The Nature of (Hu)man-Made Disasters

When will Americans have the will to alter the course of the slow-moving, human-made natural disaster our food system has become?

The horrific outcome of the flash flood in Texas Hill country will hopefully trigger some long overdue changes in preparedness for the next flood.

The difference between a true natural disaster and a human-made natural disaster boils down to the presence or absence of meaningful actions to reduce property damage, environmental degradation, and human health impacts. “Meaningful” actions include things like installing sirens linked to real-time sensors placed along parts of flood-prone rivers where lots of people sleep at night.

Increasingly, the nation will face decisions about what comes next in the wake of human-made disasters. How should we rebuild the Los Angeles communities ravaged in last year’s fires; what comes next in the cost and availability of homeowners insurance in Florida; how can we save lives and property when hurricanes rip through landscapes?

As a nation, and in most communities, after the sting and heartache of the latest human-made disaster wears off, the remedial response typically struggles to move beyond wishful thinking and half-measures. In the interim, the underlying factors exposing humans to natural disasters deepen and spread (e.g., climate change, population growth, desire to build homes and recreate along live water).

Yet some of the most consequential human-made natural disasters unfold slowly and are hard to see. They arise from complex combinations of factors, like the flash floods in Texas (very unusual weather pattern, first warnings after midnight, impacted areas with no way to spread warnings, delays in getting warnings out, inadequate responses to the warnings, etc.).

There are several consequential, human-made natural disasters now unfolding that are rooted in how most farmland is managed and, consequently, in the poor quality of the American food supply and diet.

Food-driven metabolic syndrome is driving the most serious collapse in U.S. public health since our birth as a nation. Farmers are caught on a variety of chemical and animal-drug treadmills. A range of policies, corporate power, and the need to deliver profits to shareholders make it hard for farmers to find the off ramp. It hurts to admit it, but we have the kind of food and ag system that we, as a nation, have chosen to support and invest in.

I often wonder what it will take to wake people up and convince a majority of the need for substantial changes in our food and farming systems. But that is just Step 1. Step 2 is creating the political will, and ability, to overcome the lock that conventional ag and agribusiness have on all forms and levels of policy with the potential to drive and underwrite constructive change.

Take Iowa for example. A majority of Iowans clearly recognize that corn-soy farming plus CAFOs degrades water and air quality and are almost certainly contributing to adverse reproductive problems and chronic diseases. But the political will required to bring about change is nowhere in sight. Why? What is missing?

Do people really believe that Iowa farmers cannot do better, and that both Iowans, and the country as a whole, need to accept the downsides of “modern” ag as an inevitable and unavoidable cost of life as we know it?

Many have wondered whether the current interest in making America healthy again might make a difference. Perhaps the harsh economic realities arising from the aging of the increasingly unhealthy baby-boomer generation will force a reckoning. Until we invest much more in health promotion, and do so wisely and continuously, the country will be unable to provide all available medical technologies and interventions to keep us boomers alive as long as possible.

I fear that the adverse consequences of the way much of the farmland is managed in America, and our remarkably unhealthy food system, will have to become even more obvious before meaningful change can begin to take root. Instead on investing in solutions to crystal-clear problems, the stewards of American ag and the food industry continue to perfect the art of denial.

I worry about a perfect storm of conditions occurring in the Midwest some summer that triggers toxic algae blooms that rapidly overwhelm the treatment and filtration systems in some municipal drinking water plants, leading to hundreds, or thousands, or tens of thousands of people ingesting enough bacteria to get sick, with some suffering serious health problems as a result.

Might such a tragic event serve as the long-needed wake-up call to trigger the changes needed to reduce “non-point” pollution from farms and CAFOs? Maybe, but not likely, since defenders of all-things conventional ag will point out the unusual, uncontrollable natural circumstances that brought about such an episode and will claim that effective systems and policies are in place elsewhere.

Until it happens again. But then the same arguments and excuses will be rolled out, likely refined by experience gained during the last episode, and now amplified by various industry-funded communication and political-action organizations created to “get ag’s message out.”

I started a career focused on food and farming, the environment, and public health in the late 1970s. Over the past nearly 50 years, remarkable and steady progress has been made in understanding how food and farming systems, technology, and policy are impacting farmers and ranchers, rural communities, and everyone who sits down to enjoy a meal day in and day out.

Yet the adverse environmental and public health footprints left by how we farm and feed America have steadily deepened and are dragging us down as a nation, and with no end in sight. This is perhaps the most consequential human-made natural disaster of this century, and one that seems baked into the DNA of how we do business, make policy and feed America.