Rising Food Costs and Eductation: Some Comments

Since I have been really busy this week I will leave you with some links to follow and think about.

It has been lingering in the news off and on the past couple of months that the cost of food is on the rise. This article by The New York Times says that the rising cost of commodities is to blame. This is quite understandable. "Foods like coffee, meat and milk, which are closer to raw materials, will probably show some of the biggest price jumps," says the New York Times. Of course well all know that rising commodities will affect just about anything and everything that rely on them. Fortune Magazine reports nearly the opposite of The New York Times saying that rice, meat and milk will not take as steep of hit, yet.

I can never claim to offering perfect solutions to problems but I will say this: the majority of commodities that we currently trade for or produce rely heavily on oil to harvest and transport them. This means that as the price of oil steadily increases we will see a fluctuation that will effect the entire chain of subsequent markets. I feel like some of this can be circumvented by purchasing sustainable food from local sources. Less transportation, less packaging,  less waste and less money for the quality of product.

Now I often complain on this blog about the deplorable state of the USDA school lunch program. However, I did find an uplifting article today about schools around the country who aim to grow some of the food that they are serving and work with local farmer to provide sustainable and healthy alternatives to ice-burg lettuce and chicken strips. This is the beginning of a great thing. It educates children about healthy food choices, enables them to learn where their food is coming from and teaches them to stewards of the earth. If all schools around the US could adopt similar programs it would be a huge step toward sustainability. I firmly believe that all change can come through education. 

But, do all of us, young teenagers especially, want to be educated. When I read this article about a Pennsylvania teacher who called her students, "disengaged, lazy whiners" , I had to laugh. Now on one hand, I realize that this is really unprofessional and probably not a smart thing. But when I think of my high school and my frustrated teachers I could not help but wonder about my generation. Do we truly expect everything to be handed to us? Education has become a passive brain-wash rather than an active pursuit in some schools. There are a variety of factors behind this which I think I had better save for another blog. But I will leave you with a Ted Talk that has some ideas about our education system.

Ken Robinson: Changing education paradigms | Video on TED.com

Happy Wednesday
-CCosner