{"id":7614,"date":"2016-07-19T23:06:06","date_gmt":"2016-07-20T06:06:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/BigJimIndustries.com\/wordpress\/?p=7614"},"modified":"2016-07-21T23:10:18","modified_gmt":"2016-07-22T06:10:18","slug":"the-real-american-tragedy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/2016\/07\/19\/the-real-american-tragedy\/","title":{"rendered":"The Real American Tragedy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2016\/jul\/13\/us-food-waste-ugly-fruit-vegetables-perfect\" target=\"_blank\"><em>from The Guardian<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<h1>Half of all US food produce is thrown away, new research suggests<\/h1>\n<p><em>The demand for \u2018perfect\u2019 fruit and veg means much is discarded, damaging the climate and leaving people hungry<\/em><\/p>\n<p>By\u00a0<a class=\"tone-colour\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/profile\/suzannegoldenberg\" rel=\"author\" data-link-name=\"auto tag link\">Suzanne Goldenberg<\/a>\u00a0US environment correspondent<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/9cc9dae1a0a3007510c04b21a82334dfd182b34b\/0_192_5760_3456\/master\/5760.jpg?w=620&amp;q=55&amp;auto=format&amp;usm=12&amp;fit=max&amp;s=89d13c6533b642ac8ab4149dd93de536\" alt=\"Discarded food is the biggest single component of US landfill and incinerators, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.\" width=\"480\" \/><em>Discarded food is the biggest single component of US landfill and incinerators, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Photograph: Dan Tuffs\/for the Guardian<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Americans throw away almost as much food as they eat because of a \u201ccult of perfection\u201d, deepening hunger and poverty, and inflicting a heavy toll on the environment.<\/p>\n<p>Vast quantities of fresh produce grown in the US are left in the field to rot, fed to livestock or hauled directly from the field to landfill, because of unrealistic and unyielding cosmetic standards, according to official data and interviews with dozens of farmers, packers, truckers, researchers, campaigners and government officials.<\/p>\n<p>From the fields and orchards of California to the population centres of the east coast, farmers and others on the food distribution chain say high-value and nutritious food is being sacrificed to retailers\u2019 demand for unattainable perfection.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s all about blemish-free produce,\u201d says Jay Johnson, who ships fresh fruit and vegetables from North Carolina and central Florida. \u201cWhat happens in our business today is that it is either perfect, or it gets rejected. It is perfect to them, or they turn it down. And then you are stuck.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[ <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2016\/jul\/13\/us-food-waste-ugly-fruit-vegetables-perfect\" target=\"_blank\">click to continue reading at The Guardian<\/a> ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>from The Guardian Half of all US food produce is thrown away, new research suggests The demand for \u2018perfect\u2019 fruit and veg means much is discarded, damaging the climate and leaving people hungry By\u00a0Suzanne Goldenberg\u00a0US environment correspondent Discarded food is the biggest single component of US landfill and incinerators, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7614","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-weirdness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7614","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7614"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7614\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}