1: How many farmers remain in America? How people must each farmer feed? (1 farmer per _129 people)
There are fewer than 2 million farmers that remain in America. Each farmer must feed 129 people.
2: Why is George Naylor’s farm considered to be a food desert? (pg. 34)
George's crops are inedible and there is no water for the plants to drink on his farm.
3: Pg. 35- Which two crops are rotated on George Naylor’s farm? Explain why.
Two crops that are rotated on George's farm is corn and soybeans. Soybeans have become the second leg supporting the industrial food system. It feeds livestock and is in 2 thirds of all processed foods.
4: Pg. 36- Why are farmers who are using Monsanto’s products not reaping the benefits of their greater yield?
The greater yield from Monsanto's products are used to buy more of the GMO's from the company. There is little profit to using the Monsanto product.
5: Pg. 37- What does it mean that hybrid corn is “high yield”? What are the benefits of using this hybrid variety?
The hybrid corn is "high yield" because they can be planted closer together, having 30 thousand an acre instead of only having eight thousand an acre.
6: Pg. 38-39- What did planting more and more corn do the biodiversity in Iowa? Why was this biodiversity so helpful?
Planting more corn caused the biodiversity to become monoculture. This biodiversity wasn't helpful because planting only one species of plant caused the prices of corn to go down. With the price of corn going down, more and more corn was grown.
7: Pg. 40- “Growing corn is just riding tractors and spraying”. Explain this quote.
Growing corn was easy, because it was just to plow lands to grow the crops, and to spray fertilizer on the corn. There was no need for other things (like other animals or other tools), as it took only a few days to raise 500 acres of corn, which could be counted in weeks.
8: Pg. 41- Ammonium Nitrate is an artificial fertilizer- The U.S. Government starting using this as a fertilizer because? What was it used for before this?
The U.S Government starting using this as a fertilizer because they wanted to convert their explosives department/war machines into peacetime purposes.
9: Pg. 42- How did the introduction of artificial nitrogen fertilizer affect the nitrogen cycle on farms and nearby lands?
Instead of waiting for the nitrogen to become fixated by the soil bacteria in the roots of legumes, or by the shock of electrical lightning, artificial nitrogen fertilizer could be used immediately.
10: Pg. 43-44: Why is the Haber-Bosch process considered to be the most important invention of the 20th century?
Without the Haber-Bosch process, two out of every five humans on Earth would never have been born. Without the synthetic fertilizer, millions of people would never have been born.
11: Pg. 45- “Instead of eating exclusively from the sun, humanity now began to sip petroleum”. Explain this quote.
Instead of naturally growing our corn and other plants from the sun, we use petroleum based nitrogen fertilizers to grow the food we eat.
12: Pg. 45- How much “oil” does it take to create a bushel of industrialized corn?
1/4 or 1/3 of a gallon of oil to grow a bushel of industrialized corn.
13: Pg. 46- What happens to the hundred pounds of synthetic nitrogen that Naylor’s corn does not take up?
Some of the nitrogen evaporates into the air and acidifies rain and contributes to global warming.
14: Pg. 47- What does it mean when they have “blue baby alerts”? What happens when babies are exposed to too many nitrites?
Blue baby alerts warns parents it's unsafe to give children water from tap. If babies are exposed to too much nitrites, it would bind to hemoglobin and compromise the blood's ability to carry oxygen to the brain.
15: Pg. 48- If there’s so much corn being grown in America today that the market won’t pay the cost of producing it, then why would any farmer in his right mind plant another acre of it?
It has everything to do with farm policies. The government farm programs once designed to limit production and support prices. This caused the farmers to increase production.
16: Pg. 49- What was one strategy of the New Deal Farm Program?
The government establishes a target price based on the cost of production, whenever the market price dropped, the farmer was given to either take loans out of the government and return it after prices recover or to keep the money the farmer was given in return for the crops to the government.
17: What is “a plague of cheap corn”? What happens if we have too much corn produced? Summarize the politics of being a corn farmer.
A plague of cheap corn is what happened when Earl Butz removed the government programs for farmers, which left the market with nothing but cheap corn. If we have too much corn produced, the demand for it will go down. With the demand going down, farmers need to grow more corn to get enough money to support their family. With more corn produced, the price would go down even more. The politics of being a corn farmer was to have the biggest yield out of the rest of the farmers. Having the biggest yield meant that you could brag about it, even if you're going bankrupt.
There are fewer than 2 million farmers that remain in America. Each farmer must feed 129 people.
2: Why is George Naylor’s farm considered to be a food desert? (pg. 34)
George's crops are inedible and there is no water for the plants to drink on his farm.
3: Pg. 35- Which two crops are rotated on George Naylor’s farm? Explain why.
Two crops that are rotated on George's farm is corn and soybeans. Soybeans have become the second leg supporting the industrial food system. It feeds livestock and is in 2 thirds of all processed foods.
4: Pg. 36- Why are farmers who are using Monsanto’s products not reaping the benefits of their greater yield?
The greater yield from Monsanto's products are used to buy more of the GMO's from the company. There is little profit to using the Monsanto product.
5: Pg. 37- What does it mean that hybrid corn is “high yield”? What are the benefits of using this hybrid variety?
The hybrid corn is "high yield" because they can be planted closer together, having 30 thousand an acre instead of only having eight thousand an acre.
6: Pg. 38-39- What did planting more and more corn do the biodiversity in Iowa? Why was this biodiversity so helpful?
Planting more corn caused the biodiversity to become monoculture. This biodiversity wasn't helpful because planting only one species of plant caused the prices of corn to go down. With the price of corn going down, more and more corn was grown.
7: Pg. 40- “Growing corn is just riding tractors and spraying”. Explain this quote.
Growing corn was easy, because it was just to plow lands to grow the crops, and to spray fertilizer on the corn. There was no need for other things (like other animals or other tools), as it took only a few days to raise 500 acres of corn, which could be counted in weeks.
8: Pg. 41- Ammonium Nitrate is an artificial fertilizer- The U.S. Government starting using this as a fertilizer because? What was it used for before this?
The U.S Government starting using this as a fertilizer because they wanted to convert their explosives department/war machines into peacetime purposes.
9: Pg. 42- How did the introduction of artificial nitrogen fertilizer affect the nitrogen cycle on farms and nearby lands?
Instead of waiting for the nitrogen to become fixated by the soil bacteria in the roots of legumes, or by the shock of electrical lightning, artificial nitrogen fertilizer could be used immediately.
10: Pg. 43-44: Why is the Haber-Bosch process considered to be the most important invention of the 20th century?
Without the Haber-Bosch process, two out of every five humans on Earth would never have been born. Without the synthetic fertilizer, millions of people would never have been born.
11: Pg. 45- “Instead of eating exclusively from the sun, humanity now began to sip petroleum”. Explain this quote.
Instead of naturally growing our corn and other plants from the sun, we use petroleum based nitrogen fertilizers to grow the food we eat.
12: Pg. 45- How much “oil” does it take to create a bushel of industrialized corn?
1/4 or 1/3 of a gallon of oil to grow a bushel of industrialized corn.
13: Pg. 46- What happens to the hundred pounds of synthetic nitrogen that Naylor’s corn does not take up?
Some of the nitrogen evaporates into the air and acidifies rain and contributes to global warming.
14: Pg. 47- What does it mean when they have “blue baby alerts”? What happens when babies are exposed to too many nitrites?
Blue baby alerts warns parents it's unsafe to give children water from tap. If babies are exposed to too much nitrites, it would bind to hemoglobin and compromise the blood's ability to carry oxygen to the brain.
15: Pg. 48- If there’s so much corn being grown in America today that the market won’t pay the cost of producing it, then why would any farmer in his right mind plant another acre of it?
It has everything to do with farm policies. The government farm programs once designed to limit production and support prices. This caused the farmers to increase production.
16: Pg. 49- What was one strategy of the New Deal Farm Program?
The government establishes a target price based on the cost of production, whenever the market price dropped, the farmer was given to either take loans out of the government and return it after prices recover or to keep the money the farmer was given in return for the crops to the government.
17: What is “a plague of cheap corn”? What happens if we have too much corn produced? Summarize the politics of being a corn farmer.
A plague of cheap corn is what happened when Earl Butz removed the government programs for farmers, which left the market with nothing but cheap corn. If we have too much corn produced, the demand for it will go down. With the demand going down, farmers need to grow more corn to get enough money to support their family. With more corn produced, the price would go down even more. The politics of being a corn farmer was to have the biggest yield out of the rest of the farmers. Having the biggest yield meant that you could brag about it, even if you're going bankrupt.