Baxter Black - Food Deserts

Many of us in the food producing business are watching with a suspicious eye, Mrs. Obama’s pending federally funded efforts to combat obesity in children. Our skepticism is justified because every special interest group from global warming to UFO conspirators somehow wind up casting blame on modern agriculture. Nevertheless, obesity apparently is a serious problem and worthy of attention. Her “Let’s Move!” web page states that “6.5 million children (live) more than a mile away from a supermarket. These communities are now called “Food Deserts.” More than a mile! It is obvious that Mrs. Obama and I live in different realities. I would guess many who read this column live more than a mile from a supermarket. I can picture a rancher’s wife twenty miles north of Ekalaka, MT, a farmer’s wife in Oyen, Alberta who gets snowed in for 3 days, or a family riding out a hurricane, flood and 5-day power outage on the South Carolina coast. Food Desert? I guess what is most unsettling for me, is the helplessness Mrs. Obama ascribes to the urban parents of obese children. She assumes they are incapable of planning a trip to the store, teaching their children discipline, managing a budget and, God forbid, having to walk, drive or bus more than a mile of couple times a week to shop. Truthfully, no one expects them to grow a garden or can their own food. But I would bet that if these helpless parents had a grocery store right next door it still wouldn’t decrease children’s obesity...more

The real aridity is in the minds of these DC do gooders.