories for the least amount of money, leaving them hungry for the nutrients they need to sustain health. This has cascaded into the rise in obesity we are currently experiencing, and obesity rates will continue to rise until nutritious foods become more affordable and more attainable.
My proposal is for the government to reconfigure their agriculture subsidies to provide more money to smaller, locally-owned farms that produce fruits, vegetables, and whole grains and reduce subsidies on large corporate farms that produce mass amounts of crops like corn, wheat, and soy. This is the way that government subsidies were set up in the ‘80s when hunger was nearly eradicated, and it is the solution to our present-day hunger/obesity crisis. The effects of this redirection of agricultural subsidies are extremely advantageous. This new plan will provide the public with greater access to nutritious foods, will cause a decline in the rates of obesity, and will decrease the amount of money that our nation spends on health care in treating obesity-related diseases. Additionally, school lunches will be more nutritious due to decreased costs of nutrient-rich food, which will improve student performance in schools, as nutrition and performance are strongly linked.16
Intro
Original reason for government subsidies in farms
• Great Depression Era program
• Farms were struggling
o The farms we subsidize are not struggling anymore; they’re flourishing
• Vegetables were excluded from subsidies, as transport and refrigeration technology of the time forced most people to eat vegetables grown in smaller, local gardens
Information on government farm subsidies in the 1980s
Information on current government subsidies including facts and figures
• “Farm Bill”
o $4.9 billion a year directly to commodity crops like corn and soy
• “The future for direct payments does not look good, thankfully,” said Craig Cox, agricultural director for the Environmental Working Group. “They have no relationship to what’s going on on the farm today.”
The effects of corn-based products
• Examples: sugary cereals, soda with high-fructose corn syrup, meat from animals fed a diet of corn, breading on foods like chicken nuggets
o All cheap, accessible foods
Between 1985 and 2010, price of processed foods fell 24% while the price of fruits and vegetables went up 36%
• Graph plotting these two trends and obesity
Farms that we subsidize are not struggling, and make enormous profits every year; farms that we do not subsidize are struggling which causes them to increase their costs of their goods
Agriculture is the second largest lobby in Washington
• How much money big ag pays to influence congress
• Chart showing lobbies and how much they spend
Recommended diet by USDA and difficulty of achieving that
• New MyPlate guidelines recommend half of our diets be fruits and vegetables
o Too expensive for too many Americans
Shopping on a budget, differences in amounts of calories you can get for a dollar
• 1,200 calories of potato chips
• 250 calories of carrots

I’ve actually really been enjoying these extra credit opportunities! The speakers always have something interesting to say, and David Owen was no exception. Owen, a current writer for the New Yorker, is also an environmental enthusiast that now has two books published on the subject of sustainability, “Conundrum” and “Green Metropolis”.

Owen spent most of the beginning of his talk speaking about his experiences in New York City. When he first moved there with his wife, they lived in a small apartment and something like a dollar a day on electricity. They walked everywhere and took public transportation wherever they needed to go. He pointed out that having a car in New York either meant you were filthy rich or just plain insane. Also, because of the incredible amounts of people living in one place, almost everyone lives in apartments that do not take up nearly the amount of space that a spacious suburban house does. Living in New York, Owen had an incredibly small carbon footprint. When he moved to Vermont, though, supposedly the “greenest state”, he realized how much more energy efficient New York City was. In Vermont, he lived in a house which took up much more room, cost more to heat and air condition, and that wasn’t within walking distance from everywhere he needed to be. He and his wife bought two cars, and then later bought a third, to make their travels easier. This suburban living, how the average American lives, wastes so much more of our energy than the compact living in urban cities.

I felt that Owen’s main point he was trying to make was that just because we are becoming more energy efficient does not mean that we are using less energy. In fact, it means quite the opposite; as our energy use becomes more efficient, we use more of it. He gave many examples, including air conditioning and air travel. 50 years ago, 20% of American homes had air conditioning, but as we have developed more efficient air conditioners, better insulation, sealed windows that conserve our air, now 80% of American homes have air conditioning. Additionally, we now condition every room in our home instead of just a few rooms, and our houses are much larger. Instead of closing the blinds when sunlight is heating a room, we just turn up the air conditioning.

In reference to air travel, he talked about how the price of jet fuel was so high 50 years ago that people did not travel by planes frequently. In the past 50 years, though, are planes have become 75% more efficient and people fly more than ever. People now fly all over the world and can do so without making any stops. A round-trip flight to Australia, according to Owen, uses as much energy as the average person uses in an entire year!

So how do we become more sustainable? Owen truthfully didn’t see a very bright future for sustainability. He said that you have to make it literally impossible for people to drive for people to stop driving and use public transportation, or go into recession so people can’t afford to drive and engage in other energy-consuming activities. Until then, our energy consumption will continue to rise and fossil fuels will continue to deplete until nothing is left.