Like Some Coca Cola (TM) With Your Odwalla Bar?

As you munch on your bowl of Kashi and Silk this morning, check out this post by Bonnie P. at Ethicurean.

You’ve probably seen the work of Phil Howard, even if you don’t know his name. He’s the professor behind those massive colored charts that show how most organic brands — usually the ones with the bucolic farms on the packages designed to make you feel all warm and fuzzy — are actually owned by large multinational corporations.

Recently Phil, who is an assistant professor of community, agriculture, recreation and resource studies at Michigan State University, alerted me that he had collaborated with Skye Bender-deMoll, an author of Stanford University’s SoNIA program (for Social Network Image Animator), on a short animation of the consolidation of the organic industry since 1997.

Have a look at this piece, if you have a chance. It's mesmerizingly disturbing.

Other good stuff at or from Ethicurean (a daily favorite for me . . . I'll try to add it to the sidebar here soon), lately: ongoing Farm Bill analysis there is always good, lucid stuff. Try this piece on the recent defeat of subsidy reform; they also link to Michael Pollan's most recent piece in the NYT Magazine: "Our Decrepit Food Factories."