Why The California Furor Over Humanely Raised Pork Matters Everywhere

The Biden Justice Department has asked the Supreme Court to strike down California's Proposition 12, which forbids the sale of pork in California from hogs whose nursing sows were raised in 7 by 2 foot confinement crates. Such sows are not able to lie down, stand up, fully extend their limbs, or turn around. Voters in California passed Proposition 12 in 2018 by a 2:1 margin, with 63% of voters in favor. The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments for the case on October 11.  

The National Pork Producers Council (NPPC) and the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF) petitioned the Supreme Court in September 2021, arguing that Proposition 12 violates the U.S. Constitution’s commerce clause. NPPC claims that the rules would impose “burdensome and unnecessary recordkeeping requirements” among other concerns. The California Grocers Association, also opposes Proposition 12, citing that  “the pork industry is ill prepared for the high requirements imposed by Prop 12.”

In an amicus brief vastly divorced from public sentiment, U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar stated California “'has no legitimate interest in protecting’ the welfare of animals located outside the state” and that voters in pork-producing states must determine what constitutes "cruel" treatment of animals housed in those states —not voters in California who consume them.” On the other hand, Senate Agriculture Committee Chair Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) has called on USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack to support California's Proposition 12 before the Supreme Court. 

“The authors of this measure were sensitive to the fact that agricultural systems can be complex. The law in question here is pursuant to longstanding state authority with regard to health, safety and morals. Right now, there's about a dozen states that have said these types of crates are just too far and we're not going to have them. And then there's a smaller subset of states that have said we're not going to allow these products sold in the marketplace,” stated Jonathan Lovvorn, Chief Counsel at the Humane Society of the U.S.

Andrew DeCoriolis, Executive Director of Farm Forward, observed that "it's incredibly disappointing to see the government side with the meat industry over the millions of voters in dozens of states that have enacted protections for farmed animals." Studies have shown that crated sows can suffer from weakened bones, overgrown hooves, urinary tract infections, and other distresses. 

A number of special interest groups have filed amicus briefs in support of the petitioners, including the North American Meat Institute, the National Cattlemen’s Beef association, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, the National Retail Federation, the Food Industry Association (FMI), the North Carolina State Farm bureau and 11 other state farm bureaus. However, a number of smaller pork processors have indicated that they can comply with Prop 12, including Hormel, which owns Applegate, as well as Perdue, which owns Niman Ranch and Coleman Farms.

Austin Frerick, deputy director at the Thurman Arnold Project at Yale University, points out that, “The ones complaining are the industrial operations that pack hogs into metal sheds that never see the light of day or even a blade of grass.” Pork is a $23 billion industry in the United States. Most hogs live in “concentrated animal feeding operations” (CAFOs), or “factory farms”, averaging more than 14,000 animals each. The majority of the 6 million breeding sows spend a significant portion of their pregnancies in gestation crates: 7 by 2 foot metal cages where they can’t stand up, lie down, turn around, or stretch their legs. The pork market is also heavily concentrated. Tyson FoodsTSN, with 18% market share and $5 billion in annual pork sales, slaughters and processes over 469,000 hogs weekly. JBS, with 20% of the pork market, hit $7.6 billion in sales in 2021 and processes 24.7 million hogs annually. WH Group, the world’s largest pork processor, owns Smithfield, which processes 26% of U.S. pork, and saw record 2021 sales of $27 billion .

Jonathan Lovvorn explains that “California is 9% of the country's pork market and 30% of the industry is already crate free. There's a brief that was just filed by the pork industry's own experts at U.C. Davis, two professors that were funded to do research for the pork industry on what would Proposition 12 would do. What they say is everything the industry is telling you about the cost of this is not correct and is not borne out by our research.” The amicus brief states that “Not only are Petitioners’ arguments flawed as a reflection of basic economic incentives, but they are factually implausible… the model projects that the average price of uncooked cuts of pork in California will rise by 7.2%... and a 0.3% decrease in the price of hogs that produce non-compliant pork.” These cost variances are minor compared to recent double digit, profit-driven price increases in the meat sector.

Lovvorn is also concerned about the legal precedent. “If it's overturned in the way that the industry is asking for, what they're saying is that California saying they don't want this sold is a violation of the Constitution. Essentially, they (hog operations) have a right to set up shop outside of jurisdictions and then sell things into that jurisdiction that are contrary to the laws and ethics of those jurisdictions. If they succeed in getting a ruling like that, it could really be problematic on a number of issues, particularly climate change, but also on a whole host of things that states do that affect products that are sold out of state. In the age of Amazon AMZN , the idea that the location of manufacturer somehow presents a privileged status and that jurisdictions have to accept those products or they're violating the constitution would be a significant reordering of authority between state government and corporations in an era where we're already dealing with tremendous power and consolidation in the agriculture industry. So surprise, surprise, the industry is asking for a system where there aren't really any regulations on food products.”

In an interview with The Checkout Podcast, Professor Silvia Secchi of the University of Iowa explained that agriculture, where 98% of the wealth is in the hands of white people, is one of the least regulated industries in the United States and is extremely adept at academic and regulatory capture. This is particularly the case in hog producing states such as Iowa. Galina Hale, a professor of economics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, says this lack of federal regulations on how animals are raised for food is “a form of a subsidy to factory farming. They are allowed to do whatever they want to increase production per dollar of investment.”

Over a third of hogs are raised in Iowa, followed by North Carolina, whose hog operations are concentrated in Black, Latino, and Indigenous communities with high rates of poverty. In 2018, the North Carolina Medical Journal documented that residents who live near hog CAFOs had higher death rates of all studied diseases, and higher rates of infant mortality, anemia, kidney disease, and tuberculosis. And Iowa counties with the most hogs had higher levels of depopulation, job losses and businesses closings, including retailers and grocery stores, subsequently leading to food deserts.

 “Iowa is predominantly white and we have CAFOs pretty much all over the state. It’s different in North Carolina because the CAFOs are concentrated in certain parts of the state. There is very clear evidence that these areas were chosen for operations because local communities don’t have the same pull with legislators as white communities,” Professor Secchi stated in a recent article in The Counter. The archipelago of hog manure lagoons and consequent runoff when used as fertilizer are also directly associated with a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico the size of New Jersey.

Such hog farms, along with meat processing plants, have become mega incubators for pandemics. Rob Wallace, an evolutionary biologist who predicted the Covid-19 pandemic and author of Big Farms Make Big Flu calls factory farms “an explosive evolutionary accelerant” for pandemic pathogens, that “when you populate the globe with cities of hogs and poultry, you’re going to generate novel pathogens.” And an October 2021 US House Select Subcommittee report found that at least 59,000 meat packing workers were sickened by Covid-19 and at least 269 died. Researchers estimate that an additional 5,000 deaths and 330,000 cases could be attributed to the rapid spread in meat facilities. 

 “When we talk about factory farms and confinement systems, these are integrated threats. They pose problems for animals. They pose problems for the workers, for the environment. They pose problem for consumers and food safety. And so what California is really saying with Proposition 12 is that we don't want to worry about whether or not these harmful products are in our food supply. We want a food system in California that reflects the values of California,” Jonathan Lovvorn explains.

And California voters are far from alone in that sentiment, despite the Justice Department’s recent amicus filing.

There has been significant retail sales and market share growth of plant-based foods over the past decade, with millions of consumers eating less meat and trying out alternatives. And nearly 60% of U.S. consumers are concerned about animal welfare. According to SPINS, meat with animal welfare claims increased 8.8% to $765 million in annual sales, and crested to 12.4% growth in the past 12 weeks. “There is a growing concern over the treatment of animals in our food supply.” said Dan Buckstaff, CMO at SPINS. “Consumers are turning to meat and poultry products that are raised in a more humane way. Products that are labeled with animal welfare claims are growing at nearly double the rate of meat products without such claims.”

Brands such as Applegate, Coleman, Niman Ranch and Mary’s, as well as retailers such as Natural Grocers, Thrive Market, Whole Foods, Safeway, Aldi and many food cooperatives have made various commitments to sourcing humanely raised meats as well as expanding availability of whole food, plant-based alternatives. Meanwhile, worker-led food justice coalitions such as HEAL Food Alliance  and Food Chain Workers Alliance are organizing against CAFOs and meat processors as well as promoting a just transition for their workforce; despite record profits, Smithfield used Prop 12 as a justification to lay off 1800 workers in California.

Professor Christopher Carter, author of The Spirit of Soul Food and a theologian at San Diego University, concludes that “Prop 12 was a milestone proposition because it forces industrial farms to either adjust their husbandry techniques to adhere to the criteria that Californians have decided are humane or to just not sell pork to California. 

“If the Supreme Court were to overturn the will of the 63% of voters in California who passed this measure, then this is not only a major setback for farmed animal advocacy, it also undermines a citizen’s belief that our democratic system can be used to effectively confer rights upon a marginalized group if the giving of those rights presents an “undue burden” on corporations. As an African American, these originalist interpretations of the Constitution feel eerily familiar to the ways laws were interpreted for hundreds of years before the Civil Rights movements of the 1960’s.”

Why Worker Organizing Is So Essential To The Food Industry

The Covid-19 pandemic continues to roil the food industry. Barely 2 years after hundreds of essential workers died from Covid-19, corporate profits continue to soar, driven by industry consolidation and price inflation. But high profile organizing campaigns have captured the imaginations of many food retail and service sector workers, reflecting a steady escalation of discontent with the status quo and a newfound faith in their collective power.

Many of the largest companies in food retail and hospitality continue to pay their workforce far less than a living wage, leading to endemic food insecurity and anxiety among essential workers. The labor share of national income has decreased and real wage growth declined 2.6% year over year, while corporate profits continue to far outpace wage growth. The pandemic also enabled a huge transfer of wealth upwards, as shareholder wealth grew by 57 times as much as worker wages. Meanwhile, the CEO-worker pay gap grew even wider in 2021, jumping to 670 to 1, with employee pay rarely keeping pace with price inflation.

And such inequality has been objectively deadly during the pandemic. A recent study showed that Americans working in retail and service sectors bore the brunt of the Covid-19 pandemic. The death rates of low income adults were 5 times than that of high income adults. And while low income adults made up just one-third of the working age population, they accounted for over two-thirds of Covid-19 deaths.

But the pandemic era has also been punctuated by victories for unionized food workers. RWDSU members at Kellogg’sK in Kansas City ratified a new contract containing significant wage increases and quality of life improvements. UFCW locals in California ratified a 3 year agreement with Stater Bros, which included wage increases, stronger healthcare and pension provisions. And over 47,000 employees at Ralphs and AlbertsonsACI/Vons/Pavilions ratified a 3 year contract after voting overwhelmingly to strike. 

Kim Sisson, a Vons supervisor and bargaining committee member remarked that, “This new contract feels like we are finally taking a step in the right direction towards making grocery jobs a viable career option.” 

AmazonAMZN workers voted in favor of forming a union at their Staten Island fulfillment center, despite millions of dollars of union avoidance efforts by their employer. The new Amazon Labor Union is seeking a $30 an hour minimum wage, 2 paid 30 minute breaks, an hour long lunch break, and the reinstatement of stock options and bonus pay programs that were eliminated in 2018 when Amazon moved to a $16/hour minimum wage. Amazon, meanwhile, is running out of workers to hire in key metro areas while boasting the industry’s highest turnover and injury rates.

And over 150 StarbucksSBUX stores have voted to unionize while dozens more are organizing. Starbucks is one of many service sector companies that pay most employees far below living wages. Starbucks workers hope to use collective bargaining agreements for higher pay, better schedules, improved tipping policies and better safety protections. Starbucks has fired dozens of its own “partners” for organizing and has been accused of over 200 labor law violations by the NLRB, while CEO and Founder Howard Schultz has referred to unions as “adversaries”.  And despite facing heavy handed tactics, essential workers across the food industry, from Amy’s Kitchen to Trader Joe’s to TargetTGT continue to organize.

So what is it about unions that make them so appealing, particularly for the 74% of Americans aged 18 to 24 who would join a union if they could? First, a labor union is not a business. It is a 501(c)(5) tax exempt organization and files no articles of incorporation. A union is an association of workers that promotes and protects the welfare, interests and rights of its members, primarily through collective bargaining. It is created by and for workers, who also have the power to decertify it through a majority vote. 

Next, this right to organize is fundamental. It is not up to any CEO or supervisor. The formation of unions was enabled by the National Labor Relations Act, signed in 1935 by FDR under pressure from a depression-era labor movement. This also established the National Labor Relations Board. The creation of a union is initiated by employees who file a petition with the NLRB showing that at least 30% of employees wish to organize. The NLRA makes it illegal for employers to intimidate workers from trying to form a union or threaten to close down businesses where unions form. However, this is rarely enforced, considering what many companies get away with to disrupt union campaigns. This is also why the recent NLRB petitions for injunctive relief and reinstatement of Buffalo Starbucks workers is so profound and timely. The initial goal for newly unionized workers is the ratification of a collective bargaining agreement, so that they have a collective say in the terms of their employment, including pay scales, schedules, grievance policies and workplace safety. And unions also wield the power of strikes, which have been an effective tool recently, with over 73,500 workers involved in strikes so far in 2022.

Unions, despite now only representing 11% of American workers, have had an indelible impact on daily life. Unions are the reason for the federal minimum wage, Social Security, child labor laws, occupational health and safety laws, unemployment insurance, worker’s comp, the 40 hour work week and the weekend. Yes, the weekend. Social progress was therefore not inevitable nor was it due to the guiding hand of benevolent, enlightened elites. Declining unionization, on the other hand, has been directly linked to rising inequality and a shrinking middle class.

The paychecks prove this. Unionized workers earn 10% more than non-union peers, have better benefits and collectively raise wages across their respective sectors, even benefitting their non-union peers in many cases. Unions have also lowered racial and gender pay gaps, with Black unionized workers earning 17% more, Latin/Hispanic workers earning 23% more and Asian workers 14% more than their unorganized peers, And unionized women earn 52% more that non-union women in the service sector. And while there are plenty of companies that do right by their employees, unions provide what investors would refer to as downside protection for members. Legally binding contracts ensure workers’ needs are prioritized during downturns, bankruptcies or other tough spots in company business cycles.

Unions are also more than just a vehicle for communication between workers and management. They are about having an equal seat at the table and about redistributing bargaining power, so that employees are not on their own when asking for a raise or safer working conditions. Case in point is Amazon, whose CEO can unironically claim, "It is much harder when you have a union to have a direct relationship with your manager and to get things done quickly”. Yet former Amazon supervisor and current Amazon Labor Union President Chris Smalls was fired in April 2020 after directly and quickly expressing concerns about unsafe COVID working conditions at his Amazon warehouse. So it’s not about communication. It is about power.

This is also why union campaigns can be brutal for workers. Three quarters of private sector workers face union avoidance consultants and captive audience meetings. And up to 1 in 5 unions organizers are fired for their activities and 34% of employers fire workers during organizing campaigns.

But as the saying goes, the struggle continues. Workers have also used other methods to achieve better pay, benefits and working conditions. Workplace standards boards in right to work states have enabled essential workers to have a voice in setting policies that affect them, such as in Houston, Texas. Some worker-led organizations have opted for solidarity organizing instead of collective bargaining, such as Brandworkers in New York City. Others, such as Worker’s Justice Project, have organized immigrant gig workers for better working conditions and more control over delivery apps. And rural worker centers like the Coalition of Immokalee Workers and Migrant Justice organize farmworkers who have been historically excluded from NLRA provisions. They have catalyzed a movement for Worker-Driven Social Responsibility, where corporate and institutional buyers sign legally binding agreements that ensure better pay and safety standards for farmworkers. The connective tissues here is the collective agency of working people, coming together to forge a better life.

Tevita Uhatafe is a union member, an essential worker, and the Vice President of the Tarrant County, Texas AFL-CIO Central Labor Council. His assessment is clear-eyed yet hopeful, that “essential workers are realizing just how hard it is to survive under the current economic climate, that it’s geared to keep us down. Many workers are organizing, swapping school or medical debt stories. And with little to no formal organizing training, they’re using their own stories as an opportunity to learn each other’s issues, and how we can make gains together. Collective power is the only way we can force corporations to recognize that their workforce isn’t satisfied with the meager compensation they receive and that we want to be treated with dignity.”

Why Accountability May Be The Next Big Meat Industry Trend

A recent U.S. House subcommittee report has detailed how the largest meatpacking companies worked closely with the Trump Administration to keep meat facilities running at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. The new House of Representatives Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis Report validates the concerns of many worker advocates and journalists, who demanded action in early 2020 to protect meat processing workers. The report’s revelations are just the tip of the iceberg for why stricter oversight and regulations are so necessary for the meat processing sector.

Some of the report’s key findings include:

•       The meat and poultry industry was aware of the risks that Covid-19 posed to workers.

•       Meat companies falsified claims of an impending meat shortage and had millions of pounds set aside for storage and export contracts.

•       Meat companies enlisted Trump USDA appointees to push back against health protections for workers, even against the recommendations of USDA staff.

•       Meat companies worked closely with the USDA to force meatpacking workers to stay on the job, despite deadly conditions and growing infection rates, including preventing state and local health departments from keeping facilities safe and infection-free.

•       Trump’s Executive Order was lobbied for and written at the behest of meat companies so they would be insulated from safety regulations and protected from liability over safety issues, mass illness and death.

An earlier October 2021 US House Select Subcommittee report found that outbreaks in the meat plants caused huge viral clusters in these communities, with over 44% of workers testing positive for the virus and thousands of community members sickened or killed by the spread. Researchers estimated that an additional 5,000 Covid-19 deaths and 330,000 cases could be attributed to the rapid spread in meat facilities. 

The North American Meat Institute, a leading meat industry trade group, said the report "distorts the truth" and "uses 20/20 hindsight and cherry picks data to support a narrative that is completely unrepresentative of the early days of an unprecedented national emergency."

The meat and poultry industry generates over $210 billion in annual sales and employs over 500,000 workers. Despite not being necessary for human survival, meat is heavily marketed to U.S. consumers, including through the beef checkoff, and occupies a disproportionate amount of advertising mindshare. Meat and poultry typically account for 5-10% of grocery store sales and are a key driver of customer loyalty and quality perception for retailers. Yet the business model of conventional meat is an environmental and social catastrophe. 

Just a few conglomerates control up to 85% of beef, poultry and pork processing, including Tyson, JBS, Smithfield, Marfrig, Cargill and Seaboard. Billions of animals are slaughtered daily after living in crowded and inhumane feedlots. Such conditions are ripe for the spread of virulent pathogens, risking future pandemics even as millions of animals are cruelly culled. The meat industry generates millions of tons of carbon emissions linked to climate change and is responsible for nearly 60% of all greenhouse gases from food production. Corporate consolidation has put downward pressures on wages and unionization rates since the 1970’s. The meatpacking workforce is largely immigrant and people of color: over 42% of meat plant workers are Latin/Hispanic. 

This business model has generated enormous profits for shareholders and a handful of executives. Pandemic profits in the meat sector surged by 500% while stock buybacks and dividends topped $4 billion earlier this year. Tyson's most recent earnings report revealed that over $500 million in price increases were passed through to consumers, at an incremental gross profit rate of 25%. When you consider that retail gross margin is calculated by retail price minus cost, divided by retail price, it is no wonder that meat profits have skyrocketed alongside price hikes.

Food justice and worker advocates want to see action taken to rein in the industry. According to Navina Khanna, Executive Director of the HEAL Food Alliance:

“This report corroborates what workers and organizers have been saying for years. We’re glad to see that the House is taking seriously these now proven allegations that the meatpacking industry and USDA colluded to prioritize corporate profits over the lives of working people and their families. Time and time again, the giant corporations that control the meatpacking industry take deliberate actions to line their own pockets, with zero regard for the lives of working people or their communities.

“This time it resulted in preventable illness for thousands and hundreds of lost lives. At the height of a deadly pandemic, through coercion and lobbying, they refused to enact basic safety precautions, like providing PPE, and provisions for workers to call in sick without penalty if they or a family member was exposed to COVID-19. The corporations not only deprived their employees of federal benefits and blocked public health regulations and state and local oversight to keep plants open, but also literally wrote a presidential executive order to shield themselves from any liability for workers’ deaths. They did this under the guise of a domestic food shortage. Meanwhile, they exported the majority of their product, and raked in record profits.

“To date, the federal government has failed to protect the very workers that they deem essential. Congress, OSHA, the DOJ, the DOL, and the USDA must do more to prioritize the safety of this predominantly Black, Latinx, and Asian workforce, and enforce our basic civil rights laws. We are calling on the Biden administration and Congress to act. Our elected officials must hold corporations like Smithfield, Tyson, and JBS accountable for these workers' deaths and the harm to public safety, and to prevent future instances of government and corporate corroboration. We hope this investigation conducted by the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis is a wake-up call that leads Congress to heed the call to create comprehensible and enforceable workplace protections, starting with the passage of the Protecting America’s Meatpacking Workers Act, which we so clearly and desperately need.”

Unions that represent meat processing workers, such as UFCW and RWDSU, as well as other worker-led organizations have also been advocating for The Protecting America’s Meatpacking Workers Act.  Key provisions of the bill include:

·      preventing the U.S. Department of Agriculture from issuing any line speed waivers unless meat and poultry plants show that an increase in line speeds will not adversely impact worker safety.

·      strengthening health and safety standards and communication.

·      expanded safety inspections of plants, with attention to line speeds, work site temperatures and bathroom breaks.

·      strengthening protections from retaliation over safety concerns.

·      new pandemic safety reporting to require plants to report the number of employees who become ill.

·      restoring country of origin labeling so that consumers know their food came from well-regulated domestic facilities

The bill also directs OSHA establish an industrywide protocol for protecting workers from repetitive stress injuries and a mandate to enforce safety conditions in plants. Meatpacking plants consistently report the highest rates of injuries, including amputations, and more than a third of meatpacking workers have carpal tunnel syndrome along with other debilitating conditions.

According to Axel Fuentes, Executive Director of the Rural Community Workers Alliance, who organizes meat processing workers in Missouri and the Midwest,  “Weak existing laws have failed to protect workers in the meat processing industry both before and during the COVID pandemic. Now we have an opportunity to improve these working conditions and prevent the deterioration of workers’ health through passing and implementing new laws and policies. I urge Congress to listen to workers’ needs and act swiftly to pass this bill.” 

The House Select Committee report is the latest impetus for prioritizing workers and communities who have borne the externalities of the meat industry. Unions and worker advocates have quite reasonably demanded greater legal and safety protections. And while such actions won’t resolve all of the calamities caused by conventional meat production, they are necessary and vital steps towards food justice.

How Good Food Enterprises Are Thriving In The Covid-19 Era

There is plenty of bad news about the food industry lately. From profit-driven price inflation, to worker deaths from Covid-19, to widespread supply chain shortfalls, the last few years have been brutal to everyone who needs an efficient and sustainable food supply. But there is good news too, and stellar enterprises that prove that better food systems can be developed under the most competitive and chaotic circumstances.

Food retail is highly consolidated, enabling big chains to raise prices, pay low wages and glean huge profits without accountability. Over two-thirds of food retail dollars are spent in a handful of these national chains. Many bustling metropolitan areas, including Denver, Austin and South Florida, are dominated by 1 or 2 quasi-monopolies. Walmart has greater than 50% market share in hundreds of municipalities. Yet alternatives continue to sprout. 

National Co+op Grocers (NCG) is a business services cooperative based in the Twin Cities. NCG enables community-owned grocery stores, or food cooperatives, to compete with some of the largest retail chains in the country. NCG does this by negotiating competitive pricing and product assortments with brands and wholesalers, as well as by providing operations, finance, human resources and store development support services for member cooperatives. Over 215 locations across 38 states cooperate through NCG, generating over $2.5 billion in annual sales and serving over 1.3 million member-owners. 

Food cooperatives have a deep and rich history. According to historian John Curl, cooperatives were key to the development of the Labor and Populist movements. Cooperatives have also been crucial to developing self-sufficient and sustainable economies in Black communities, as scholars such as WEB Du Bois, Monica White and Jessica Gordon-Nembhard have rigorously documented. 

Cooperatives are also an international phenomenon. There are thousands of cooperatives across the globe, with hundreds of millions of members. According to the International Cooperative Alliance, a cooperative is “an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social, and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly-owned and democratically controlled enterprise” and are guided by 7 unifying principles. Food cooperatives have even become market share leaders in some European countries. While lax enforcement of U.S. antitrust laws such as Robinson-Patman have enabled the dominance of corporate food conglomerates, retail food cooperatives have carved out a valuable niche.

NCG enables food cooperatives to stand out and build on these legacies. Food cooperatives have been leaders of the good food movement from the starting gate. They helped establish and continue to champion Organic standards and were key to building the local foods movement and the plant-based food industry. Over 40% of food cooperative sales are organic, well above the industry average of 5-10%, and rivaled only by chains such as Natural Grocers and Whole Foods. The average food cooperative sources 26% of their products locally and works with over 178 local farms and vendors, helping circulate millions of dollars back into local economies. Many food cooperatives pay living wages, making them an outlier in a grocery industry with widespread food insecurity and high turnover among clerks. Food cooperatives also sell higher percentages of ethically produced products than other grocery chains, including Fair Trade certified products.

Some of the densest regions for food cooperatives include Seattle, the Twin Cities and the Upper Midwest. But they can also be found from coastal Maine, to Austin, Texas to Ocean Beach, California, surviving and thriving among multi-billion dollar grocery oligopolies. Communities across the country continue to plan, open and develop food cooperatives, and are fortunate to have an organization like NCG in their corner.

The wholesale trade is among the most consolidated and invisible aspects of the food supply. On a good day, wholesalers are like mycorrhizae that link producers to retailers and restaurants, enabling greater access to markets. On a bad day, which has become more frequent, wholesaler out of stocks and SKU rationalization limit the choices of consumers. And wholesaler consolidation has reduced competition and enabled revenue grabs such as billbacks and deductions that bankrupt smaller producers. Wholesalers are quite literally the “middle man”, and all that implies. 

The Common Market is an exciting supply chain innovation that is transforming the role of wholesalers. A non-profit that builds regional and regenerative food supply chains throughout the Mid-Atlantic, Southeast and Texas (and soon the Great Lakes), The Common Market partners with farmers to handle distribution of their harvests, ensuring that customers get some of the best and freshest foods. The Common Market distributed over 15 million healthy meals and 450,000 hand packed food boxes to school districts, hospitals, social service institutions and food access NGOs in 2021 alone, investing over $11 million in regional food purchases on $15 million in total revenue.

Since their founding in 2008, The Common Market has invested over $100 million in their host communities and sourced from over 144 family farms annually. Their hyper-local sourcing means that 50% of their suppliers are within 100 miles of their warehouses and 90% of their suppliers are within 300 miles, saving food miles and reducing fuel costs and potential supply chain hiccups. This enables The Common Market to grow local economies and create jobs while circulating and amplifying revenue flow within communities.  Their purchasing standards are transparent and developed in partnership with some of the country’s leading agricultural scientists and sustainability experts, and focus on four areas: local economies, community health, animal welfare, and environmental sustainability. The Common Market also partners with city agencies and institutions enrolled in the Center for Good Food Purchasing’s Good Food Purchasing Program, a collaborative framework that provides criteria and resources for developing ethical supply chains. 

"The Common Markets offers a common sense model — securing markets for family farmers and producers who produce clean, nutritious, locally grown food within institutions that are responsible for feeding communities," says Haile Johnston, the nonprofit's co-founder, based in Philadelphia, PA. "The persistent challenges presented by COVID-19, rising costs, and supply chain issues puts well-deserved attention on resilient local food systems. These food systems offer accessibility and traceability of fresh, wholesome food, and most importantly: place people at the forefront, in and out of crisis. We are proud to help lead the way, to offer our farmer partners fair prices, to offer our communities food they can rely on, to create significant systems changes in our food ecosystems."

According to one of their institutional customers, Abigail Pierce of Jackson County Public Schools in Alabama, “We are grateful for the relationships that the Common Market creates, the delicious produce it offers our students, and the community resilience that it supports.”

Consumer packaged goods (CPG) is the most visible sector of the food industry. From your favorite cereals and soft drinks, to whatever pasta and sauce you need to whip up a quick meal for the kids, CPG dominates family pantries and fridge space. Yet the CPG sector at retail is highly consolidated, with less than 4 companies dominating the majority of shelf space in over 75 different categories. And launching a new CPG brand may seem cool and fun, but the failure rates for food entrepreneurs are astronomical and the industry is brutally competitive for emerging brands.

Yet there are still CPG renegades out there. Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps is an iconic brand and manufacturer in the grocery industry with over $200 million in annual revenue. Famous for the surreal labels on their popular soap bottles, the company has expanded into organic coconut oil, toothpaste, hand sanitizer, and most recently, chocolate bars sourced from regenerative organic farms. But the family-owned company, whose favorites catch phrase is “We’re All One or None”, lives its values by taking care of employees, farmers and their communities in a myriad of ways, detailed in a recent book by Gero Leson, the brand’s longtime head of supply chain.

The company sourced over $23 million in fair trade ingredients and converted over 1000 farmers to organic agriculture, with over 124,000 organic acres under cultivation. 74% of their raw materials are fair trade and 76% are organic, including historically exploitative ingredients such as palm oil, coconut oil and cocoa. Dr. Bronner’s employs over 260 workers, a third of whom are under 35. More than two thirds of employees are non-white, with over 54% identifying as Hispanic or Latinx. Their starting wage is over $20 an hour, 60% higher than the California minimum wage, and the company has an executive pay cap of 5 times the lowest paid employee. For context, the average CEO pay is 320 times that of the average worker; the CEO of Kroger is paid nearly 1000 times the average employee’s wage. The Dr. Bronner’s supply chain philosophy ensures that profits and wealth are shared by all, enabling workers and farmers to live well and thrive, but also engendering loyalty and commitment.

Dr. Bronner’s is also setting an example in areas not usually prioritized by consumer packaged product brands, including landfill-free manufacturing and use of post-consumer recycled materials. The company, in particular CEO David Bronner, has been an outspoken advocate of psychedelic therapy and has supported ballot initiatives to decriminalize and legalize marijuana. The company donated over $16 million last year to dozens of NGOs working on a wide variety of issues, including criminal justice reform, fair trade, animal rights and plant based foods, civil liberties and regenerative agriculture. Along with Patagonia and the Rodale Institute, Dr. Bronner’s has co-founded and helped guide the Regenerative Organic Alliance, which is elevating organic production by including stricter animal welfare, social justice, climate change mitigation and soil health considerations in supply chains and is among the fastest growing and most promising recent food trends.

The food industry continues to be a hotbed of exploitation and supply chain issues. But as Mariame Kaba writes, “Hope is a discipline.” Building enterprises that are sustainable, ethical and beloved by customers is not only possible. It’s the only real choice.

How Windfall Profits Have Supercharged Food Inflation

The Federal Reserve Board has voted to increase interest rates by 50 basis points in an attempt to curb price inflation. The monetary policy move does not address the main reason for increased food prices: how big food companies, exploiting their market leverage, have passed costs onto consumers and reaped excessive profits. 

The food at home index rose 10% over the last 12 months, led by meat, poultry, fish and egg increases of over 13% and beef increases of 16%. Commodity prices are seeing their sharpest rise since the 1970’s due to Russian and Ukrainian supply disruptions, sky high gasoline prices and unregulated grain market speculation. Avian influenza culls are spiking poultry and egg prices. And all grocery categories, except for fresh vegetables, are expected to rise another 3-4% in the coming months.

These price increases have been driven by food companies passing their costs onto consumers, subsequently generating windfall profits. 2021 was the most profitable year for big corporations since 1950, with pre-tax profits rising to $2.5 trillion and after-tax profits surging 35%, enabling the 1% to finally overtake the middle class in share of overall wealth. 

Tyson, one of the “Big 4” meat and poultry conglomerates whose price increases have been scrutinized by the Biden Administration, posted over $1 billion in profit in Q1’22, up 48% from the previous year as beef prices surged over 23%. Cargill, at the heart of the speculation-heavy global commodities trade, topped $5 Billion in profits on $134 Billion in revenue in 2021. And omnichannel monopoly Amazon increased net income by $12 billion and allocated $10 billion in buybacks, while raising the price of its annual Prime subscription from $119 to $139 and paying their CEO over $212 million annually.

In the supermarket sector, for the 5 weeks ending April 2, U.S. grocery sales grew 6.4% in dollars but declined 4.1% in units, as higher prices pushed downstream by retailers started to impact consumer demand. Albertsons, the nation’s fifth largest grocery chain, reported identical sales growth of 7.5% for the three months ending Feb. 26, up nearly 20% from two years ago. Quarterly profits rose to $455.1 million, compared with a $144.2 million loss a year ago. And Kroger, which accounts for over 10% of all grocery sales nationwide, reported identical sales and profits up as well.

Recent research illustrates these inflationary-profit trends, in particular busting the myth of a wage-price spiral driven by increased worker incomes. Over 53% of price increases in the last two years have been driven by profit margin gains, while wage increases were responsible for less than 8%. This is a big turnaround from the trends of the last 40 years, when profits contributed just 11% to price increases while labor contributed over 61%. And a Morgan Stanley analysis concluded likewise, even as news broke of declining worker productivity during the pandemic, that "real wages systematically undershot productivity growth for most of the last two decades, and the labor share of income fell notably as a consequence. Corporate profit margins were the prime beneficiaries of the falling labor share." 

According to economist Isabella Weber , “Outsize price hikes are at least partially responsible for inflation. Companies have bragged about how they have managed to be ahead of the inflation curve, how they have managed to jack up prices more than their costs and as a result have delivered these record profits.” And during a recent congressional hearing on inflation, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.) said “Corporate greed is motivating large companies to use the pandemic and supply-chain issues as an excuse to raise prices simply because they can.”

This profiteering trend stood out in the food industry in particular. Food company profits far outpaced worker wage growth, led by Albertson’s (671%), Amazon (333%), beverage/snack conglomerate Keurig-Dr.Pepper (83%) and commodity giant ADM (55%). And profit gains outpaced topline revenue growth, such as at Albertson’s (by 17 times), Kroger (4.5 times) and Target (3.5 times). CEO pay at these companies averaged over $22 million apiece, nearly 1000 times the average employee annual earnings. Not surprisingly, many of these same food companies pay much of their workforce far less than a living wage including Kroger, Target, Walmart, Dollar General, Starbucks, CVS, Walgreens, Dollar Tree and Albertsons. So much for stakeholder capitalism. 

And shareholders were the main beneficiary of this trend. Stock buybacks as a percent of profit were through the roof at Walmart (38%), Target (52%), Dollar General (117%) and Kroger (50%). If such profits had been given back to employees, it would have meant annual pay raises for every employee at Dollar General of 112%, Target, 50%, Walmart, 18%, and Kroger, 12%. 

This dynamic essentially redistributed vast amounts of wealth upwards. Shareholder wealth grew by 57 times as much as worker wages. The labor share of national income fell back to pre-pandemic levels. While employee compensation rose 11%, real wage growth decreased 2.6% from a year ago, undermining the argument that labor costs are driving inflation. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of food industry workers are food and housing insecure and depend on public assistance to survive.

If Walmart, the largest private sector employer, were to give all of its employees a living wage, it would only have taken 2/3rd of the company’s profits posted in the 12 months prior to Q3 2021. Walmart’s reticence is not just from the executive suite, but also driven by investor pressures. Institutional shareholders tend to view worker pay increases skeptically, consistently tanking share prices when raises are announced and insisting that labor costs be kept at the absolute minimum so as not to lower their returns. 

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Instead of relying on higher interest rates, there are policy remedies that could be implemented to slow down and reverse price inflation, while building a more fair and just food system in the process.

·      Empower workers and make it easier to organize unions, such as by passing key elements of the PRO-Act. Worker-led organizations, such as trade unions, workers’ centers and worker cooperatives provide a necessary counterweight to unrestrained corporate power and influence. This should also include worker representation on corporate boards, which is not as radical as it sounds.

·      Enforce antitrust laws, such as the Robinson-Patman Act, to curtail retailer market leverage. The pandemic has proven that excessive consolidation in grocery retail enables price inflation. The vast majority of grocery categories are controlled by fewer than 5 companies and just a half dozen retailers control more than half the grocery market share. These oligopolies dominate supply chains and pass costs onto consumers without fear of being undersold by smaller competitors who can’t keep up. A&P was split up when it was less than half the market share of Walmart, so the industry is way past due for some disaggregation.

·      Price controls. They may sound far-fetched, but they are as American as cherry pie. Price controls were implemented during World War Two to hold down consumer prices on key items and commodities, and again in the early 1970’s for a brief time. . But when it comes to basic foods and necessities, emergency strategic pricing power should be in the public sector until the crisis subsides.

·      Congress should pass the Ending Corporate Greed Act, which would impose a 95% tax on the windfall profits of large corporations, particularly the oligopolies and quasi-monopolies that make up much of the food industry. Similar taxes were imposed during World War Two and the Korean War to prevent wartime profiteering, so there is precedent.

·      Regulate commodity speculation to prevent raw material price spikes. Grain pricing, which contributes to increased meat, dairy and CPG costs, should not be treated as long-only investment vehicles by institutional investors and hedge funds. Wheat pricing should not subject to Bitcoin-like volatility. Commodity markets were deregulated  over 20 years ago and it is time to look at price parity and stronger public oversight of such critical food infrastructure .

These policy fixes prioritize the needs of workers and consumers. Higher interest rates will decrease the amount of money people can spend on food, leading to greater food and nutrition insecurity. Grocers are already indicating that consumers, particularly low-income shoppers, are buying less as prices go up. While over 83% of Americans think that food should be a human right , 47% of Americans are already worried about feeding their families and over 35% cannot afford enough healthy food. And if history is any indication, higher interest rates may also be a sign that the financial sector has grown weary of working people asserting themselves, quitting their jobs en masse and organizing unions.

Raising interest rates is just a diversion from dealing with the true source of food price inflation- profiteering by industry oligopolies. As the supply chain crisis enters its third year, the priorities should instead be to rein in big business and build a food system that works for everyone.

How Meat Processing Workers Are Fighting For Safer Working Conditions

 recent bill authored by Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Cal.) seeks to address the enormous power gap in the meat sector and make processing plants safer for workers. The bill has earned support amongst worker advocates and organizers, who see it as a good first step in improving industry conditions for meat processing workers.

“The Protecting America’s Meatpacking Workers Act would provide much needed protections for meatpacking workers… It is clear that our food system is not safe for most farm and food chain workers including meatpacking workers that, due to the power and influence of large multinational corporations, have been forced to risk their lives, crowded into meatpacking plants that became hotbeds for COVID-19 outbreaks”, stated the legislation sponsors in a press release.

The meat industry is highly consolidated. Meat conglomerates have used their market share power to exploit workers, increase consumer prices, underpay farmers and generate enormous profits. Pandemic-era net income surged by 500% while stock buybacks and dividends topped $4 billion. Processors prioritized productivity and profitability over worker safety. Smithfield stoked fears of a meat shortage while exports to China surged. And the CEO of Tyson argued in an op-ed that meat production was essential as healthcare and meat plants needed to stay open no matter what. The Trump Administration subsequently increased line speeds amidst crowded conditions, with workers performing up to 24,000 knife cuts and lifting 15 tons of meat per day.

An October 2021 US House Select Subcommittee report found that at least 59,000 workers at the 5 biggest meat packers, including JBS, Tyson, Smithfield and Cargill, were sickened by Covid-19 and at least 269 died. Outbreaks in the plants caused huge viral clusters in these communities, with over 44% of workers testing positive for the virus and untold numbers of friends, family and community members sickened or killed by the spread. With over 500,000 employed in meat processing, researchers estimate that an additional 5,000 Covid-19 deaths and 250,000 cases could be attributed to the rapid spread in meat facilities. 

The Protecting America’s Meatpacking Workers Act is the first step in addressing these injustices. Some of the bill’s key provisions include:

·      preventing the U.S. Department of Agriculture from issuing any line speed waivers unless meat and poultry plants show that an increase in line speeds will not adversely impact worker safety

·      strengthening health and safety standards and communication

·      expanded safety inspections of plants, with attention to line speeds, work site temperatures and bathroom breaks

·      strengthening protections from retaliation over safety concerns

·      new pandemic safety reporting to require plants to report the number of employees who become ill

·      restore country of origin labeling so that consumers know their food came from well-regulated domestic facilities

The bill also directs OSHA to establish an industrywide protocol for protecting workers from repetitive stress injuries, with worker participation in the process, as well as a mandate to enforce safety conditions in plants. Meat packing plants consistently report the highest rates of injuries, including amputations, and more than a third of meatpacking workers have carpal tunnel syndrome along with other debilitating conditions. The bill would also stop employers from preventing bathroom breaks; 80% of workers aren’t able to use bathrooms when needed.

The meatpacking workforce is largely immigrant and people of color. Over 42% of meat plant workers are Latin/Hispanic. The average meatpacking wage is $19 an hour, with many thousands paid much less than a livable wage. About 1 in 5 meat plant workers is eligible for SNAP, double the rate of 20 years ago. The unionization rates in meatpacking have shrunk from 90%, among mostly white workers in the 1950’s, to 18% in 2020. And meat sales continue to increase at retail, cresting $82 billion in 2021, or around 7% of overall grocery and mass market sales. Grocers depend on meat sales to increase customer transaction volumes (aka “basket size”) and have yet to see meaningful meat competition from plant-based analogues, which have leveled out at $1.4 billion in 2021 sales. Regulating the meat industry in the near term is a much higher priority for worker advocates and organizers than pinning hopes on tech-savvy replacements.

According to leaders of HEAL Food Alliance and Food Chain Workers Alliance, meat and poultry processing workers have been organizing for safe working conditions for many years and were on the front lines demanding COVID protections.

“Weak existing laws have failed to protect workers in the meat processing industry both before and during the COVID pandemic. Now we have an opportunity to improve these working conditions and prevent the deterioration of workers’ health through passing and implementing new laws and policies. I urge Congress to listen to workers’ needs and act swiftly to pass this bill,” according to Axel Fuentes, Executive Director of the Rural Community Workers Alliance, who organizes meat processing workers in Missouri and across the South.

Suzanne Adely, Co-director, of the Food Chain Workers Alliance stated, “Meat processing workers have been organizing for safe working conditions and for a voice in their workplace for years, and the COVID pandemic showed us just how much these workers are at risk. While there is still much more to do to protect workers and support worker organizing in meat processing plants, we think the provisions in this Bill are a critically important step.”

And Magaly Licolli, Executive Director of the workers’ center Venceremos in Rogers, Arkansas, gave input on the bill’s contents. Licolli recently told The Checkout Podcast, “These companies treat workers as expendable. They don't see any value of these workers. Workers must be part of the solutions, part of creating those solutions and be part of monitoring those solutions.”

Why Economic Justice Begins In The Food Industry

How do you quantify dignified, essential work? For food retail and hospitality workers in the age of Covid-19 and rising food prices, this descriptor does not translate into better wages. A new report from the Economic Policy Institute and The Shift Project of Harvard University details the low wages at dozens of firms throughout the industry and skewers the notion that profit-driven price inflation is due to workers’ wage demands.

Low wages are the norm in the service sector. The industry accounts for 20% of the U.S. workforce, including 7 out of 10 of the lowest paid jobs. This includes food, drug, discount and mass market retail, food service and hospitality and logistics/delivery. The EPI/Shift project data is based on extensive surveys of almost 21,000 hourly service-sector workers at 66 firms across the U.S. At least 100 respondents from each firm were surveyed, for an average of 317 per firm.

Over 56% of total service sector workers made less than $15 an hour, a data point underscored by the decades long but still incomplete Fight For $15 campaign, which has yet to translate into national policy despite some recent victories in cities across the country. Over 25% of service sector workers made less than $12 an hour across over 60 large companies. At the bottom of the heap is hospitality and fast food, with 73% of workers making less than $15 an hour.

According to the survey, over 60% of retail workers made under $15 an hour, represented by some of the largest private sector employers, including Walmart. Almost 5% of retail workers made less than $10 an hour, led by workers at deep discounters such as Dollar General at 22% and conventional chains such as Food Lion at 15%.

There are a few standouts that defy these norms. Only 1% of Whole Foods workers made under $15 an hour, while Target and Costco have less than 3% of workers making that little. No Amazon workers surveyed made under $15 an hour, despite industry leading injury rates, high turnover and the highly publicized union victory in New York.

About 36% of Safeway, Aldi and Albertson’s and 32% of CVS workers made under $15 an hour. 92% of workers at Dollar General, 77% at Food Lion (Ahold) and Meijer, 60% of workers at Publix, 68% at Rite Aid, 84% at Speedway, 56% at Stop & Shop (Ahold) and HEB, 51% at Walgreens, 50% at Wegmans,48% at Kroger/QFC made under $15 an hour. At full time rates, that is barely $30,000 a year for tens of thousands of grocery clerks and cashiers.

On the other end of the spectrum, 53% of Costco workers, 13% of Amazon, 24% of Whole Foods, 63% of the highly unionized UPS, 22% of Stop & Shop, 24% of Safeway, 21% of Albertsons, 15% of Hannaford, 12% of Wegman’s, 4% of Target, 9% of Kroger/QFC, 6% of HEB, 21% of Aldi, 3% of Food Lion and just 1% of Dollar General workers made over $20 an hour. The vast majority of grocery retail workers in the survey earned between $12 and $18 an hour at their jobs, or between $25,000 and $37,000 a year, unloading pallets, stocking shelves, ringing up customers, bagging groceries, enforcing mask mandates, wiping down and sanitizing carts, preparing sandwiches and helping customers buy food for their families. How do you quantify essential work in the U.S. grocery sector? It doesn’t translate into livable wages.

Yet for hundreds of thousands of service workers, grocery would be a welcome departure from food service, where popular national chains pay even more abysmally. 23% of workers at McDonald’s, 24% at Waffle House, 14% at Taco Bell, 17% at Wendy’s (which has come under fire for their tomato sourcing by the ever vigilant Fair Food Program), 23% of Subway, 22% of private equity-owned Sonic, 25% of Pizza Hut, 17% of Burger King and 14% of workers at Arby’s still made under $10 an hour. Full time, that is less than $20,000 a year. And 63% of workers at the rapidly unionizing Starbucks made under $15 an hour, underscoring the sense of urgency of hundreds of baristas.

On a somewhat brighter side, 24% of Applebees, 15% of IHOP, 14% of In-N-Out, 33% of Olive Garden, 31 % of Red Lobster, and admirable 48% of LongHorn Steakhouse workers made over $20 an hour. On the other hand, this goes for just 2% of Burger King and Wendy’s workers and 1% of McDonald’s workers. Fast food is a grease-pit sweatshop, and little of the recent price inflation of those cheeseburgers is hitting the pay stubs of the cashiers, burger flippers and French fry dunkers keeping working people fed every day.

Not surprisingly, the retail trade experienced 6.1% turnover in February 2022, or over 950,000 separations, a 28% jump from February 2021 when such numbers were starting to make headlines. Nowadays, it seems to be a given that there is so much turnover in the industry. Likewise, turnover in food service increased to 919,000, or 7% of the workforce and a 20% jump over 2021.

Despite media hysteria trying to connect wage inflation to the profit and supply chain driven price increases, the federal minimum wage remains at a dismal $7.25 an hour, a living wage nowhere in the 50 states. And while a number of high profile companies have announced wage hikes and other beneficial hiring and retention perks, the overall outlook for wages in the service sector is grim.

Had wages kept up with productivity since 1975, the minimum wage would be $21.50 an hour; if wages had kept up with Wall Street bonuses, it would be $44 an hour. This amounts to over $2.5 Trillion a year in lost wealth for working people, nearly twice the entire annual sales of the grocery industry, or 3 times the annual Pentagon budget. Nor does this include the $15 Billion a year in wage theft, including overtime and minimum wage violations. 

What the report does not emphasize is that even the companies that pay a large share of their workers over $15 an hour do not guarantee full time, stable, 40 hour a week schedules. Unless those hourly rates are matched up against a full time schedule, it is impossible to meet livable wage thresholds in most metro areas. In my experience, I never would have stayed in a retail career if I hadn’t been full time with a career path, and even then we barely scraped by for many years with my wife working 2 part time jobs. While supporting a family of four we were constantly in debt, even eligible for public assistance, until I was promoted into a regional grocery director role. And that was 15 years ago when housing prices were still reasonable, gas wasn’t $6 a gallon and food at home prices weren’t going up 10%.

Livable wages, or the amount of income required for basic needs such as food and housing, tops $45,000 a year in most states and is well over $50,000 in cosmopolitan coastal cities. Based on the EPI/Shift Project data, only a small minority of service sector workers are taking home enough from their jobs to afford to survive, let alone thrive and make the most of life. It is no wonder that tens of thousands of retail workers need public assistance to make ends meet, a clear form of corporate welfare and externalization of costs to assure profit extraction. It also means that when 75% or more employees at one mass market retailer are food insecure and 14% have experienced homelessness in the last year, we may assume that these numbers are applicable to the entire industry. 

And it also means that the gargantuan profits gleaned by large scale grocery and service sector chains during the pandemic, as well as the billion dollar dividends, stock buybacks  and exorbitant CEO salaries, represent a direct transfer of wealth out of the pockets of retail workers into shareholders and executives. Livable wages could be paid for through more reasonable executive compensation and pay caps- perhaps maxing out at 10:1 and up to 50% bonus rates, meaning company bigwigs could still be taking home $200-300 an hour. Not too shabby. And a more conservative approach to shareholder buybacks and dividends could keep more cash on the balance sheet for employee wages, career development and training. The service sector could instead encourage the growth of a new, deeply diverse middle class. 

And finally, the survey underscores the key demand of recent grocery and service worker union campaigns, contract negotiations, strikes and walkouts/strike threats: better wages mean a better life.

The service sector is ground zero for economic justice in the U.S. If dignified, living wage jobs matter at all, then they should start with the essential work in food retail, service and hospitality.

Why ‘Alt-Protein’ Won’t Save The Planet

A new report by the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems  critiques the growing trend of alternative proteins. By promising a more sustainable and humane food system, this “alt-protein” sector, including mass marketed plant-based foods, cell-cultured meats and precision fermentation products, has been flooded with investment dollars and media hype. And while such well-capitalized merchandizing guarantees serious consumer attention on store shelves, researchers continue to question their merits. 

The Politics of Protein argues that the evidence for the positive impacts of alternative proteins is limited and even speculative, primarily funded by the companies themselves. The report also comprehensively addresses major claims from the alt-protein sector, who these promises benefit and who is left out of the discussions. The study’s lead author, Phil Howard, is a member of IPES, a professor at Michigan State University and a longtime scholar of food systems ownership and governance.

According to Professor Howard, “This report addresses claims that are frequently made, and frequently amplified/oversimplified in relation to higher protein foods, such as meat, dairy and their plant-based alternatives. One of our recommendations is to reclaim the debate from dominant meat and dairy processors, and to have broader conversations, ones that involve the communities with little voice in policy discussions currently.”

The alternative proteins market is expected to grow to $28 Billion by 2025 as entrepreneurs commercialize analogues to dairy, eggs, chicken, beef and much more. Plant-based meat analogues, for example, hit 2021 sales of $1.4 Billion, or up 74% in the last 3 years. This hyperbolic growth has attracted truckloads of investor cash, despite a recent slowdown and concerns about market saturation.

Alt-proteins received over $4.8 Billion in investments in 2021, led by big names such as Impossible Foods, which closed a $500 Million round, and precision fermented dairy leader Perfect Day, which has raised over $700 Million to date. Other staggering capital raises include Just Eggs at $465 Million, Future Meat at $387 Million, Every (egg white analogues) at $239 Million and Upside Foods at $206 Million.

The Big 4 Meat processors have joined the alt-protein feeding frenzy, despite their business models based on slaughtering billions of animals annually. JBS, Tyson, WH Group and Cargill have all made significant investments in the space, including brand/product acquisitions and product development pipelines. This goes likewise for CPG oligopolies such as Nestle and Unilever, who already own vast swathes of grocery shelf space, making the alt-protein sector ripe for turnkey consolidation of ownership. David Welch, co-founder of Synthesis Capital, a food-tech V.C. fund, is one endorser of this ownership concentration, stating to AgFunder News, “Overall I believe it’s a positive trend because they have the scale, supply chain, and access to the end consumer, which will accelerate the transition to a more sustainable protein supply.”

But why all the fuss on protein? Meat and dairy feed production occupy nearly 80% of global farmland and account for up to 30% of greenhouse gas emissions. The meat and dairy sectors are major sources of pathogen outbreaks and are associated with worker abuse and exploitation, including an astounding number of Covid-19 worker illnesses and deaths in the U.S. Annual global meat and poultry sales were over $867 Billion in 2021, dairy over $827 Billion, and seafood over $221 Billion. The race is on for alt-protein entrepreneurs, funders and patent holders to carve out and own out a slice of this lucrative market.

But the global economics of protein are not all the same. Global North meat is primarily sourced from factory farms with a smaller Organic and regenerative sector for wealthier consumers. Global South/majority world animal production on the other hand contributes to the livelihoods of over 1.7 Billion smallholder farmers and acts as an important buffer against food crisis shocks. Livestock represents 40-50% of global agricultural GDP. Fisheries and aquaculture likewise provide livelihoods for 60 million people worldwide and over 3 billion people worldwide rely on fish as their primary source of protein.

In terms of the sustainability credentials, alternative proteins deserve a closer look. Many use energy/resource-intensive ultra-processing, as well as sub-ingredients or feedstocks that are produced through environmentally destructive and chemical-dependent monocultures that are already found in 75% or more of processed foods. This includes GMO corn and soy engineered to withstand high doses of glyphosate or grown with Bt pesticides in their genes, or palm oil that is the cause of deforestation, rural displacement and critical habitat destruction. The high energy requirements of cell-cultured meats mean that any longer-term potential to cut greenhouse gas emissions is contingent on the decarbonization of fossil fuel-based energy grids, an unlikely scenario without major socio-political upheaval in the Global North. According to Chuck Templeton of investor group S2G, another trillion dollars of infrastructure would be needed to scale alternative proteins to the expected demand. And a rapid scaling up of alternative proteins could disrupt and displace the livelihoods of millions across the globe who work in food and agriculture. There is little appetite or funding for a Just Transition for food workers in the V.C.-driven world of alternative protein.

And while the race to disrupt animal protein at a global scale is typically positioned as an environmental or animal rights concern, it is also about market share and intellectual properties. For example, Impossible Burger has filed 14 patents for its formulations, including “Methods for extracting and purifying non-denatured proteins” and “Expression constructs and methods of genetically engineering methylotrophic yeast”, making it essentially the first ever software burger. Impossible has even sued a competitor for patent infringement.

And due to such I.P. protections and patents, risk disclosures of alt-proteins rarely get publicized. The public SEC filings for Ginkgo BioWorks indicate serious considerations for human health and the environment, that the company “cannot eliminate the risk of (a) accidental or intentional injury or (b) release, or contamination from these materials or wastes.” While top investors may be privy to such information, alt-protein media hype rarely communicates the risks to consumers and the general public.

Nor do alternative proteins necessarily herald a shift to more diverse diets and less ultra-processed foods. The gargantuan investments in alternative proteins divert resources away from desperately needed regionalization of food production and processing and eclipse diversified agroecological and indigenous food systems. Even the IPCC has recently recognized the potential for agroecology to mitigate climate change.

The capital-driven focus on alternative proteins emphasizes magical disruption, or competing priorities of transparency and secrecy to drive innovation and capture market share. Underlying this is what Vandana Shiva refers to as “monocultures of the mind”, silver bullet solutions and breakthrough technologies that privilege the loudest, brashest and wealthiest voices in the food system. According to the IPES report’s authors, what is needed is a system transition, not just a protein transition and they outline 3 meaningful reform pathways to get there. They believe the food system needs an influx of democracy and participation, not high-risk venture capital.

Neither majority world/Global south smallholder farmers nor Global North food retail, processing and farm workers are at the “alt-protein” table. That should be a red flag. Nor do all leading vegan and plant-based food advocates buy into the alt-protein hype. And there are distinct perspectives and business models in the plant-based food industry beyond the “alt-protein” label. Beyond Meat has built up tremendous Non-GMO, rotational crop supply chains, while the founder of Impossible Burger champions GMO ingredients, yet refers to cultured protein as “vaporware.” And many scrappy and independent plant-based food brands, including Miyoko’s Creamery, Cool Beans, and Upton’s Naturals look beyond isolated protein to sustainably sourced, whole food ingredients.

“We hope this report broadens the conversations around higher protein foods and moves the discussions away from an overemphasis on protein,” Phil Howard told AFN. “Many of these claims are worded in a way that promotes technological fixes. These approaches will only reinforce current problems, without addressing the political and economic factors that created them in the first place.”

What if instead of investing $4.8 Billion a year in ultra-processed and questionable protein technofixes, there was a concerted policy effort to ensure that plant-forward, healthy, diverse and sustainable diets were made accessible to all, while tackling the concentrated wealth and power in the food industry? That would indeed be a broader conversation.

Why 48,000 California Grocery Workers Authorized A Strike

Over 48,000 California unionized grocery workers have voted to strike in a bid for higher wages and better working conditions. Members of 7 UFCW locals across 540 stores from the Mexican border to Central California approved the strike authorization by a margin of 95%, signaling that thousands of grocery workers are ready to walk out.

Union contracts at Kroger and Albertson’s banners, including Ralph’s, Von’s and Pavilions, expired as of March 6th. Negotiations have been ongoing since January, with workers pushing to earn higher wages, better schedules for part-time workers and improved health and safety conditions as the pandemic continues; thousands of unionized grocery workers fell ill from Covid-19 and hundreds died. The union proposals include a $5 per hour raise over 3 years, while the companies have offered $1.80 and rejected proposals to improve worker safety and minimum guarantees of staffing.

California Kroger division Ralph’s has stated that the union’s proposal was unrealistic due to the cost of doing business in California, including a $133 million annual health care program. Kroger sales topped $132 billion in 2021 with over $4 billion in profits, including $1.3 billion in shareholder buybacks. Kroger’s CEO took home over $20 million in compensation in 2021, nearly 1,000 times the wages of many workers. Meanwhile, a recent study called “Hungry at the Table” showed that 75% of Kroger workers struggled to feed their families and 14% of workers experienced homelessness.

The California strike authorization comes during a wave of food worker uprisings, as retail clerks, baristas and manufacturing workers evaluate what it means to be called essential in jobs that treat them as expendable. Cereal and snack workers won campaigns at Kellogg’s and Nabisco facilities, while poultry workers organized in Texas and Arkansas. Union campaigns have brewed at over 150 Starbucks locations and fulfillment workers have walked out at Amazon facilities. A recent strike victory by UFCW clerks in Colorado gave 8,000 grocery workers their best contract in a generation, including hourly raises of $2.00 to $5.99, higher investments in health care, as well as addressing a controversial two-tiered pay structure.

All the while, the food industry reels from two years of supply chain disruptions and spiraling inflation, driven by food conglomerate profiteering and exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Higher food costs have been compounded by declining living standards as housing, fuel and other basic necessities get more expensive. For Southern California retail workers, costs of living are among the highest in the U.S., with a livable wage of over $57,000 annually for individuals and over $70,000 annually for families with children.

The strike authorization by California grocery workers hearkens back to the 5 month long grocery strike in 2003 and 2004. Grocery chains such as Kroger, Safeway and Albertson’s successfully pushed to slash wages, benefits and living standards of a generation of grocery workers. This time, the union has filed an “unfair labor practice” (ULP) claim with the National Labor Relations Board. According to UFCW 770, the ULP charges include intimidation, harassment, and surveillance of workers, refusals to implement contractual wage increases, doling out bonuses during wage negotiations, and subcontracting work to non-union companies. The grocery chains have denied the allegations.

Albertson’s released a statement on Sunday March 27th saying, "The outcome of the strike authorization vote does not change anything related to this process. We remain committed to negotiating a contract that is fair to all parties, including our employees, and will continue to work to achieve that." Ralph’s had previously stated in the Los Angeles Times that the vote creates "unnecessary concern for our associates and communities, at a time when we should be coming together in good faith bargaining to find solutions and compromise. At Ralphs, we remain focused on settling a deal with the UFCW."

“Grocery workers are essential,” said John Grant, president of Local 770. “They’re not easily replaceable given the labor shortage. We don’t want another disruption. but we’re prepared to strike.”

Kathy Finn, Secretary-Treasurer of UFCW 770 told The Checkout podcast, in regards to union members, “I've never seen them this engaged and upset about how they're being treated. They feel like the proposals from the employers are a slap in the face based on the amount of profit that is made. It doesn't recognize in any way the sacrifices they've made for these companies for two years, the sacrifices they've made with their health, working tons of overtime, coming in when they're needed because their coworkers are out sick, going the extra mile to serve the customers and communities and make sure people could eat throughout this pandemic. And they feel that all of their sacrifice and their hard work is not being rewarded and not being valued.”

“Twenty years ago this was a middle class job,” cashier and UFCW 770 collective bargaining committee member Rachel Fournier told the Los Angeles Times. “People are fed up and they’re eager to walk out.”

Healing Grounds: Liz Carlisle On The Deep Roots Of Regenerative Farming

Regenerative farming has hit the mainstream, as manufacturers, retailers and investors look for ways to mitigate climate change through a better food system. At the most basic level, regenerative agriculture intends to mitigate climate change by sequestering carbon in the soil. But with recent events highlighting the need to address racial injustices and redefine the roles of workers in the food system, there is so much more to consider with regenerative farming. Healing Grounds by Liz Carlisle is an excellent place to start this conversation.

Liz Carlisle is an Assistant Professor in the Environmental Studies Program at UC Santa Barbara, where she teaches courses on food and farming. She has written three books about regenerative farming and agroecology: Lentil Underground (2015), Grain by Grain (2019, with co-author Bob Quinn), and most recently, Healing Grounds: Climate, Justice, and the Deep Roots of Regenerative Farming (2022).

Errol Schweizer: What motivated you to write Healing Grounds: Climate, Justice and The Deep Roots Of Regenerative Farming? 

Liz Carlisle: Food and agriculture is responsible for a quarter to a third of greenhouse gas emissions. And yet you can imagine a world in which it's actually a climate solution. And so I've always been drawn to farmers who are trying to make this shift. How do we take agriculture, which on this continent is so clearly a climate problem and shift it to a climate solution? But something that really struck me when regenerative agriculture started to get a lot of attention in the mainstream a few years ago is the response from the research community, from my colleagues in academic institutions and nonprofits that work on this and even a lot of the farmers engaged in it. On the one hand, you had some people who were so excited about regenerative agriculture as a climate solution. But then, on the other hand, I started seeing a lot of people in the research community saying, wait, hang on a minute here. This sounds like a lot of marketing hype, it might just be smoke and mirrors. So I was really puzzled and really curious. Why is there this big gap between some people who think regenerative agriculture is a really important part of the climate solution and other people who feel like this is something that the big food companies are using to greenwash their products? So what got me started researching this book is this question, is regenerative agriculture really a powerful climate solution? 

ES: Why the focus on regenerative as opposed to organic?

LC: I have done a lot of work in the organic community and I would consider myself a part of the organic community. My first book, Lentil Underground, came out of just beautiful, life-changing conversations with folks in my home state of Montana who were part of starting the organic movement in that part of the world and for whom organic was the way they saved their farms and their rural communities. And so I think that story about the organic movement is really important. I learned a lot in those conversations about the role of agricultural chemicals and the businesses that manufacture them in shaping the way agriculture developed over the past 50 to 75 years. But I'd been left with these questions, was that really the beginning of extractive agriculture? Did it really start in the mid-20th century? And in researching this book, I found deeper origins of extractive agriculture in this country.

ES: And so when you're considering extractive practices in the U.S. food system, what is the significance of land and land stewardship?

LC: The observation that a lot of the organic farmers were making was that the dominant industrial agriculture system in the U.S. is extractive. It's extracting from the land, it's extracting from rural communities, it’s extracting from rural economies. And so I think people have started rallying around this word regenerative because that clearly describes the action that people want to take to reverse this logic of extraction and instead start giving back to the land, start giving back to community and, from a food sovereignty perspective, starting to reclaim land and community and the ability for communities to feed themselves.

And what I realized in researching this book, is that the extraction of soil carbon that folks in regenerative agriculture are so worried about and trying to reverse was part and parcel of a much larger set of extractive processes. And the name for that, the clearest name I know, is colonization. And so the starting point for understanding what's wrong with agriculture, is when European colonists came to the North American continent, proceeded with a genocide of indigenous peoples, a genocide of indigenous food systems. And this very extractive idea about how agriculture would be designed, that its purpose was to extract resources from land, to extract from community, to extract from people who are already here in order to generate wealth for the European elites at that time.

But that logic, if you're really serious about regenerative agriculture, that's what you've got to address because it has repeated itself over and over in the experience of African people who were brought over and enslaved in agriculture and immigrants who were brought to work in conditions that were not much better than slavery. And then ultimately even European-American family farmers who experienced this extractive process. And I think there's a recognition that ultimately, even though there are certain communities that are on the frontlines of these processes of extraction, ultimately they're screwing us all. And climate change is a very clear example of how extraction is ultimately going to disrupt all of our ability to have a secure livelihood and a good life on this planet.

ES: A lot of the dialog around regenerative agriculture rightfully puts soil in the center of the conversation. But what I like about your work is that you look towards the socio-economic relations, i.e., who works the soil. Why did you take that direction?

LC: I think my experience of talking to people who really do have an intimate relationship with soil and land and plants is that I think most of those folks understand that they themselves are deeply intertwined with the natural world, that the natural world is full of all of these embedded histories. When you walk the land, if you're a farmer and you have a farm, when you're walking that land, you see all kinds of signs of the presence of your parents and your grandparents, and maybe generations before that or maybe another family that stewarded that land. You can't speak of healing land without that being a profoundly social project as well.

But I think there are also people who are a few steps removed, who like the idea that simply repairing soil health through some simple practices that don't require a reckoning with political economy might be a way of dealing with climate change without actually having to really face structural racism. That's why I think it's important to be really explicit and say, if you want to bring back indigenous plants, then indigenous human land stewards are very important. And that's what the regenerative grazing conversation is all about: it has to do with indigenous sovereignty for indigenous people. You can't just speak of buffalo as some kind of theoretical model that we're going to use to inform cattle grazing without acknowledging that buffalo are a relative for indigenous plains people. And it's the relationship of the people and the buffalo and the way in which indigenous people were setting fires that actually amplified what the buffalo grazing was doing to the prairie. 

And I don't think I had previously recognized what a deep history agroforestry practices had on the African continent. And there's a lot of really incredible research demonstrating the ways in which those agroforestry practices and those deep relationship with trees and forests have been translated throughout the Black diaspora all over the Americas. Those agroforestry traditions and that relationship with the woods and that relationship with plants more broadly was key to Black resistance and Black liberation movements all the way from enslaved people planting dooryard gardens for their own subsistence and to sustain cultural traditions, through Harriet Tubman using her knowledge of plants that grew in the woods to help sustain people along the Underground Railroad. All the way up through the reconstruction period: George Washington Carver working at Tuskegee and doing research on compost and understanding that the woods provided this model of how to build up biological fertility that could be useful specifically to Black sharecroppers, for whom buying new commercial fertilizers meant being more deeply in debt to white elites, which was exactly the opposite of Black liberation. And then all the way up through Fannie Lou Hamer’s Freedom Farm and the Civil Rights Movement, and then ultimately Black liberation work today and projects like Soul Fire Farm.

This is an incredible thread of ancestral practices of relating to plants and trees in particular that have provided an ally in the face of all this extraction and exploitation. I spoke at length with Olivia Watkins, who stewards a piece of forested land in the triangle area of North Carolina, Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill. She's in a community called Holly Springs, and her family's had this land for 130 years. An ancestor of hers was one of the first Black landowners in the area and bought it in 1890. It was a sanctuary space for her family at a time when Black people experienced so much violence and discrimination. And over the years, her family managed to hang on to that land in the face of just about every strategy you could imagine to dispossess Black people of their land. Raleigh Durham ended up urbanizing in recent years. And so this land that has been for so long a sanctuary for Black people is also now a sanctuary for wildlife, for species of trees that you don't find in the area anymore and for soil carbon. And so when Olivia talks about agroforestry and forest conservation, she's talking about conservation, always in this double sense of conserving Black owned land, which has been threatened, and conserving all this wildlife and these forested areas that sequester carbon, which is also threatened. And that allyship really struck me and that connection between liberation work and regeneration work.

It's time for us to get on the right side of history for an obvious set of moral and ethical reasons, and also because if we don't understand the root causes of the processes that are leading to our disconnection from land, we're not going to be successful in our movements to shift them. And so, if we take a cowardly approach to regenerative agriculture because we don't want to face race, we don't want to deal with indignity, not only is that the wrong choice, but it means we're going to fail. If we don't address the root causes of the problem, we're not going to solve it. And so I think this book, for me, it's a first step of just trying to listen to another set of perspectives other than my own. When I sit with them and reflect on them, I think they ultimately really deepened my understanding of the world around me such that I can better position myself to be effective in that world.

How To Attend Grocery Trade Shows In The Covid-19 Era

Grocery industry trade shows are picking up steam again as Covid-19 restrictions ease. These huge events, such as the upcoming Natural Products Expo West, are opportunities for brands, investors and retailers to network, negotiate, and check out the latest trends.

Grocery trade expos attract a wide variety of attendees focused on buying, selling, marketing and investing in the food industry. The shows are organized to enable brands to display their wares for investors, brokers, wholesalers and, most of all, retailers. Grocery retail accounts for about $1.4 trillion in annual sales. Grocery is composed of a number of different channels of trade, most of whom send buyers and other staff to these shows. These include supermarkets (i.e. national chains like KrogerKR or Safeway or regional players like Wegman’s and HEB), mass market channel (WalmartWMT, TargetTGT, Amazon), club stores (Costco and BJ’s), natural/specialty (Whole Foods, Sprouts, most cooperatives), dollar stores and discounters (Aldi, Dollar GeneralDG), pure-play Ecommerce (Fresh Direct, Thrive Market), drug stores (WalgreensWBA, CVS) and convenience (7-11, Wawa’s, bodegas). 

There are over 280,000 food retail doors in the U.S. But around half of that sales volume is monopolized by the top four grocery chains. Walmart alone captures more than 50 percent of grocery share in over 200 markets. And despite the business models and formats that distinguish these channels, there is now less difference in their product assortment than ever due to the increased consolidation in wholesale, CPG, co-manufacturing and processing. For a brand that is exhibiting at a trade show, it is important to distinguish themselves and know which channels matter most to their business.

Retailers also account for the $200 Billion a year private label industry. An archipelago of manufacturers and wholesalers make those store brand items that are now ubiquitous, from Simple Truth to 365 and Kirkland. And while the private label industry has its own trade show, there is plenty of crossover with grocery expos. Private label teams scout shows for new suppliers or product trends.

Retail buyers tend to be the center of attention at trade shows because they wield the power of the purchase order. Each retailer has its own phalanx of buyers, also known as category managers, and its own schedule for reviewing products and putting them on shelf. Brands and their employees need to know what category their products belong to, when each individual retailer is reviewing and taking meetings, what the launch windows are and whether or not they can afford to get on shelf and stay competitive. 

Retailers each have their own set of expenses that brands need to be prepared for if they want to launch and thrive at a given chain. These revenue streams can be onerous to small brands, so it is important for brands to know what their capital needs are before having these conversations. Product introduction fees called slotting fees or free fill can range from a few hundred dollars to hundreds of thousands of dollars depending on the retailer, the store count and number of SKU’s.

In my time at Whole Foods, my team scaled back slotting fees for local and emerging brands, or we redirected those funds into lower costs called EDLC. These days, slotting revenue accounts for millions of dollars in margin padding for retailers and is tough for most brands to negotiate down. Since many retailers use third party, for-profit wholesalers, brands will also need to know what wholesale expenses they will incur. These include payment terms that require 60 or 90 days of guaranteed inventory, to promotional chargebacks, shrink billbacks and warehouse fees that skim significant revenue from brands and assure the profitability of wholesalers. Retailers will also charge promotional and advertising fees, in addition to requiring that brands fund the markdown expenses when items go on sale, all of which accounts for trade spend or trade allowances.

These trade expenses are a huge piece of the retail business and are what brands use to acquire and retain customers with retailers. Trade spend adds up to $225 Billion a year, or over 20% of retail sales volume. Most retailer trade programs will cost 15-20% of a brand’s annual sales, while mass merchants like Amazon will extract over 30% in trade. 

It is important for the employees of emerging brand to have their eyes wide open about these transactional requirements. Plus, there is no guarantee that retailers will keep product on shelf long enough to recoup these costs. One brand I work with estimated that it would take over 36 months of average sales to amortize the investment of launching at one nationwide retailer. Yet category reviews happen once or twice a year and new product performance is reviewed after just 6 or 9 months. Plus, such smaller brands are up against a handful of Big CPG companies that account for more than 75% of sales in dozens of categories. CPG oligopolies have deep pockets to spend on trade allowances, virtually guaranteeing they will continue to stay on top.

These business practices are now under FTC investigation, as regulators are trying to figure out if they have contributed to supply chain woes and price inflation. Many common retail merchandising strategies would not be legal if the Robinson-Patman Act were actually being enforced. Passed in 1936, this law bars retail chains from using scale to leverage better deals from suppliers. It is supposed to prevent retail giants from extracting steep discounts to undersell competitors and expand market share. However, the grocery industry has never been more consolidated. If startup and emerging brand employees worked collectively to get better antitrust enforcement, they could level the playing field and have better chances of success.

This is because the grocery industry is brutally competitive for emerging brands and the people that work for them. More than 3000 new beverage brands enter the U.S. market every year and the failure rate is over 90%. Only 3% of all beverage brands reach a $10 Million revenue “proof of concept” threshold. In 2019, NielsenNLSN reported over 30,000 new grocery products are launched every year, which is about the total number of sku’s the average grocery department stocks. Only about 6,000, or 20%, increased their sales over the first 2 years on shelf and just 10% sustained their sales. Dr. James Richardson has cited research that over 80% of premium food and beverage brands fail to make it past $1 Million in annual sales. The failure rate for new product introductions is close to 80%; smaller companies and startups are closer to 90%, while well-capitalized, incumbent CPG companies had less than a 25% failure rate for new products. When it comes to the odds being in your favor, the Hunger Games has nothing on being a start-up in the grocery industry. But that doesn’t stop many from trying.

These hurdles for emerging brands are even more stark when they are owned and managed by diverse founders. Over 84% of food companies are owned and run by white people. Consolidation and suburbanization have made Black-owned grocery stores few and far between. In recent years, the food industry has started to reckon with these disparities. New initiatives to support equity and diversity in the industry are becoming more visible at trade shows, such as Project Potluck, New American Table and OSC2’s JEDI Initiative.

These are some of the challenges that exhibitors at trade shows are trying to navigate and overcome. It is why their employees are working so hard at those booths. It is why empathy and compassion go a long way in the food industry.

And while attending trade shows can feel like being at the center of the universe, it’s really just the tip of the iceberg. The real work of the food industry happens in stores, at wholesalers and manufacturers, at co-packers, over the road with truckers and behind the farmgate. The food industry rank and file is diverse and globalized, from unionized cereal manufacturing workers to Oaxacan migrant farmworkers to poultry processing workers from the Marshall Islands. But nearly 8 out of 10 of these food industry jobs are among the lowest paid jobs in the country. A recent survey estimated that over 75% of grocery employees were food insecure and 14% had experienced homelessness in the past year. When you look at wage rates and cost of living expenses, it is fair to assume that the vast majority of stock clerks and cashiers can’t make ends meet, despite handling food all day. This is why solidarity matters. 

And despite the return of trade shows, the pandemic is still raging. While we are told that 1500 deaths a day is an acceptable level of carnage for a return to normalcy, many food industry workers lost colleagues and loved ones to Covid-19. And many are immune-suppressed or have high risk factors. Trade show attendees can prevent turning these shows into super-spreader events by exercising some caution and consideration for their colleagues, including masking up indoors. Be safe out there.

What Consumers Should Ask About Precision Fermentation

Precision fermentation is a relatively new food technology that is rapidly entering the mainstream. Products such as milk protein, animal fats, collagen, honey, lobster, egg whites and more are receiving hundreds of millions of investor dollars. They are being rapidly commercialized for the mass market without the raising and killing of animals. These products are being marketed to a young consumer base that wants sustainable, climate-friendly foods that buck the system and promise a better tomorrow. But what should consumers being asking about this new wave of food technologies?

Precision fermentation technology is a form of synthetic biology and has been around for several decades. It has only recently being tapped to produce consumables. It typically requires the use of genetically engineered microorganisms, which are cultivated in brewery-style fermentation tanks. The little critters, usually yeast, algae or bacteria, are programmed through a range of in-vitro nucleic acid techniques such as CRISPR, gene editing or cloning. They produce or excrete a particular sellable material, usually edible fats or proteins that are biologically similar to animal products. These end products can be further processed into ingredients or finished CPG items.

The FDA’s new National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard would not require these foods to be labeled as GMO because they do not contain the genetically engineered organisms, they are just produced by them. Such products would therefore not qualify for Non GMO Project Verification. Because some may be considered novel foods, it is not clear how they will be labeled or regulated in Europe. And since they are animal-free, they may be considered vegan, but will still need to have the same allergen labeling as their animal-based counterparts.

Because this technology is new and just starting to scale, consumers may still have the opportunity to push for greater transparency. Researchers Julie Guthman and Charlotte Biltekoff describe the marketing techniques of such food-tech enterprises as magical disruption. One the one hand, they intend to replace or compete with the brutality of CAFOs (concentrated animal feedlot operations) and the resulting pollution. But they are also bound by intellectual property regimes that create tremendous value for their founders and investors while clouding potential externalities. With that in mind, here are some conversation starters around precision fermented foods and synthetic biology.

What is in the cell culture medium and what is it derived from? The microorganisms need to eat if they are to grow and produce sellable commodities, like any type of livestock. Is the nutrient bath derived from corn or soy, typically genetically modified to withstand high dosages of herbicides? Are there supply chains in place to provide such nutrient media at scale? What is the caloric conversion and nutrient uptake efficiency of the microbes compared to animal livestock. How much farmland acreage would be impacted? What will be the input costs besides feedstock and how will that impact consumer prices?

How much waste material is produced by such microorganisms relative to sellable product? This includes metabolic wastes, as well as the leftover steep once the spent microbes and consumable material have been filtered out. How will such wastes be disposed of and who is ultimately responsible for it?

How does the energy and resource usage of such products compare to competing animal-based items? Much of the marketing and fundraising for such products revolves around being significantly less harmful to the climate than CAFOs. Precision fermentation requires large investments in concrete, steel, plastic and fossil-fuel dependent electric utilities to maintain the particular environmental settings necessary for the microorganisms to thrive. If the sector wishes to have a significant impact on consumption, they will require the buildout of thousands of fermentation tanks and dozens, if not hundreds of facilities. How will this resource use impact communities already dealing with the environmental racism and colonialism inherent in mining, tech manufacturing and waste disposal?

What kind of testing has been done to understand the potential environmental impact for if and/or when the microbes escape the confines of a fermentation plant, particularly as the technology scales? Can they survive and interact in the variable conditions and ecosystems that exist in the wild? Since some of these organisms are derived from strains that can live and thrive well outdoors, what are the environmental risks? CAFOs have long been linked to the spread of pathogens and pandemics, so will precision fermentation reduce these risks or create new ones?

The biggest set of questions here revolves around ownership, governance and social equity considerations. Just about all of this new food technology is heavily funded by tech oligarchs, venture capitalists, or the occasional celebrity. Bill Gates is just one such example. He made his fortune by enclosing, privatizing and scaling what had previously been mostly an open-sourced, common-pool resource: software.

The investor model here is very Silicon Valley: identify a particular market sector or category and its sales potential, fund the company to offset large losses as it scales, and compete aggressively with the goal of cornering this market as a monopoly or a duopoly. Think: Uber, Doordash, Instacart, Amazon.  The investors throwing billions of dollars at such enterprises are not altruists, even if some are motivated by animal rights or climate change. They have a fiduciary duty to their shareholders and are betting on the potentially enormous upside in the enclosure and market domination of whole commodity groups and categories.

So, is the value of the enterprise in the finished product, as either a raw material, ingredient or CPG item? Or is it in the process and techniques or the microorganisms themselves? Who holds the patents or intellectual properties? How much of this technology is open sourced? What will be the implications for a single company to own the formula for milk, honey or eggs?

Much of the food industry is already heavily consolidated among a handful of oligopolies. Less than 4 companies control greater than 75% of market share in numerous grocery categories, from soft drinks to cereal to toothpaste. Will investors clamor for quick returns through mergers, acquisitions, and joint ventures with “strategics”, aka, the incumbent CPG and supply chain oligopolies? This absorption pattern has been common in the Natural/Organic foods sector for the past two decades, where many once socially conscious and edgy brands took on growth capital and were eventually bought out by the conglomerates they set out to disrupt. Are there any market signals that such food-tech enterprises intend to break from this system and build something more economically diverse and decentralized?

This leads us to questions of how food technology feeds into racialized capitalism. White people own over 98% of agricultural land and make up over 84% of food executives and over 70% of VCs. Yet the food industry is extremely diverse among the rank and file, from farmgate to retail. How diverse are the leadership teams, boardrooms, capitalization tables and investor pools of precision fermentation enterprises? Are any of these companies worker cooperatives or employee owned? Will this new food technology slow down, reverse or accelerate racial capitalism in the food industry?

When you consider that up to 75% of food retail workers are food insecure due to low wages and high costs of living, or that hundreds of food processing workers died from Covid-19, what substantive changes will this technology bring to a food workforce that has tremendous turnover, low morale and a growing sense of injustice with the way they are treated and compensated? We were promised that GMOs, which are now in more than 75% of processed foods, would feed the world, yet they can’t even feed grocery clerks.

And workers’ struggles for labor rights are now in the headlines. Unions have historically been the surest path to a good life for workers. How many such companies would be willing to ratify collective bargaining contracts with their workforce and not use union avoidance firms? Is that even a possibility given the antipathy to organized labor campaigns in the tech sector and throughout food retail and CPG, despite overwhelming public sentiment in favor of unions? 

The life cycle research around precision fermentation shows extremely favorable positioning against CAFO systems that exacerbate climate change. But these studies should also consider the growing category of humanely raised, carbon neutral, Biodynamic and Regenerative Organic dairy products. Nor do they compare to the burgeoning sector of agroecologically produced foods that produce impressive yields, integrate humanely raised livestock, demand land reform and require greater social equity. 

Agroecology is a rights-based process that can’t be flipped to a strategic buyer. Such projects are usually under resourced but scalable and replicable. Many are cooperatively owned and managed and rooted in Black, Indigenous and non-settler colonialist worldviews. Some have been skeptical about recombinant food technologies and genetic enclosures. A few of the more well known examples include members of HEAL Food Alliance, as well as Soul Fire Farm, Sicangu Food Sovereignty Initiative, Virginia Free Farm, Regeneration Farms, Tierre y Libertad Farm, and New Roots Cooperative Farm.

And agroecological projects are backed up over 40 years of field research documenting high yields, nutrient density, shared wealth creation, lower agrichemical use, more humane production and processing, and biodiverse soils that sequester carbon and reduce flooding and runoff. Isn’t that worth attention and investment? 

There are record levels of VC “dry powder” out there, most of which will be destined for high-risk ventures in the hope that a handful go buckwild. In a capitalist economy, what gets funded is what gets established, particularly with millions of dollars of marketing and advertising to engineer demand. So, picture this. For every high-risk food-tech investment dollar deployed, a matching amount is either invested, donated, or gifted to organizations who are building soil, increasing nutrient density and enabling greater food and land access. Or diverted into decentralized processing, refrigeration and frozen foods infrastructure, or forecasting, logistics and delivery technologies that could mitigate food waste and eliminate food insecurity. And maybe the carried interest of successful food-tech ventures should be taxed to fund a just transition for the farm and processing workers who will be laid off and displaced by the growth of precision fermentation ventures. Considering the astronomical failure rates of food and beverage startups, a food-tech reparations model may actually be a safer bet across the board.

his begs the question of whether it makes sense for the food industry to replace one capital and resource intensive system for another, albeit sans animal cruelty and seemingly more climate friendly. Precision fermentation, or synthetic biology, is a clever food-tech. It will hopefully be far less destructive than conventional agriculture, but that is a low bar. Perhaps what consumers really need is a new food paradigm.

Why Grocery Retailers May Eliminate Cashiers

Cashiers have arguably the toughest job in grocery retail. They are the last interaction and most important impression a customer will have in a store. As much as pricing, assortment or displays, they determine the experience for shoppers. Cashiers also collect most of the payments that a grocery store receives, despite being low paid, sometimes even entry level workers. So why is there a growing trend to eliminate cashiers with expanded automation, self-checkout and cashier-less technologies?

Until recently, retail couldn’t function without cashiers. As a cashier you are the frontline of frontline workers, ringing up customers to make sure every penny is counted accurately. An accurate till is your holy grail. Miss it by a few pennies too often and you are out of job. So you are counting cash and staying present in the moment to make sure you give correct change. 

As a cashier, you are herding dozens of customers every hour, making eye contact, occasionally smiling or making small talk. You are handling customer complaints and comments, from belligerent anti-maskers mouth breathing all over plexiglass barriers, to the special diets customers who couldn’t find their gluten-free cauliflower crust pizzas because they were looking in the cooler and not the freezer. All in a day’s work.

When an item doesn’t scan correctly, or a customer thinks the sale price was X and not Y, you get on the intercom and buzz your supervisor to mediate and solve the momentary crisis. When the grocery department is out of a customer’s favorite item, or in the current circumstances where out of stocks are sometimes hovering over 20%, out of all of a customer’s favorite items, you have to be the diplomat and let them know the situation is temporary (so you have been told) and that you appreciate their business.         

When prices start going up and customers either make pleasant small talk about it or aim their frustration about it your way, you handle it politely and efficiently. On a well-staffed shift, you have a bagger at your side packing customers’ items into shopping bags and loading them into carts. More often, you have to switch gears from scanning items and counting change to doing the bagging yourself, 15, 20 times an hour. Occasionally, a helpful customer even bags their own groceries.

When your retail employer put in some automated self-checkout kiosks, they tasked a few employees to hover near them to make sure customers knew how to use it. Most customers still seemed to prefer coming through cashier checkouts. 

Cashiers make the retail world go round.

So why are retailers going out of their way to eliminate cashiers?

Cashier-less technology is starting to roll out to tech-enabled retailers and may eventually impact the whole grocery industry. Executives and boosters claim that tech-savvy customers love it, as it eliminates wait times, crowded kiosks and potential Covid-19 exposures. Customers can pick up what they want and stroll out the door without a single human interaction.

But the technology will have other knock-on effects in retail operations, like recent tech innovations such as click and collect. Not only does the cashier-less technology make cashiers obsolete, but it requires an extreme form of retail discipline, de-skilling and surveillance in stores. Each product must be in the exact place determined by the planogram from corporate HQ. Product must be faced and fronted frequently so that the inventories are accurately captured by the scanning technologies that track the movements of product and people. The inventories are perpetual, everything that comes on shelf and out the door is tracked and quantified in real time, all the time. There is no option as a clerk to improvise the assortment, add new items, onboard local suppliers, negotiate hot deals at the back dock or change the merchandising to suit the seasonality, locality or evolving customer preferences; those decisions are made elsewhere. This new retail environment is total surveillance of stores, products, staff and customers. In the name of convenience, is the retailer now a panopticon?

Such automation is an existential threat to cashiers, who are a service industry unto themselves. In 2018, 3.3 million people worked as cashiers, making it the third largest occupation in the U.S. Retail sales or cashier jobs are the most common jobs in 46 states. There are over 865,000 cashiers in the grocery industry, accounting for 30% of this overall workforce. Such retail workers tend to be younger, over 70% are women, and are disproportionately Black, Latin/Hispanic and immigrant. Most cashiers do not have Bachelor’s degrees and are nearly twice as likely to live in poverty and have Medicaid. And unlike their counterparts in some European countries who have stronger unions and better working conditions, most U.S. cashiers need to stand all day at the cash register.

The mean wages for cashiers hovered around $12.00 an hour in 2019 and the median earnings for full-time cashiers was just over $22,100 annually. Considering their jobs are to harvest and account for every single transaction that happens in the retail store, they are woefully underpaid and undervalued. What they don’t receive in hourly compensation they make up for in sheer numbers. A bustling, busy store will have from 10 to 30 cashiers buzzing along during any given shift. 

Eliminating cashiers is really about rationalizing store labor; those jobs won’t likely be reassigned elsewhere in stores. This major variable expense, when cut, goes right to bottom line improvement. A grocery store typically budgets about 12-15% of their sales for labor, and lower for mass merchants and discounters. Cashier teams can account for 20-25% or more of store labor dollars. Even a partial rollout of this technology would be tempting for a retailer looking to save 2-3% in overhead, even if it radically altered operations and the customer experience. Could this happen? It was barely a decade ago that online ordering, delivery and click and collect were seen as not operationally feasible, yet here we are.

A widespread adoption of this technology would eliminate hundreds of thousands of jobs nationwide. Stores without cashiers may mean slightly lower prices in non-inflationary times, if this cost savings is passed on to consumers. But it also means that incremental profits can be invested into expansion and market share growth. In a retail sector with lax Robinson-Patman oversight, scale is key to locking in better deals with suppliers and underselling competitors.

But more likely, the difference will just be redistributed as profits back to institutional shareholders and executives in the form of buybacks, dividends and bonuses. In the race to the bottom that is food retail, there will be pressure on the whole industry to lower labor expenses, regardless of whether holdouts adopt the technology or not.

But on the other hand, working in retail during the pandemic has caused many grocery staff to question their career paths. Turnover in grocery has been at record levels for the past year, with hundreds of thousands of employees changing jobs or leaving the industry. Fed up with low wages, poor benefits, difficult customers, erratic schedules, long hours and lack of childcare or sick leave, retail workers have been a leading force in the so-called “great resignation.” And while many retailers have raised wages and increased benefits in order to attract and retain workers, these boosts are usually well below what constitute livable wages in most major metro areas.

This threshold is typically north of $50,000 a year after taxes, or what the minimum wage would be if it had kept up with productivity growth since the 1960’s. Retailers have used the workforce turnover and staffing issues as an opportunity to invest in more automation and de-skilling technologies. It could mean that once these jobs are gone, they are gone for good.

Yet there is a healthy strain of misanthropy in assuming that jobs should get replaced by artificial intelligence in the name of convenience and narrowly defined consumer sovereignty. Are livable wages with good benefits, plus safe and convivial working conditions really that anachronistic and unachievable? It seems like technology historian David F. Noble was prophetic in his understanding of automation as authoritarian.

On your next trip to the grocery store, thank your cashier for their hard work. Maybe dial up the store manager and let them know how much you appreciate cashiers. Or call your congressperson and ask them to protect blue collar jobs from automation. Before they are gone forever.

Where Do Grocery Prices Come From?

Food retail prices are going up. The corporate consolidation and profiteering behind these inflationary pressures gives us the opportunity to examine how pricing decisions are made, what factors are used to determine prices and what this all says about our food system. But let’s start with where prices come from.

Prices are set by either retail category managers or pricing analysts according to their category role (competitive, destination, innovation, etc.), market intel, demand elasticity and the corresponding gross margins and sales targets. Any given retailer will have dozens of product categories based on particular purchase occasions, such as milk, yogurt, snack bars, citrus, berries, etc. These staff who negotiate prices with suppliers are accountable to financial targets set by executives. Pricing strategy is a major tool these workers use to achieve or exceed these expectations, lest they lose their jobs. Pricing is skilled work, akin to high stakes gambling with spreadsheets and algorithms.

One basic pricing example is store brand milk, a highly competitive, known value item also subject to some levels of federal and state pricing regulations. Milk is typically priced at low single digit or negative margins to match pricing with every other retailer selling the same stuff in their own brand, such as Lucerne, HEB Select, Good & Gather, or 365. On the other hand, a local, pasture-raised, cream-top, low heat-pasteurized milk will more likely be priced with margins in the 20’s or higher, because it is considered premium and retailers assume customers will tolerate a higher price. The goal here is that the blended average of unit sales and margin rates across all milk sku’s in the category will yield the desired gross margins. 

Likewise, a Greek yogurt may be priced low to move volume and create value-perception. But independent of item-level costs, a plant-based, cashew yogurt may be priced higher because customers are willing to pay more for innovative dairy free items. The blended margins derived from the millions of yogurt cups sold daily and their respective margin rates means that yogurt category margins are typically higher than milk, usually in the 30’s. When you zoom out with this same concept across a store with tens of thousands of products, you can gauge the impact of pricing on retailer profitability and sales growth.

Next step upstream for pricing is wholesale. Retailers typically contract with wholesalers to supply them with many products they sell; brands and growers rarely deliver directly to chain stores. Sometimes the wholesaler is a cost center, and a vertically integrated division of the retailer. Much of the time a wholesaler is a for-profit, third party company, either publicly traded, privately held, or cooperatively owned by its members. Respective examples include UNFI, C&S, and Wakefern. The wholesaler carries what retail customers will stock. They derive revenue from selling those products, both through wholesale markups downstream to retailers, and through promotions, advertising and chargeback programs upstream to brands. Due to lack of enforcement of Robinson-Patman, bigger retailers command better costs and better inventory and assortment priorities. Wholesale retail markups can be as low as 2 or 3% in such mass market operations, or up to 25 or 30% for specialty wholesalers. Most often, the wholesale markup is around 5-15%.
Proceeding upstream further, both CPG brands and produce growers, for example, sell their products to a given wholesaler based on what the retailers think customers want. A fruit or vegetable grower will set a case rate price for their carrots, squash or apples depending on what the market will bear, what will cover their labor and overhead, and what wholesalers are willing to accommodate. Growers hope to achieve price parity, where the price they receive covers their operating costs and profits, but that is not always the case. Yet all growers and brand owners also benefit from underpaid and exploited farm labor. Domestic farmworkers are not protected by New Deal-era labor protections, such as overtime pay and collective bargaining. The cost of farmworker labor and how it is factored into retail pricing is much lower than the value that farmworkers contribute to the food system.

For a multi-ingredient CPG company, pricing gets more complicated, and depending on the product, can be much more lucrative. A smaller, emerging brand will likely have higher raw material and production/co-packing costs due to lack of scale and market share. Depending on its stage in the business cycle, such a small brand may not yet be profitable. Their price will be set by estimating what the retailer margins and wholesale markups need to be and what they hope the retailer will set as their shelf price. Also figured is how much trade spend is needed to support advertising and promotions, and what gross margins the brand needs to operate. Pricing for emerging brands can make or break the business; set a price too high to lessen pressure on operating margins and the product may not sell. Set the price too low and the company may miss payroll and go under. 

A larger, incumbent CPG company has it much easier, but is yet more complicated. Such companies, like, PepsiCo, Kellogg’s or Mondelez, negotiate large scale raw materials contracts across multiple business units and globalized supply chains. They are able to take advantage of multilateral trade deals and vertically integrated or outsourced manufacturing. They have multiple “buckets” of trade spend that can be allocated across business units to deploy ad dollars to gain and retain customers, as well as fund the expensive slotting, listing and referral fees at mass merchant and omnichannel retailers that optimize placement. Grocery trade spend is a big deal, with transactions of over $225 Billion annually.

But both emerging brands and Big CPG companies factor various elements of cost into their price architecture. As an example, let’s consider a hypothetical line of snack bars made of oats, sugar, soy protein, and a handful of other ingredients. The emerging brand decides to source organically grown oats that are certified glyphosate free, plus organic soy protein and vanilla extract, fair trade sugar and cocoa, and guar gum. The incumbent CPG brand decides that they can undersell the upstart competitor by producing a similar line of products, but with conventional oats, GMO corn syrup and soy, an artificial flavor called vanillin, mass balanced, untraceable cocoa most likely tainted with forced or trafficked labor, and a host of stabilizers, humectants and preservatives to extend the shelf life. The latter product is going to have much cheaper costs, enabling higher margins, bigger trade spend rates and a lower shelf price, probably enabling the Big CPG company to maintain its category dominance despite customer trends pointing towards the emerging brand’s attributes.

Yet this difference in price leads us to a sticky quandary in the supply chain. How are these elements of costs accounted for? Some input costs are pretty standard, such as fuel, shrink wrap, corrugated cardboard, wooden pallets. But what about the ingredients? 

Conventional oats tend to be sprayed for weed control upon planting and then again pre-harvest for desiccation, leaving herbicide residue in consumer products. Organic oats typically rely on crop rotation, mulching and other low-tillage practices to reduce weeds and pest pressure, and are not sprayed with probable carcinogens. GMO ingredients like soy and corn are typically Round-up ready, heavily sprayed with glyphosate and other herbicides, or engineered with Bt pesticides in their genomes using viral vectors. These multi-stack traits enable high yields and low labor costs, but also gift us with air pollution and herbicide drift, soil loss, fertilizer and herbicide runoff, algal blooms, polluted groundwater and waterways, Gulf-spanning dead zones, as well as rampant chemical residues in consumer-ready products. And these chemical dependent monocrops crops destined for processing or animal feed tend to be heavily subsidized, with public funds underwriting 20% or more of the income of overwhelmingly white, large scale, land-owning, boomer-aged farmers. These are the externalized cost of cheap food prices.

The downstream environmental, health and economic burdens of these externalities are not factored into the shelf price. They are instead borne by the most vulnerable in society, particularly farmworkers, rural communities and the urban poor. According to a recent study, less than one third of externalized costs are included in pricing. On the other hand, the many environmental, health and community benefits of organic, regenerative and other agroecological systems are not accounted for to lower costs. Sustainability attributes are instead counted as added-values to enable higher mark-ups and profits throughout the value chain, up to and including the retail shelf price, putting such products out of reach of millions of consumers. The good stuff ends up more expensive, despite being much more cost-effective to society and the planet. 

Retail price inflation is just the tip of the spear for what’s wrong with our food system. We have the ability ensure good food, clean water, healthy environments and liveable wages for all. But instead, the ongoing food pricing crisis illustrates a system rooted in precarious, transactional relationships and geared towards maximum profit, consolidation and externalized costs. No wonder it is a high-stakes, complicated mess.

Why Is Food Insecurity So Widespread In The Grocery Industry?

Mass market grocery has a curious relationship with food access. On the one hand, grocers are among the largest donors to food aid organizations and help make SNAP benefits possible for millions. On the other hand, food insecurity, driven by low wages and precarity, is growing among grocery workers. Is food insecurity 2022’s biggest grocery trend? 

The USDA defines food insecurity as a household-level economic and social condition of limited or uncertain access to adequate food, leading to hunger. According to a recent survey commissioned by UFCW, over three quarters of Kroger workers are food insecure. Kroger is the country’s largest full service grocery chain, with 10% market share and operating over 2700 stores and dozens of banners. The company earned $132 Billion in annual sales and $2.5 Billion in net income in 2021, on relatively slim 23% gross margins. Adjusted for inflation, since 2010, sales have grown by 36%, and net income by over 100%. Yet hourly wages have dipped 3-5% in value in that timeframe, with average wages under $30,000 a year.

Over 37,000 UFCW members at Kroger Divisions in Los Angeles, Colorado and Seattle responded to the survey, which was published by Economic Roundtable. One worker noted, “Every day it’s a struggle and the constant fear of getting fired is getting to me. I'm a single father and I live on pay check to pay check to make sure my kids eat.”

And last week, independent media outlet More Perfect Union revealed that the company was well aware of employees’ struggles. A 2018 leaked internal Kroger report warned that hundreds of thousands of company workers relied on food stamps and other public benefits just to get by. The report quoted an employee saying, “Something is wrong when the people who are actually making this company profitable are the ones deepest in poverty. I literally work at a grocery store and can’t afford to eat regularly.” Kroger declined to comment on the leak.

The 2018 report noted that in their headquarters state of Ohio, Kroger had the third highest number of employees receiving public assistance, after Walmart and McDonald’s MCD -0.5%. Most Kroger employees in Ohio were noted as living in poverty. Low wages were cited as the major reason why employees would quit. According to Payscale.com, the average take home pay for hourly store staff was just over $12 an hour for Kroger employees in 2021, with baggers, cashiers and clerks making as little as $8 an hour. The company recently announced wage investments to lift the average wage to $16 an hour. Livable wages, or the amount of income required for basic needs such as food and housing, tops $46,000 a year for Ohio and $50,000 in Virginia, Colorado, California and Washington, where Kroger operates hundreds of stores.

The 2018 Kroger report coincided with that year’s launch of Zero Hunger Zero Waste. The initiative partners with nonprofits such as Feeding America, Meals on Wheels and WWF to “help unlock critical food access in communities”. It includes an ask for customers to “round up” and donate to the initiative at check out. A Kroger press release in April 2021 highlighted over “$213 million in charitable giving to help end hunger in its communities”, while the affiliated Zero Hunger Zero Waste Foundation granted $16 Million to dozens of noteworthy organizations focused on food security and food waste across the country. The 2021 Kroger proxy statement likewise highlighted not only “racial disparities but food inequities” from Covid-19 and called out company efforts in “focusing on ways to support food-insecure households… we directed a record 1-year total of 640 Million meals to fight increased food insecurity”. The internal Kroger source who leaked the 2018 report noted that the company was focused on suppressing wages while burnishing their public image in order to deliver the promised 8-11% returns for shareholders.

Kroger is not alone in this curious dance with food access. Because Walmart is non-union, there is no comparable survey data to the UFCW report. So instead, here is some context for the country’s largest private sector employer. Nearly 1 out of 3 food retail dollars are spent at Walmart in the U.S. In 2021, Walmart had over $559 Billion in sales and $13.5 Billion in net income, on 25% gross margins. Walmart’s hourly take home for employees is $12.82, with many popular positions such as cashier and stock clerk averaging under $12 an hour. The company recently announced wage hikes to $12 an hour minimum and a $16.40 company average. Walmart is also the largest employer across much of the country, particularly Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Mississippi and Alabama. The retailer is also the market share leader in many metro areas across these states, with 69% share in Fayetteville-Rogers Arkansas, 60% in Oklahoma City, 52% in Tulsa, and 56% in Gulfport-Biloxi Mississippi. The livable wage is at least $45,000 a year in these states. Food insecurity is over 16% in Arkansas, Alabama, Oklahoma and Louisiana and over 20% in Mississippi, with at least 1 in 5 children in each state food insecure.  

Like Kroger, Walmart partners with nonprofits to alleviate problems that its business model may contribute to. Walmart has closely partnered with Feeding America with the Fight Hunger. Spark Change campaign, stating that “Walmart and Sam’s Club have long-encouraged associates and our customers and members to help fight hunger and spark change in their communities.” Walmart is one of Feeding America’s visionary partners and most generous donors, funding the distribution of over 265 million meals in the past year. Like Zero Hunger Zero Waste, Feeding America has encouraged customers to “round up” and donate at Walmart's cash registers. While vital to ensuring millions have food, such food charities have come under criticism for not advocating for higher wages and collective bargaining efforts.

And we can’t discuss food access with bringing up SNAP, among the world’s largest food aid programs. SNAP feeds nearly 9 times as many people as all food banks combined; over 42 Million people and 22.1 million households are enrolled. SNAP is crucial to the grocery industry. Over 80% of SNAP benefits are spent in supermarkets such as Kroger and Walmart, contributing $64 Billion in revenue annually, and growing. Researchers have estimated that up to 4% of annual Walmart revenues are derived from SNAP. And across 9 states that track SNAP beneficiaries, Walmart was by far their largest employer, with over 14,500 workers enrolled. Monthly SNAP benefits recently increased for the first time in 45 years, up $36.24 monthly per person to $157. Yet this may be stretched thin by the profit-driven food price inflation of these same major grocery retailers. 

And here’s the big picture. Over 40% of Americans live in poverty or in low income households. The federal minimum wage has been held at $7.25 since 2009, despite recent market adjustments driven by retail and hospitality workers quitting by the thousands. And while most food insecure households are white, the racial disparities in food insecurity have worsened since 2019, with food insecurity increasing to 21% of Black and 17% of Hispanic households. It is not a coincidence that Black and Hispanic workers are overrepresented in many of the low wage jobs in the food systems, in particular retail and wholesale, and that up to 8 of the top 10 lowest paid jobs are in the food industry. Is it any surprise that ex-retail workers started the 1.6 million strong r/antiwork? Or that 7000 grocery workers are on strike in Colorado? Even Henry Ford, warts and all, realized he should pay his workers enough to afford his products.

So is food insecurity a key trend of mass market grocery in 2022? The broader food industry has been largely quiet on this phenomenon. Or maybe it is just a case of winners take all. But food insecurity may hint at a greater dynamic at play in the grocery sector, one that demands solidarity and collective action. Farmer, Bronx community organizer and food justice icon Karen Washington can break this down for us:

 “Food apartheid” looks at the whole food system, along with race, geography, and economics. You say “food apartheid” and you get to the root cause of some of the problems around the food system. It brings in hunger and poverty. It brings us to the more important question: What are some of the social inequalities that you see, and what are you doing to erase some of the injustices?”

Why Are Rich Products Bakery Workers On Strike?

Bakery workers at a Rich Products frozen foods facility in Southern California have been on strike since November. Cristina Lujan, an employee and union member with BCTGM Local 37, discusses the working conditions and what these workers want.

Errol Schweizer: Why are you and your co-workers workers on strike?

Cristina Lujan: We are on strike because we're fighting for higher wages, affordable health care and to be treated with respect and dignity.

ES: How long have you folks been on strike?

CL: We've been on strike since November, over two months now.

ES: So what type of products do you folks make? Where are they found? 

CL: We make ice cream cakes for companies like Baskin Robbins, Coldstone, Walmart WMT +2.2%, Costco, Ralph’s, Vons, Smart & Final SFS 0.0% and Safeway.

ES: What is it like to work in these facilities making ice cream cakes?

CL: We work under cold conditions obviously because it's ice cream. It's always wet because we always change over to different products and different cakes and we have to wash down the line. So we're always on wet surfaces and since we start at the beginning of the day until the end of day, it's just a go-go-go type of thing.

ES: How do you make an ice cream cake?

CL: Well, first it starts off with the tank bringing in the mix. It gets pasteurized, it gets thrown into these big tanks where it's produced into ice cream. And then it goes in through 2 pipelines. And then we have different size of pans for the different sizes of cakes and ice cream is dropped into the pan. And then it goes into the freezer and it's in there for 24 hours. And the next day it goes into either the packer line or they just need to add some cookie crumbs and then onto the unit filler line, which is the line I run.

ES: How many cakes do you make a day and how quickly can you make an ice cream cake? 

CL: Thirteen Cakes per minute

ES: So that's 1 cake every 4 seconds. And just like that, you made another cake. You each make 6240 Ice cream cakes per day. That's amazing. 

ES: Who works in these facilities?

CL: In our plant, I can say about 90% of us are women, a lot of them are single working moms, ages probably run between 40 to 55 years old.

ES: What has it been like during the COVID-19 pandemic?

CL: It's been very stressful. We all know COVID itself has been very terrifying, very stressful. And we've been working through it, we worked through the whole pandemic. I can say we were off maybe 2 weeks, at the most. You know, being fearful everyday going into work, for me, it was very scary because my mother started cancer treatment. So it was very stressful to not bring this home to her, and I still had to attend her and help her. And you were hearing from people that they've been positive because the company wasn't very good at informing us when people were leaving because of COVID. We were just kind of figuring it out on our own. And I didn't have to leave, thank God, because of COVID. But from what I heard from a lot of my co-workers, when they would leave, they were really pressured into coming back soon, with human resources on them, calling them every day. “How are you feeling? Did you get tested? When are you gonna come back?” 

It was pretty hard and is still pretty stressful.

ES: Have you had to work a lot of overtime?

CL: Yes. They let you know, like 5 minutes before your shift is over. You're not even prepared to stay for overtime. And you have to stay as mandatory, there's no option. They don't ask you “can you stay”? It's “you have to stay”. And you don't know the amount of time. It could be 20 minutes only, it could be 3 hours, it could be 2 hours. You never know the amount of time you're gonna stay overtime.

ES: What are the demands of you and other striking workers at the Jon Donaire Facility?

CL: We are asking for higher wages, which is we're only asking for $1. Our contract is three years. So we were asking for $1 for each year, a total of $3 raise after 3 years and for insurance to remain the same plan that we have now because they want to raise what we pay out of pocket.

We’re asking them to notify us on overtime. And also we're demanding more sick days because we only have three sick days, which we have only because the state made it mandatory for us. And we are on a 7 point program. We're allowed from day 1 through a year we're allowed 7 points. You get 1 point for missing work. You get half a point for getting to work late. And you get half a point if say I asked for permission because I have a 9 A.M. doctor's appointment and I need to leave at 8:30 and the permission is denied. I can still leave to my appointment but I'll have to leave with half a point. We actually have women in our plant that are going through cancer treatments. One of my co-workers that I'm close to, she started cancer treatment right before our strike,. And she was denied many appointment. And that's something that it's a need, it is not because you want to, and she was denied all these appointments. Imagine she's going to accumulate her points eventually get fired.

ES: How can folks support your campaign? 

CL: Well, the main thing is this, making it public to show the greed of this corporation. The worth of this corporation is $7.5 Billion dollars. So I think that they can afford to pay us what we're asking for. And we're gonna fight until we get something that's better. And please support our strike fund.

This interview has been abridged and lightly edited for clarity.

Note: Rich Products shared a statement with the author, including the following.

“We continue to operate in good faith and welcome back any striking workers with open arms, many of whom have already returned to work. 

This is the first strike in Rich Products’ 77-year history – because the family-owned company consistently provides our associates with competitive wages, high-quality benefits, safe working conditions and a respectful working environment. We will continue to do so.

Rich’s associates, many of whom are multi-generational and average 10 years of tenure at the plant, currently have a platinum health-care plan, of which the company pays 90% of the premium with no deductible; up to 38 days of annual paid time off; and a company-paid pension plan. The company recently presented its last and final contract offer that would have retained all that, and also included wage increases for each of the three years of the next contract, to ensure wages continue to be at or above-market for similar roles in Los Angeles County.”

Why Were Denver Kroger Workers On Strike?

Over 8,500 grocery workers at over 80 King Soopers/City Market locations in Denver and Colorado Springs went on strike Wednesday, Jan. 12. The negotiations between UFCW Local 7 and Kroger KR +1.6% owned chain have reached an impasse, with the union rejecting the latest company offer. The union has also commissioned a timely report on the poverty, food insecurity and homelessness affecting Kroger workers in multiple cities, providing crucial context for the hard line that the bargaining unit has struck at the urging of their members.

After 17 hours of negotiation on Jan. 5, UFCW rejected a $148 million investment from Kroger in wages, signing bonuses and benefits, according to a statement from King Soopers. The union, which is pushing for materially better wages, pension and health benefits, has countered that the proposed agreement includes numerous concessions. This includes an unpopular multi-tiered wage system, where some workers would get paid significantly less for doing the same work as others.

Union members overwhelmingly approved the strike, particularly after the grocer started hiring temporary workers to fill shifts in stores. The union subsequently filed an unfair labor practices complaint.

“King Soopers/City Market has followed the law and has not received any notice of wrongdoing from the National Labor Relations Board,” the company said in a statement. “King Soopers/City Market remains focused on the bargaining process and is committed to negotiating in good faith and settling a contract that is good for our associates while keeping groceries affordable for our customers.”

At the heart of the issue in Colorado is whether or not grocery retail employment can provide living wages and fulfilling career paths for workers. A new report commissioned by several UFCW locals sheds critical light on the lives of the racially diverse Kroger workforce. Entitled “Hungry At the Table”, the white paper is the largest such research project yet, surveying almost 37,000 workers in Colorado, Seattle and Southern California. The takeaways are startling:

Over three quarters of Kroger workers are food insecure, over 7 times the national average. This means they cannot afford a healthy, balanced diet, they run out of food between paychecks and they regularly skip meals.

• 9 out of 10 workers report that their wages have not increased as much as basic expenses; adjusted for inflation, since 1990 Kroger clerks have seen an 11-22 percent decline in wages. Nearly two thirds of Kroger workers face frequent economic hardship, particularly workers in their 20’s, with over 50 percent unable to afford rent.

• 85 percent of Kroger workers who are single parents are food insecure and cannot afford to provide enough good food for their kids.

• 14 percent of Kroger workers have experienced homelessness in the past year, 36 percent worry about being evicted and 44 percent live in inadequate housing.

• Kroger’s just-in-time labor scheduling is another stressor, with over half of workers having different schedules every week and the majority getting little notice of when their schedules will change. Only 16 percent work fixed schedules.

• Over two thirds of workers had difficult customer interactions during the pandemic, one quarter were confronted by customers threatening violence and over a fifth experienced violent incidents at their stores, capped off by a deadly mass shooting at a local King Soopers in March 2021.

• Three quarters of Kroger workers reported ongoing depression and anxiety.

• Kroger has been among the most successful food companies during the pandemic. The broadline retailer has rapidly innovated to stay ahead of trends, from supporting more diversity in their supplier community, to developing a leading private label assortment and healthier food options, to omnichannel ordering and fulfillment strategies, such as Vitacost and their Ocado partnership. The Cincinnati based grocer captured nearly 10 percent of the industry sales volume, second only to Wal-Mart. Kroger clocked 8 percent sales growth to $132 Billion in sales, with over $2.5 Billion in net income in 2021, on top of the $1.7 Billion in 2020. The retailer has recently distributed 2 billion dollar rounds of shareholder buybacks to investors and executives and their CEO earned over $22 Million in compensation, over 900 times what hourly wage earners took home annually.

  But the “Hungry At the Table” report makes some recommendations that would provide some measure of economic justice and security to workers without sacrificing any of Kroger’s competitive edge:

  • Increase minimum pay to $45,760 annually, a modest amount to survive in Seattle, Denver or Los Angeles and a significant increase from workers’ average earnings of just under $30,000 annually.

  • Immediate housing assistance for employees facing eviction or homelessness

  • Increase full-time worker share to 60 percent from the current 30 percent

  • Provide a 50 percent grocery discount for workers to alleviate food insecurity

  • Subsidize childcare for workers with children under 12

  • Provide at least 1 weeks’ notice for schedule changes and overtime pay for short notice changes

  • Provide 2 board seats for unionized employees, elected by the rank and file

  • Require a living wage for grocery workers at stores that accept federally subsidized SNAP benefits. SNAP accounts for over 12 percent of grocery retail revenues nationally.

  In a time when over 4 million Americans are quitting jobs and changing careers every month, including over 4% of retail workers, America’s largest full service grocer has the unique opportunity to redefine the value of retail workers. The UFCW contract negotiations may be localized to Denver and Colorado Springs, but the implications are nationwide.

Why Food Price Inflation Is Not Inevitable

Retail price inflation is hitting consumers hard this new year. A recent KPMG study documented consumers facing a 22% increase in grocery bills and inflation hitting a 31-year high in Q4 2021, led by double digit jumps in meat, poultry and fish prices. Inflation has been driven by the companies at the commanding heights of the food system pulling in massive profits throughout the pandemic. And it sure isn’t inevitable.

By passing higher costs downstream, corporations have taken full advantage of rising fuel and input prices, supply chain logjams and increased labor costs to grow their profit margins to the highest rates since 1950. Meat prices have been the largest contributor to these rising consumers costs, and have attracted the attention of the White House and antitrust regulators. Beef, pork and poultry pricing make up a quarter of the food price increases. Four conglomerates control 55-85% of these markets, including Tyson, JBS, Marfrig and Seaboard. Their combined profits increased by more than 120% and net income surged by 500%. They announced over a billion dollars in new dividends and stock buybacks, on top of the $3 billion already distributed to shareholders since the pandemic began. These profits have fallen on the backs of meat processing workers. Over 59,000 meat sector workers were infected by Covid-19 and 300 died since the pandemic began. Meanwhile, Tyson, who oversaw record exports of chicken overseas during the pandemic while raising the alarm about shortages, noted during a recent earnings call that their pricing actions allowed them to make more money on beef while selling less of it.

Similarly, in the CPG sector, Pepsi announced a 5% price increase starting in July 2021, leading to $8 Billion in net income and a projected $5.8 Billion in shareholder dividends. Coca-Cola also announced plans to raise prices, leading to net income increasing almost 15% over 2020. Hershey’s HSY -0.2%, ADM and Con-Agra saw double digit net income increases over 2020 and Kraft-Heinz saw a triple digit increase, despite sales flattening out. And the CEO of Kellogg’s noted that consumer demand has stayed high despite price increases.

And large-scale retailers have reflected these trends. When supplier costs rise en masse, grocery stores tend to pass through the increases and then some, so that their gross margins also increase. I know this from experience, but don’t take my word for it. The CEO of Kroger explained that the nation’s largest full-service grocer operates best when inflation is at 3-4%, while the CEO of Albertson’s felt customers could afford higher prices when the economy is growing and they have cash to spend. Kroger KR +1.6%, Albertson’s, Target TGT -0.9% and Dollar General DG +0.1% all saw double digit net income growth over 2020. Walgreens WBA -0.7%’ income growth soared well into the triple digits. Ahold Delhaize net income increased 23% over 2020, despite a 5% sales decline. Dollar Tree DLTR -0.5%, who recently raised prices to $1.25, increased net income 62% over 2020, on top of a 10% increase in gross profits. These all come less than a year after an initial round of windfall pandemic profits for major food retailers, which saw 2 billion dollar rounds of Kroger stock buybacks and the Walton family adding $45 billion to their wealth.

In theory, competitive markets should push profit margins near zero, as long as consumers have ample choices in any given category, among other hypothetical factors. Four or fewer corporations control 93% of soda sales, 83% of mayonnaise, 80% of chocolate candy, 75% of yogurt, 76% of frozen meat analogues, 72% of breakfast cereals, 66% of frozen pizza, 60% of bread, 80% of toothpaste and 80% of toilet paper sales. The number of grocery stores has declined by 30% in the last 25 years and just 4 companies registered two thirds of all grocery sales in 2019. Walmart WMT +2.2% alone siphons $1 out of every $3 consumer grocery dollars nationally and up to 90% in some metro areas, yet Walmart’s share of grocery is twice as high as A&P’s was when it was broken up by federal actions and its power curtailed by the Robinson-Patman Act, nearly a century ago.

These massive profits also deflate the bait and switch tactic that rising wages and associated labor costs are driving inflation. Over 99.99% of workers don’t set prices. And that small subgroup of retail and CPG category managers and pricing analysts that do set prices are accountable to profitability targets set by the executives and boards whom they report to, with the goal of keeping investors happy with an ever flowing stream of buybacks and dividends. Missing these targets means these folks are out of job. Even staid Fed Chair Jerome Powell has recently said that “wages are not a big part of the high inflation".

So what can be done?

Economists are divided on what to do about inflation. Do we wait it out? Or should the Fed increase interest rates, risking stagflation and an austerity-imposed recession that would claw back any of the gains that working people have recently made. Think Paul Volcker, 1979. There is another option, one that is more consistent with the prevailing economic sentiment of consumer welfare. Public officials could impose price controls on key sectors of the economy. Price controls regulate what big businesses can charge customers. This is not a new idea. FDR employed over 160,000 administrators to control prices during World War 2 “on goods from scrap steel to shoes to milk” and even Republican Richard Nixon dabbled with price controls in the early 1970s. Price controls could be a public policy lever to prevent the further upward redistribution of wealth in the food industry, as well as prevent further food insecurity, like what 1 out of 4 Americans faced just over a year ago and what Black Americans increasingly face. Price controls could conceivably go so far as pushing retailers and manufacturers to reduce prices to pre-existing levels and flatline profits for the time being.

Another tool is enforcing anti-trust laws, such as Robinson-Patman, which is supposed to prevent larger retail firms from engaging in the types of anti-competitive conduct that are now seemingly widespread. Under the context of strengthening supply chains and preventing future logjams and disruptions, the FTC is currently investigating the relationships between big retailers and CPG companies and how trade spend and market dominance allow national chains to elbow out independents and “mom & pop” stores. Researchers such as Philip Howard have documented for decades how retail consolidation drives up food prices. One potential outcome should be obvious: break up and disaggregate Big Food into smaller constituents that would have to compete harder for customers. Scale does not produce efficiency in the food industry, but just enables shareholder primacy. 

And why should food always have to be a commodity? Instead of being rooted in pricing and margin dogma, maybe food industry workers should be prioritizing rights and responsibilities in the food system? Healthy, fresh food should be a human right, and it is our responsibility to make sure everyone has access to it, a lofty goal all things considered. There is always the potential to develop more food cooperatives or expand a public food sector, in the form of municipal utilities, or nonprofit food hubs like Common Market. Or encourage and underwrite courageous grassroots efforts like Ithaca’s Healthy Food For All, L.A’s SUPRMRKT, Farmshare Austin or Philly’s Soil Generation. 

Or an even broader agenda would be to make healthy, fresh food fully subsidized at the point of purchase. SNAP, which already accounts for up to 12% of all food retail sales, could be expanded into a more comprehensive single payer solution. Over 60% of SNAP recipients cite high prices as the barrier to eating healthy, and inflation will make this worse. So why not cover a broader assortment of foods and mandate better quality and sourcing standards, such as those articulated by HEAL Food Alliance and Good Food Communities?

Food inflation is not inevitable, and it is purely the result of prioritizing the goals of capital over the needs of people. We have the opportunity to leverage the current crisis into building a more fair, just, human and sustainable food system, now more than ever.

Why Tom Vilsack Is Wrong About Farm To Fork And What We Can Do About It

USDA Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack has recently downplayed the European Union’s ambitious Farm To Fork strategy. Farm To Fork is the cornerstone of the European Green Deal, and puts sustainability at the heart of the world’s largest food import and export market. But Vilsack’s dismissal of the E.U. are out of step with consumer sentiments, food justice advocacy and the latest cutting edge research on agroecology.

The Farm To Fork framework articulates a roadmap for sustainability, access and nutrition in E.U. member nations. Farm To Fork is based on several focus areas:  science-based diet recommendations, better labeling and reduced intake of meat and highly processed foods; protection of pollinators and biodiversity; reduced greenhouse emissions; strengthening and harmonization of animal welfare policies; protection of food workers; increasing organic acreage by 25%, decreasing pesticide use by 50% and fertilizer use by 20%; as well as broad support through marketing, investment and public procurement. The E.U. will also require food businesses to incorporate sustainability into business strategies. 

While the strategy has attracted some criticism from inside the E.U., including justifiable critiques about land ownership from food justice advocates and hand-wringing from agribusiness about reduced pesticide use and meat consumption, the overwhelming response has been positive. Anja Hazekamp, an E.U. parliamentarian from The Netherlands, summarized the vision, “We propose concrete measures to bring our food system back within planetary boundaries by stimulating local food production and by moving away from intensive livestock farming and crop monocultures with high pesticide use.”

VVilsack, a former dairy export executive who led the USDA during the Obama Administration, counters this worldview, saying “the EU has chosen one way.” The USDA secretary is promoting an alternative strategy called the Coalition for Productivity Growth, based on market-oriented, incentive-based systems, as reported extensively by Tom Philpott recently. The Vilsack approach is music to the ears of Big Food conglomerates like Bayer, Syngenta SYT 0.0%, Corteva (Dow/Dupont), Cargill and JBS, as well as trade groups such as Vilsack’s former employers at the Dairy Export Council.

Vilsack has already recruited countries into the coalition. This includes UAE, which imports 80% of its food and is a major exporter of the natural gas used as feedstock for synthetic fertilizer, as well as Brazil, the world’s largest exporter of conventional soybeans, beef and chicken and the world’s third largest user of pesticides, including some agrochemicals banned in the E.U. One Austrian E.U. parliamentarian summarized the Vilsack approach succinctly, calling it the “complete opposite of long-term food security” as well as a “blunt lobby appearance for the GMO sector.”

While some pundits are concerned the Trans-Atlantic food policy spat may evolve into a trade war, Vilsack’s position on Farm To Fork contradicts his own recent actions on domestic food issues, such as working on racial equity for Black farmers and USDA’s recent call for supply chain innovation in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“We have an opportunity to take the lessons we’ve learned from the COVID-19 pandemic and apply those to transforming our nation’s food system from the inside out, including our supply chains,” Vilsack said in an April press release. “USDA plans to tackle this supply chain assessment… From elevating the importance of local and regional food systems, to addressing the needs of socially disadvantaged and small to mid-size producers, to supporting sustainable practices to advance resilience and competitiveness, this top to bottom assessment will position USDA to make long-term, transformative changes...” 

The USDA press release continues, “USDA is helping to accelerate a transformation of our food system. Goals of this transformation include a fairer, more competitive, and transparent system where a greater share of the food dollar goes to those growing, harvesting, and preparing our food and one that promotes and strengthens the overall health and well-being of people, our land and water, and our economy. Growing consolidation in food and agriculture, the general health of our population, a growing climate crisis, and the need to ensure racial justice and equity are important factors to take into consideration as USDA looks at strengthening food and agricultural supply chains.” 

Vilsack’s April letter ironically ends up sounding more like an E.U. parliamentarian than a stump speech for the meat and dairy lobby. And an open invitation for U.S. based food justice movements to seize the moment.

A coalition of 67 organizations, including high-road businesses, NGOs, school districts, unions and community organizations took the opportunity to call for the USDA to enact values-driven food procurement among federal agencies. The coalition stated: 

“The federal government funds tens of billions of dollars of food procurement each year for children in schools, military service members, veterans, people incarcerated in federal prison, and seniors who rely on federal feeding programs. However, the vast majority of spending on public food procurement contradicts the administration’s stated interests of addressing climate change, advancing racial equity, protecting public health, achieving nutrition security, and strengthening local economies... This is due in large part to the state of US food systems and supply chains, which compromise public health and well-being with disproportionate impacts for Black, Indigenous, and other people of color (BIPOC) through the exploitation of the food and farm workers, concentration of corporate wealth, degradation of national resources, and production of highly processed foods with low nutritional value.”

Values-driven procurement for public institutions has taken off at the grassroots level over the last decade, with the Center for Good Food Purchasing (GFPP) supporting 64 institutions across 20 cities and over a Billion dollars in annual purchases. Like E.U. Farm To Fork, GFPP hinges on a true cost accounting of food. Participating institutions commit to continuous improvement across several focus areas: strengthening local economies, prioritizing environmental justice; ensuring affordability and access of fresh, healthy, and plant-based foods; progress on racial equity and worker justice; humane treatment of farm animals; and transparency in supply chain data. Values-driven procurement for institutions de-commodifies food at the point of consumption, while ensuring economic value is shared equitably throughout the supply chain. It has been embraced at scale by New York City in its kaleidoscopic Food Forward Plan and has also been deeply informed by private sector actors that helped validate many sustainability trends, such as Natural Grocers, Whole Foods and food co-ops such as PCC. And such a decentralized approach built on a uniform set of standards is in line with strategies articulated by the Glasgow Food and Climate Declaration of mobilizing cities to commit to sustainable food policies and pressuring national governments “to put food and farming at the heart of the global response to the climate emergency.” 

The grassroots sustainability momentum in the U.S. is consistent with recent scientific studies that expose the yield/productivity myth of chemical intensive agribusiness. This research shows that broad-scale adoption of GMOs and associated herbicides have not boosted relative yields, nor account for the vast externalities of industrial monocultures and their contributions to climate change. And even more compelling are two recent studies comparing chemical intensive and agroecological approaches, including a study of 946 commercial farms in France showing that pesticides could be reduced by 42% with no negative effects on yield or profitability, and a second order meta-analysis looking at over 42,000 farm comparisons worldwide, with the researchers concluding: “in 63% of the comparisons, practices such as crop rotation, intercropping, application of organic matter amendments, microbial inoculation, reduced tillage… maintained or increased crop yields while also increasing biodiversity, enhancing pollination and pest control, improving soil fertility and nutrient cycling, and promoting water regulation and carbon sequestration… Thus, a wide range of approaches not limited to biotechnology and synthetic chemicals should be considered as part of the toolkit for building sustainable agriculture systems.” 

With 90-plus percent of soy, corn, canola grown as GMO in the U.S., these findings strike at the heart of agribusiness dogma. And considering that U.S. farmers receive over $18 Billion in annual public subsidies, contributing on average 21 percent of net farm income, it’s reasonable that the public should have better oversight of what practices and inputs farmers use.

This agroecology research also echoes the seismic changes in consumer trends that have been snowballing for the past decade. In 2020, U.S. organic product sales were up 12.4% to $62 billion, or over 4% of U.S. food sales. Organic produce led the way at $18 billion, with more than 15% of all fruit and vegetables sold as organic. Plant-based foods surged 27% to $7 billion in 2020, up 43% since 2019, with 57%of households now buying plant-based foods. And Covid-19 has heralded a new food awakening, with 79% of consumers planning on eating healthier, 62%wanting clearer nutritional labeling, 80% saying sustainability  is an important factor in food decisions and 65% wanting products that can help them live a more sustainable and socially responsible life.

And Vilsack’s alignment with agribusiness downplays the vast inequities at the heart of the U.S. food system, particularly the catastrophe of over 91,000 mostly immigrant and BIPOC meat and food processing workers contracting Covid-19, 465 of whom died. And all that yield from herbicide tolerant GMOs did not prevent 1 in 4 Americans from experiencing food insecurity during the pandemic, disproportionately impacting Black and Latin families. And while just 11% of U.S. jobs are in the food sector, 7 of 10 of the lowest paid jobs are also food jobs, many barely paying above the $7.25 minimum wage floor. Despite his admirable efforts to right past wrongs, by prioritizing the agribusiness interests who profit off of cheap, chemical-laden foods produced through exploited labor, Vilsack’s approach to food system governance will just harden this racialized status quo.

The European Union Farm To Fork plan is not perfect, but shows that public food system governance is possible and that a sustainable food system is already busy being born. And grassroots efforts in the U.S. are already building such a foundation domestically. A U.S. Farm To Fork strategy based on good food purchasing principles could ensure that healthy, fresh, affordable food grown and processed with justice, transparency and equity are available to all. Now that would be the way to go.

Why Do Gig Workers Want You To Delete Instacart?

Instacart gig workers are organizing for better pay and working conditions. Their demands include a return to being paid by the order, reintroduction of item commission and a return to the default tip of 10%

Robin Pape is a gig worker and Founding Member of the Gig Workers Collective. Errol Schweizer led the Grocery team at Whole Foods Market for 9 years, including during 2015 when the retailer was an early adapter of Instacart.

Errol Schweizer: What's it like to be a gig worker?

Robin Pape: There's a lot of uncertainty involved with being a gig worker. You never really know what you're gonna make, how much you're going to work. You generally don't have health care. And there's no sick pay, no paid time off. There's just a lot of uncertainty. 

Errol: How is it different than being a regular employee?

Robin: Well, as a gig worker, we're classified as independent contractors. And we at the Gig Workers Collective believe that that's an intentional misclassification and that it's done to specifically skirt the labor laws. So you know, if we worked for the company as a direct employee, we would have access to health insurance and sick pay and paid time off, and they would be paying into our taxes and towards social security. We would be using their vehicles instead of our own. So that there's a lot of differences in how we're treated.

Errol: What's the issue with the business model? 

Robin: So usually, the pay with these good companies starts out pretty well. And then as time goes on, it's unsustainable. And it drops and there's changes to how the pay models work. Initially, they'll usually start with a very clear and concrete pay model, and then switch to something that's more of a black-box, an algorithm where we can't really compute what exactly it is that we're being paid for, what's mileage, just the simple base pay for an order. The company makes money by charging extra money to the customers. And in addition to that, they'll pay service delivery fees to the company.

So getting into these gigs, it can feel initially like you're making good money, because you haven't been educated about all of the costs and the expenses involved. But at the end of the day, you're lucky to break even.

Errol: How have you seen gig work change during COVID-19? What's it been like?

Robin: There's been a huge increase in the number of people who are using delivery services. I think that's tapering off a bit now that people are feeling more comfortable and more people are vaccinated and getting back into the stores themselves. So while there was this huge boom in customer base, Instacart, in particular, cut our base pay, And they hired twice as many shoppers, and they sent us inadequate PPE, the shelves were empty, customers were upset about this, it was taken out on shoppers, it was out of our control. People were frustrated. It went from shopping usually one, maybe two orders at a time to most often shopping three orders at a time, and having to communicate with three different people, while you're in the middle of a pandemic, and everything is taking so much longer as you're going back and forth, back and forth, fulfilling requests for three people who aren't going to get everything that they want. And you know, there were limits. You could only have two bags of frozen vegetables. And, one case of water and people weren't happy about it. 

But people were proud of what they were doing. They weren't ashamed to say that they worked for Instacart or one of the other gigs, there was some pride. And all of these people were going somewhere that no one else wanted to go, that people were afraid to go. 

But overall, in general, we've seen pay cuts from 30 to 50%. And a lot of it is out of our control, a lot of it doesn't have to be this way. And the things that we're asking for right now are things that we've had in the past that were taken from us so that the company could be more profitable. 

Right now they want to paint this glowing picture, and they either want to sell the company or announce an IPO. And we're hoping that it's a lot harder to do that when investors understand just how poorly this company cares for its employees, for its independent contractors. 

Errol: What are the five demands that the Gig Workers Collective has around reforming Instacart and other similar apps?

Robin: All of our demands are things that we we've either had, or have been told we have, but it hasn't really been made clear.

So the first demand that we have is that they return to paying by the order instead of by the batch. So people think of as a batch as one order, but it can actually be one order, or two or three full service orders where you shop and deliver. And in some areas, including mine, it can be as many as five delivery orders. Right now, the minimum pay for a delivery order is $5.00. But if they put five of them together in one batch, there's still only guaranteeing $5.00. And that's not a base pay. That's a minimum pay. So that can include the mileage, that can include heavy order pay.

So that that's the first one is that they pay us by the order. That's the easiest way to make sure that we're paid fairly and at least a minimum wage. The second demand is that they reintroduce item commission; this was removed in late 2018. We used to receive a base pay for an order plus item commission. So you could pretty easily figure out what you're going to get paid for an order by looking at the number of items in it. In 2018, they change that to a black-box algorithm. At one point they took away the ability for customers to tip. We had to fight to get that back, you know, they stole our tips. They used our tips to subsidize pay, they had to apologize publicly and pay us back tips. So there have been all sorts of issues with tips and pay and commission. So in addition to having batches only contain one order, or if more than one order, have them be fairly priced. we would like them to reintroduce item commission. 

We'd also like them to stop punishing shoppers for issues that are out of their control. So this could look like a lot of different things during COVID-19. We were having, you know a lot of markdowns because things weren't available in the store, or because people wanted three of something and the limit was one. So there were issues there with things not being delivered on time, and shoppers would be penalized for that. And then, you know, the thing that's most out of our control is that not all customers are honest. We like to think that most of them are. So all these things together can really have an impact on ratings. Instacart keeps track of the last hundred orders that you shop. So the way that it is right now if you have a perfect five star rating, you get to see the best orders that they're offering. When I had a 4.98 I was seeing the best offers. I shopped a few orders and didn't get any ratings. So some of my five stars fell off which gave weight to the four star I have. And that brought me down to a 4.97 and I didn't see any good orders. Now it could take weeks for somebody to get their ratings back up where it needs to be and it's really unfair to the independent contractors. 

The fourth demand is that we're looking for a clear occupational death benefit. The contract says that they may pay death benefits. Just like they said that they may pay for COVID. And it's still not really clear what they mean by that they may pay occupational death benefits. We'd like them to be guaranteed, We'd like them to be accessible. We'd like to know how they're accessible, and we'd like them to be comparable to properly classified employees. 

And then the final demand is that they return the default tip to 10%. Currently, it's 5%. So if a customer tips 10%, or 20%, the next time they go into order, the default tip should be set to that higher percent. And Instacart removed it at one point and replaced it with a service fee that didn't go to the shoppers but went to Instacart. We had to fight to get them to reinstate it. But when they did, they reinstated it at 5% instead of 10%. The other 5% remains a service fee for Instacart. In some areas that 5% is closer to 8%. And then in other markets for delivery orders that service fee is as much as 15%. And that's on top of the item markups. You know, when the default tip is set to 5%, people tend to think that that's the fair amount, the customary amount to tip for this kind of a service. 

All jobs deserve a living wage. If you can't afford to pay the people who make it happen for you a living wage, then you don't deserve to be in business. 

Right now we're getting the short end of the stick while Instacart makes money and it's money that should be in our pockets right now. We'll just keep getting louder and louder because we've got nothing to lose.

Errol: So how can folks support you? 

Robin: So we successfully registered to be a nonprofit. We have a website, it's Gig Workers Collective.org. You can donate there, you can provide your information to get connected with us and be more aware of what we're doing and how we're organizing. You know, we've done a boycott, and we've done a protest, and we've done a walk off, we've asked customers to delete the app. We're not just going to go away until things get better. So delete Instacart, do the curbside pickup, and tip when you can.