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I SI B
SNB N1 -18-58358338-37-0720-24- 4
Minds and Markets
www.earthscan.co.uk
www.earthscan.co.uk

9 9 781853
781853837029
837029
Tim Lang and Michael Heasman
34755_c-1.indd 1 18/06/2009 14:12:42
FOOD WARS
Michael Heasman dedicates this book to Mum, Dad, Susan,
Colin and Jason

Tim Lang dedicates this book to Anna and Alfie and

their generation’s future
 FOOD WARS
THE GLOBAL BATTLE FOR MOUTHS,
MINDS AND MARKETS

Tim Lang and Michael Heasman

London • Sterling, VA
First published by Earthscan in the UK and USA in 2004
Reprinted 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009

Copyright © Tim Lang and Michael Heasman, 2004

All rights reserved

ISBN: 978-1-85383-702-9

Typeset by JS Typesetting Ltd, Porthcawl, Mid Glamorgan

Cover design by Declan Buckley from a painting by William Crozier
(Joie de Vivre, private collection)

For a full list of publications please contact:

Earthscan
14a St Cross Street, London, EC1N 8XA, UK
Tel: +44 (0)20 7841 1930
Fax: +44 (0)20 7242 1474
Email: [email protected]
Web: www.earthscan.co.uk

22883 Quicksilver Drive, Sterling, VA 20166-2012, USA

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Lang, Tim.
Food wars : the global battle for minds, mouths, and markets / Tim Lang and
Michael Heasman.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1-85383-701-6 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBN 1-85383-702-4
(pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Nutrition policy. 2. Food supply.
[DNLM: 1. Nutrition Policy. 2. Diet. 3. Environmental Health. 4. Food
Industry. 5. Food Supply. 6. Nutrition Disorders. WA 695 L271f 2004]
I. Heasman, M. A. (Michael Anthony) II. Title
TX359.L36 2004
363.8–dc22
2003022771

Earthscan publishes in association with the International Institute for Environment

and Development

At Earthscan we strive to minimize our environmental impacts and carbon

footprint through reducing waste, recycling and offsetting our CO2 emissions,
including those created through publication of this book. For more details of our
environmental policy, see www.earthscan.co.uk

This book was printed in the UK by CPI Antony Rowe.

The paper used is FSC certified.
 CONTENTS
List of Figures, Tables and Boxes ix
Acknowledgements xiii
List of Acronyms and Abbreviations xvii

Introduction 1
Why Food Wars? 4
Are radical options in food and health feasible or
even possible? 5
An outline of the book 8

1 The Food Wars Thesis 11

Introduction 11
Food policy choices 13
Key characteristics of the food supply chain 15
The war of paradigms: time for a new framework? 16
The Productionist paradigm 18
Two new paradigms of food supply? 20
The Life Sciences Integrated paradigm 21
The Ecologically Integrated paradigm 26
The three paradigms summarized 28
Which will dominate? 30
The place of food and health in the ‘paradigm’
framework 34
The Life Sciences and Ecologically Integrated
paradigms’ approaches to health 37
Ending the Food Wars through policy and evidence 40
Capturing the consumer 41
Evidence-based policy? 42

2 Diet and Health: Diseases and Food 47

Introduction 48
The nutrition Transition 53
VI CONTENTS

Two categories of malnutrition: underfed and overfed 60

The obesity epidemic 63
Calculating the burden of diet-related disease 70
Food safety and food-borne diseases 85
Inequalities and food poverty 89
The changing meanings of food security 92
Food poverty in the Western world 95
Implications for policy 96

3 Policy Responses to Diet and Disease 98

Introduction 99
Changing conceptions of health 100
Changing conceptions of public health 101
The nutrition pioneers: a 100-years war 103
A more sophisticated approach to food and nutrition 106
Post-World War II advances in social nutrition 108
Public health strategies: targeting populations or
‘at risk’ groups? 109
Dietary guidelines and goals 111
The dietary guidelines battle in the US 113
The case against the Western diet 115
A new approach to the relationship between food,
diet and health 117
Obesity: a case study of battles over policy responses
to a problem 120
Public policy responses to obesity 121
Industry response 123

4 The Food Wars Business 126

The battle for commercial supremacy in the food
system 126
The origins of the industrial food supply 128
Why ‘health’ is important to the food industry 134
The changing context for the global food economy 135
Remarkable changes in agriculture and food
production 137
Understanding the modern food system 139
The emergence of food company clusters 141
Farming becoming ‘irrelevant’ 147
A new ‘health’ colonialism? 151
The global scope and activity of food processors 153
 CONTENTS VII

Long-term structural change in food manufacturing

and processing 155
Changing company cultures for the 21st century 157
From globalization to localization 158
Rapid consolidation and concentration in food
retailing 160
Food retailers and their suppliers 164
The scale of the food service industries 167
The politics of GM biotechnology and the growth in
organics 173
Summary and conclusion 182

5 The Consumer Culture War 184

The battle for mouths and minds 184
Food and health: a done deal for the consumer? 186
Consuming wants and needs 188
‘Burgerized’ politics 189
The new consumer web and competing models 192
‘Schizophrenic’ consumers? 194
Moulding food culture 197
Food advertising and education 198
Obesity: redefining food marketing 203
Cooking and food culture 207
Shopping, spending and food 209
Food activism and the role of NGOs 210

6 The Quality War: Putting Public and Environmental

Health Together 214
Introduction 215
Can consumers save the planet? 218
Intensification 219
Food and biodiversity 221
Water 224
Pollution and pesticides 225
Waste 228
Soil and land 229
Climate change 230
Urban drift 231
Energy and efficiency 233
Eating up the fish? 242
Meat 248
VIII CONTENTS

Antibiotics 248
Keep eating the fruit: a UK case study 250
The clash of farming and biology: have humans got
the wrong bodies? 254

7 Food Democracy or Food Control? 257

Why is governance an issue? 258
Civil society emerges 262
Building on existing policy commitments 263
How global institutions frame food and health 265
Global standards 267
Injecting health into regional institutions: the
EU case 269
Agriculture, subsidies and health 271
Injecting the new health into national institutions 275
The emerging battle lines: food democracy versus
food control 279
Human liberty and consumer choice 280
Conclusion 281

8 The Future 283

Introduction 284
Which paradigm will triumph? 285
The paradigmatic analysis 289
Questions emerging from civil society 293
What of the future? 300
Looking for a political lead 301

Notes and References 308

Index 358
 LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES
AND BOXES

FIGURES
1.1 A simple version of the food supply chain 14
1.2 The era of the Food Wars 18
1.3 Productionist approach to health (1950s to present,
with ‘health education’ included post 1970s) 35
1.4 Life Sciences Integrated approach to health 38
1.5 Ecologically Integrated approach to health 39
1.6 The food policy web 45
2.1 Number of deaths by WHO regions, estimates for 2002 54
2.2 Leading causes of mortality, by age, 2002 55
2.3 Anticipated shift in gobal burden of disease
1990–2020, by disease group in developing
countries (WHO) 56
2.4 Diet of a well-nourished Chinese adult
(2500 kcal/person/day) 57
2.5 Diet of an under-nourished Chinese adult
(1480 kcal/person/day) 57
2.6 Relationship between the proportion of energy
from each food source and GNP per capita, with the
proportion of the urban population at 25 per cent,
1990 58
2.7 Relationship between the proportion of energy
from each food source and GNP per capita, with the
proportion of the urban population at 75 per cent,
1990 59
2.8 Life cycle – the proposed causal links 62
2.9 Number of under-nourished by region, 1996–1998 62
2.10 Obesity in adult population across OECD countries 65
2.11 Global population affected by underweight and
obesity in adults, by level of development, 2000 66
X LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES AND BOXES

2.12 Burden of disease attributable to ten selected

leading risk factors, by level of development
and type of affected outcome 74
3.1 Nutrition, health and economic growth 103
3.2 Shifting a population in a healthier direction: a
hypothetical example of fat intake 110
3.3 An integrated approach to food, nutrition and health 117
4.1 Food industry within the paradigms 129
4.2a–f Diets around the world – proportion of energy
derived from different foodstuffs determined by
different regions’ relative stages of development
(a: USA; b: EU; c: Latin America and Caribbean;
d: developing Asia; e: North Africa;
f: Sub-Saharan Africa) 130, 131
4.3 Grain per person, world, 1961–2003 137
4.4 The UK food added-value chain 2001 143
4.5 Anticipated growth of concentration in
European food retailing (by sales), 2000–2010 162
4.6a–bYum! Brands, global reach by fascia, 2002
(a: sales in international restaurants;
b: international sales by brand) 171
4.7 Global area of transgenic crops, 1996–2001 179
5.1 Model of consumer food aspirations used by a
leading UK food retailer 196
6.1 WHO environmental hazards and risk factors 217
6.2 World fisheries production, 1996–2001 245
6.3 Global marine fish catch, by region, 1975–1995 246
6.4 Decline of UK household fish consumption,
1950–2000 247
6.5 UK production area of fruit and vegetables,
1990–2001 252
6.6 UK fruit and vegetable consumption, 1975–2000,
with COMA targets to 2045 253

TABLES
1.1 Features of the Productionist paradigm 29
1.2 Features of the Life Sciences Integrated paradigm 31
1.3 Features of the Ecologically Integrated paradigm 32
2.1 Some major diet-related diseases 51
2.2 Types and effects of malnutrition 61
 LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES AND BOXES XI

2.3 Projected trends in under-nourishment by region,

1996–2030 63
2.4 Global increases in the prevalence of childhood
obesity 67
2.5 DALYs lost by cause, for the developed and
developing countries, 1990 and 2020 72
2.6 DALYs lost by selected causes, for the EU and
Australia, around 1995 73
2.7 Growth of expenditure on health, 1990–2000 76
2.8 Economic costs of diet- and exercise-related health
problems, US 77
2.9 Age-standardized deaths per 100,000 population
from CHD selected countries, 1968–1996: men 79
2.10 Age-standardized deaths per 100,000 population
from CHD selected countries, 1968–1996: women 79
2.11 Cancers preventable by dietary means 82
2.12 Numbers of people with diabetes, by region, 2000
and 2010 84
2.13 Some pathogenic organisms associated with public
health, which may be transmitted by food 88
3.1 The Eurodict Project population guidelines, 2000 116
3.2 Individualist and population approaches to food
and health 119
4.1 Directions of change in diet, food supply and
culture 142
4.2 Concentration in the US food processing sectors 145
4.3 The banana supply chain 151
4.4 World’s top 50 food groups, 2000 154
4.5 Leading global food retailers, 2002 161
4.6 Europe’s leading retailers, 2001 162
4.7 UK food retail market share (%), 1900–2000 166
4.8 World food service outlets by region, 1995–2000 168
4.9 World food service outlets, by value and type,
2000–2004, US$ 169
4.10 Burger King global presence, January 2002 170
4.11 Global top five countries by number of
McDonald’s outlets, 2003 172
4.12 Organic farming in Europe, 2000–2001 176
4.13 World markets for organic food and beverages 177
5.1 Competing models for patterns of food
consumption 193
5.2 World consuming classes 195
XII LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES AND BOXES

5.3 Adspend by food category, UK 198

5.4 Adspend by leading food companies in top 50
UK brands 200
5.5 Adspend by leading food companies, US 202
5.6 Leading food companies exposed to ‘obesity risk’,
2003 205
6.1 Environmental factors affecting health 226
6.2 Energy used by product/packaging combinations
for peas 234
6.3 Energy use and emissions for modes of freight
transport 234
6.4 Energy used per year by various UK food
industries 235
6.5 Energy input in US maize production, 1945–1985,
in MJ/ha 236
6.6 Emissions and energy use by modes of freight
transport 236
6.7 A simple dinner at home 238
6.8 Weekly costs of food and drink in the UK (organic
and non-organic) 243
7.1 Multi-level governance in relation to food and
health 259
7.2 Global institutions involved in food and health 260
7.3 List of global commitments 264
7.4 Farm subsidies by country; OECD Producer
Support Estimate, 1986–2001 273
7.5 US federal subsidies to agriculture, 1997–2001 274
8.1 Different approaches to food and health policy, by
paradigm 286
8.2 Features of the Productionist paradigm under
contest in the Food Wars 292
8.3 Some tentative rules for food and ecological
health (adults) 303
8.4 Some broad policy options for tackling food and
health 305

BOX
4.1 A brief history of Nestlé 157
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book has been a long time in gestation. We began to talk
seriously about it in the run-up to the December 1999 Seattle
World Trade Organization meeting, and an early version of our
thinking was launched there by the International Forum on
Globalization. The book is being published when there is a full-
blown debate about obesity and the cost of health care associated
with it. Back in 1999, the UN system’s World Health Organization
prepared a draft strategy on tackling the epidemic of diet-related
disease sweeping our world, which received a hostile reaction
from sections of the food industry. We had realized that, in the
very welcome and rising debate about globalization, the vital
area of food and public health was somehow being marginalized
or perceived as being limited to a few issues such as food safety
and GM foods for example. As we show in this book, food and
health issues go far wider than that, and include large issues such
as the health impact of the spread of Western diets to the develop-
ing world.
While environmentalists and citizens groups had well-
developed debates underway about the cultural and political
transition (and about the need to reform government and policies
in the pursuit of the public, not just the corporate, interest), the
food and public health movement appeared to have been left
on the sidelines – ironically, in the face of the evidence supplied
by epidemiologists and nutritionists arguing for policy change.
We decided that we had to set down our arguments and thoughts.
The process took longer than we expected, as it required us to
enter areas and review data which are themselves immensely
complex and require labyrinthine understanding. The book
underwent an iterative process of being written, read by special-
ists and friends, criticized, wholly rewritten and round again.
We therefore want to pay tribute to our many friends and
colleagues who have encouraged and helped us in this process.
It began for both of us on two fronts. First, from involvement in
XIV ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

the public policy debate throughout the 1990s, in the course of

which a coalition of interests came together to monitor, engage
with and lobby on the arcane area of international trade regimes
and regulations. Second, we were both involved in following the
global food industry as it struggled to integrate a ‘health’ agenda
into its new product development and marketing strategies.
We felt that health had to be a significant feature in the re-
alignment of food with society. Yet if a good understanding of
food and health issues was poorly represented outside the
decision-making process, discussion about their relevance would
inevitably, it seemed, be left to officials or the industrial interests
about which we were nervous. Our view was that a central role
for food and public health policy was a critical test for sound
policy-making which should be based on best evidence and best
practice.
We have been privileged to be part of that growing debate
and of our own self-education process. So our first debt is to all
those who, over the last 12 years or more, have been prepared to
discuss issues, respond to ideas, ask us to write and present
papers, support as well as curtail our enthusiasms, point out
errors, and do all such helpful things that friends and colleagues
do.
We therefore pay heartfelt tribute, for helping to form the ideas
and thinking in this book, to the following: Annie Anderson, John
Ashton, Carlos Alvarez-Dardet, David Barling, Fran Baum,
Robert Beaglehole, Warren Bell, David Buffin, Colin Butler,
Geoffrey Cannon, Martin Caraher, Mickey Chopra, Charlie
Clutterbuck, John Connor, Dick Copeman, John Coveney,
Michael Crawford, John Cubbin, George Davey-Smith, Barbara
Dinham, Liz Dowler, Anna Ferro-Luzzi, Ben Fine, Ken Fox,
Yiannis Gabriel, Susan George, Edward Goldsmith, C Gopalan,
Jeya Henry, Brian Halweil, Spencer Henson, Ildefonso
Hernández, Nick Hildyard, Colin Hines, Vicki Hird, Dinghua
Hu, Mika Iba, Michael Jacobsen, Phil James, Jean James, Jørgen
Højmark Jensen, Marco Jermini, Andy Jones, Ingrid Keller, Cecile
Knai, Mustafa Koc, Al Krebs, Lyndon Kurth, Ron Labonte,
Felicity Lawrence, Mark Lawrence, Kelley Lee, Rod Leonard, Tim
Lobstein, Jeanette Longfield, David Ludwig, Jerry Mander, John
Manoocheri, Barrie Margetts, Karen McColl, Martin McKee, Tony
McMichael, Philip McMichael, Margaret Mellon, Erik Millstone,
Sid Mintz, Monica Moore, Marion Nestle, Chizuru Nishida,
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS XV

Aleck Ostry, Roland Petchey, Miquel Porta, David Porter, Barry

Popkin, Kaisa Poutanen, Jules Pretty, Bill Pritchard, Pekka Puska,
Geof Rayner, Mike Rayner, Tom Reardon, Michael Redclift,
Sarojini Rengam, Neville Rigby, Mark Ritchie, Aileen Robertson,
Peter Rosset, Sam Selikowitz, Aubrey Sheiham, Prakash Shetty,
Mira Shiva, Vandana Shiva, Bruce Silverglade, Boyd Swinburn,
Steve Suppan, Geoff Tansey, David Thomas, Peter Timmer,
Antonia Trichopoulou, Colin Tudge, Flavio Luiz Schieck Valente,
Bill Vorley, Lori Wallach, David Wallinga, Kevin Watkins, Amalia
Waxman, Julius Weinberg, John Wilkinson, Martin Wiseman,
Derek Yach, Taka Yagi, and Richard Young, and all those in the
international food industries and agencies who shared their
insights and thoughts over the years about the business side of
health. All have provided us with encouragement, thoughts,
criticism and advice on the complex range of issues that we
feature in this book.
For permission to use data reproduced in this book, we thank
the World Cancer Research Fund, the ACC-SCN Expert Com-
mittee and Barry Popkin; as ever, all three were inspirations. For
permission to quote work, we thank Rita Clifton of Interbrand,
and the BHF Health Promotion Research Group at Oxford
University.
Many people helped us with the laborious practical process
that is book writing. From 1998 to 2000 Heena Vithlani, Jenny
Lord and Kelly Andrews took turns as PAs to Tim Lang; in 1999,
Pirkko Heasman and Jillian Pitt gave invaluable help on
mapping for us the nutritional and public health aspects of the
globalization of diet; and in 2002, Yannick Borin and Sylvie
Fritche, our inestimable French duo, gave wonderful help with
data-gathering, sorting and tables.
We want also to thank the many people who have commented
on ideas we presented when teaching or at seminars in Australia,
Brazil, Canada, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, India, Italy, Japan,
Kenya, Korea, Latvia, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand,
Russia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK and the US
over the last ten years. There have been moments when it has
seemed that there is nowhere we will not go to research food
supply. Our energy-burning, carbon-burning environmental
‘credits’ have no doubt been all used up, as we jetted about, at
other people’s expense, to meetings and conferences where we
could explore, observe and pronounce on the world’s changing
XVI ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

supply chain. At those many meetings, we would try out many

of the ideas and data given in this book. We are truly grateful to
those who came to discuss with us and give feedback; we hope
they think their efforts were worthwhile.
We also want to thank the many organizations who nurtured
our thoughts, including friends and colleagues at the Inter-
national Forum on Globalization, Pesticides Action Network,
Sustain (created by the merger of the National Food Alliance and
the Sustainable Agriculture, Food and Environment Alliance),
the UK Public Health Association, the Journal of Epidemiology
and Public Health, the Food and Agriculture Organization and
the World Health Organization, all of whom have encouraged
our work over the last decade or so. It would have been much
harder critically to assess the impact of huge societal shifts of
food, the supply chain and health without their support and
encouragement.
Finally, we want to thank Pirkko Heasman and Liz Castledine
for their unstinting support while we wrote this book; Akan
Leander, Angela Cairns and the team at Earthscan and James &
James for producing it; and especially Jonathan Sinclair Wilson
for encouraging us to write it. Any errors and confusions are, of
course, our own.

Tim Lang Michael Heasman

London UK Jokela, Finland
March 2004 March 2004
 LIST OF ACRONYMS AND
ABBREVIATIONS
AoA Agreement on Agriculture (of the GATT)
BMI body mass index
BSE bovine spongiform encephalopathy
BST bovine somatotrophin
CAP Common Agricultural Policy
CEC Commission of the European Community (also EC)
CHD coronary heart disease
CI Consumers International (world body of consumer NGOs)
Codex Codex Alimentarius Commission (joint WHO/FAO body)
CVD cardiovascular disease
DALY disability adjusted life year
EAGGF European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund (CAP)
EC European Commission
EP European Parliament
EU European Union
FAO Food and Agriculture Organization (of the UN)
GATT General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
GBD Global Burden of Disease (a research study)
GM genetic modification
IARC International Agency for Research on Cancer
ICN International Conference on Nutrition (1992)
IFG International Forum on Globalization
IFPRI International Food Policy Research Institute
JECFA Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives
NGO non-governmental organization
NIDDM non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus
OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
PCB polychlorinated biphenyl
POPs persistent organic pollutants
SFS Surplus Food Scheme
SME small- or medium-sized enterprise
SPS Sanitary and Phytosanitary Standards (part of 1994 GATT)
TBT Technical Barriers to Trade (part of the 1994 GATT)
TNCs transnational corporations
UN United Nations
UNCED United Nations Conference on Environment and
Development (1992) (also known as the Earth Summit)
UNEP United Nations Environment Programme
WFS World Food Summit (1996)
WHO World Health Organization (of the United Nations)
WHO-E World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe
WIPO World Intellectual Property Organization
WTO World Trade Organization
‘The history of the world, my sweet, is who gets
eaten and who gets to eat’
Sweeney Todd

For what can war, but endless war still breed?

Till truth and right from violence be freed,
And public faith clear’d from the shameful brand
Of public fraud. In vain doth Valour bleed,
While Avarice and Rapine share the land.

John Milton, English poet, 1608–1674;

from To the Lord General Fairfax (1648)
 INTRODUCTION 1

INTRODUCTION
‘Freedom from want of food, therefore, must mean making available for
every citizen in every country sufficient of the right kind of food for health.
If we are planning food for the people, no lower standard can be accepted.’

Sir John Boyd Orr, first Director-General of the Food and

Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (1880–1971)1

CORE ARGUMENTS
Food policy is in crisis, in particular over health. Yet health
can be the key to the solution to this crisis. For the last
half-century, there has been one dominant model of food
supply. This is now running out of steam and is being chal-
lenged by competing approaches: three major scenarios,
each of which is shaping the future of food and health. We
argue that, at the heart of any new vision, there has to be a
coherent conception of how to link human with ecological
health. Humanity has reached a critical juncture in its
relationship to food supply and food policy, and both
public and corporate policies are failing to grasp the enorm-
ity of the challenge. Food policy needs to provide solutions
to the worldwide burden of disease, ill health and food-
related environmental damage. There is a new era of
experimentation underway emerging out of the decades
we term the ‘Food Wars’. These have been characterized
by struggles over how to conceive of the future of food and
the shaping of minds, markets and mouths.

Food is an intimate part of our daily lives. It is a biological neces-

sity but it also shapes and is a vehicle for the way we interact with
2 FOOD WARS

friends, family, work colleagues and ourselves. It is associated

with pleasure, seduction, pain, power and caring. As we eat our
daily food, bought in the shops that we know, buying brands that
we are familiar with, it is hard to imagine that there is such a thing
as a global food economy, stretching from the local corner store
to the giant food conglomerate, under pressure right from the
way food is produced and processed to its impact on our long-
term health and well-being.
Our interest here is in food policy: the decision-making that
shapes the way the world of food operates and is controlled. We
see the world of food policy as formed and fractured by a series
of conflicts – the Food Wars – structured around three dominant
worldviews or ‘paradigms’ (a term explained fully in Chapter 1).
These offer different conceptions of the relationship between
food and health and also offer distinct and sometimes competing
choices for public policy, the corporate sector and civil society. We
argue that health has often been somewhat marginalized in
policy and that the Food Wars are, in part, about a jostling for
position by different interest groups seeking to influence the
future of food.
Addressing the challenges of health will require better pro-
cesses for making food policies and reform of the institutions of
food governance; they need to be shaped in an integrated way.
Unless this is done, we believe that the food supply chain will
lose public trust. If it is to achieve popular support and legiti-
macy, it will need to be infused with what we call ‘food demo-
cracy’, a notion we explore towards the end of the book.
Our focus therefore is on the policy choices that shape how
humanity orders its food economy and on urging public policy
to play a positive role in promoting the public good. To this end,
we explore five key elements of the world of food that we con-
sider to be crucial. These are:

l health: the relationships between diet, disease, nutrition and

public health;
l business: the way food is produced and handled, from farm
inputs to consumption;
l consumer culture: how, why and where people consume
food;
l the environment: the use and misuse of land, sea and other
natural resources when producing food; and
 INTRODUCTION 3

l food governance: how the food economy is regulated and how

food policy choices are made and implemented.

These issues are often studied in isolation, and at times deserve

such micro-attention. But the scale of the pressures and chal-
lenges in the context of the global food supply now suggests that
this ‘compartmental’ approach is no longer a viable way of
handling food policy-making. We are calling for a new frame-
work for making food policy choices.
While today’s food economy is grounded in a long history of
production, experimentation and technological change, the
industrial food supply is still relatively young in human history
– a little more than 150 to 200 years old. Since World War II the
food economy has undergone further remarkable commercial
and technological expansion in order to provide food for an
unprecedented growth in human population to more than
6 billion in 2003, and can deliver, in theory, enough food to end
world hunger. For those with the means and access to purchase
them, the modern food system has produced an array of proces-
sed, all-year-round, convenient foodstuffs never before available.
Yet at this very pinnacle of success in the way food is produced,
the sustainability of food production systems and the quality of
foodstuffs in the developed and developing worlds are being
challenged as never before. The current food system appears to
lurch from crisis to crisis: from new health scares such as BSE to
environmental disasters such as over-fishing and the collapse of
fish stocks. At the same time, global food supply faces new
challenges: a continuing surge in population growth in some
parts of the world and an increasingly aged population in others;
the introduction of radical new technologies such as genetic
modification; a new global scale and scope of corporate control
and influence; a breakdown in consumer trust in food govern-
ance and institutions; and persistent health problems associated
with inadequate diet such as heart disease, obesity and diabetes
which, alongside hunger and famine, affect hundreds of millions
of people.
It is obvious that something has to be done for the future. Food
Wars argues that such challenges cannot be met in a piecemeal
fashion. There has to be a new vision of public health. Our concern
is to make the links across these discrete policy areas and to show
continuity in thinking, from the way food is produced to the
4 FOOD WARS

management of consumption and the healthiness of foodstuffs.

We argue that the future viability of the food economy can be
framed to deliver effectively to the general public only if there are
new and integrated policy choices.
Difficult questions loom. How can population health goals be
reconciled with the way people want to live their lives? Can
consumers realistically continue to expect ever cheaper food?
What sort of intensification in production is best for human and
environmental health? How can patterns of food trade benefit
more people? What are the acceptable limits to the continuing
concentration of market share by giant food companies? To what
extent should public money support food production, if at all?

WHY FOOD WARS?

Every day, millions of men, women and children are direct or
indirect casualties of failures of food policy to deliver safe,
nutritious and life-enhancing diets. People raised in the devel-
oped world since World War II may think that the damage is felt
only in areas of the world that suffer famine, malnutrition or
other deficiencies; but in the rich world too there is a huge toll.
While Western societies have increased the caloric content of the
diet and boosted the sheer quantity of our food, they have at the
same time introduced methods of production, distribution and
consumption that threaten the future of the food system that
delivers those calories. These methods have at the same time
contributed to reducing the quality and nutritional value of many
foodstuffs (such as the loss of essential bioactive components like
vitamins and minerals). Health has been assumed to follow from
sufficiency of supply. While scientific understanding of food is
now very complex, too much policy-making has failed to face up
to the human and environmental health damage that surrounds
it.
All around us, food culture is divided. On the one hand, we
have ‘celebrity chefs’ with top-rating TV shows, cookery and diet
books on the best-seller lists, and popular media concerns about
food quality, safety and availability. On the other hand, a crisis
of food supply still dominates great tracts of the world. Hunger
and under-nutrition still dog many lands, as well as premature
deaths due to malconsumption and over-consumption. In 2001,
 INTRODUCTION 5

for example, the US Surgeon General attributed 300,000

deaths in the US alone to obesity.2 This book is partly about these
dichotomies: over- and under-consumption; over- and under-
production; over- and under-availability; intensification versus
extensification; and hi-tech solutions versus traditional, cultur-
ally based ones.
In the Food Wars, there are numerous conflicts over the qual-
ity of food; food safety; nutrition; trade in foodstuffs; corporate
control of food supply; food poverty and supply insecurity; the
coexistence of the overfed and underfed; the unprecedented
environmental damage from food production and the role and
purpose of technology. How are organizations, policy-makers,
businesses, farmers, non-governmental organizations (NGOs)
and even individuals to tackle the enormity of the global and
local challenges now confronting the food system? Despite appa-
rent food abundance, the security of the food supply cannot be
taken for granted.
We set out to write this book because we were frustrated that
the key figures in food policy appeared to be skirting around
major problems rather than facing them, or too often dealing
with the challenges separately in neat policy boxes rather than
holistically. Much of the food industry sees the responsibility for
food as lying with the individual consumer, and any ‘liberal’-
minded intervention in food supply, they argue, is condescend-
ing: treating individuals as victims rather than intelligent food
consumers. Such an approach, we argue, ignores the realities and
the scale of the crisis in food and health which is beyond the
scope of either individuals or single companies, and also ignores
the power relationships shaping food supply. Much of this book
is our attempt to resolve the complex battles over what the ‘food
and health’ problem really is and what to do about it.

ARE RADICAL OPTIONS IN FOOD AND

HEALTH FEASIBLE OR EVEN POSSIBLE?
Within the world of food policy there is a creeping recognition
that radical solutions are needed. Distinct policy choices are
emerging which will frame business and consumer opportuni-
ties. In the nutrition sciences, for example, a new ‘ecological
6 FOOD WARS

nutrition’ is being developed along evolutionary principles –

seeking diets that suit humans’ evolutionary legacy. Such think-
ing has the potential to offer new radical ways of perceiving food
and health (in particular the way food is produced) that go
beyond the narrow ‘technical fix’ of many solutions being offered
to ‘feed the world’ or to maintain health and fitness in ageing
consumers in the developed world through ‘health-enhancing’
foods and beverages. Another big factor is the apparent revolu-
tion in ‘life sciences’, based upon an understanding that genes
predispose people to diseases and that diet may trigger genetic
predispositions. This so-called nutrigenomic understanding
could have profound implications for the ‘personalization’ or
‘individualization’ of diets.
The word ‘radical’ is used here in the way that world business
expert Gary Hamel uses it, namely that a ‘radical idea has the
power to change customer expectations. . . to change the basis for
competition. . . and the power to change industry economics.’3
We argue that beneath the apparently calm surface of the food
supply chain (which, for all its scandals and monetary crises, has
increased output and fed more people than ever before in human
history) there are powerful undercurrents. Consumers appear,
for example, to be able to change what they demand from the
supply chain in fundamental ways; the recent restructuring of the
food economy is changing the basis for competition and what is
meant by a ‘market’; and globalizing influences are changing the
industry.
A prominent example of radical thinking entering the food
industry is the way in which nutrition science is currently being
used for new product development, food marketing and
business strategy. In 2003 the Chief Executive Officer of Nestlé,
the planet’s largest food company, for example, stated that Nestlé
aimed to become the world’s leading nutrition company within
five years.4 This announced what, in effect, we are starting to
recognize: that no food company can remain in business today
without creating added value through nutrition and health. Yet
where is there a similar vision for food, nutrition and health in
public policy? What should such a vision look like? What should
it include or exclude? How can it embrace the whole food chain,
from growing food to final consumption?
Another radical conflict, in a polarized form, can be seen in
the global tussle between a ‘GM’ (genetically modified) future or
 INTRODUCTION 7

an ‘organic’ future – with both camps making claims of enhanced

health benefits as the rationale for their competing ways of
producing food. Through examples such as these we try, where
possible, to explore the possibility of ‘radical’ options in food and
health policy and whether these are feasible, what their scope
might be, or even whether the ‘technical fix’ approach is the most
appropriate way forward.
The foundation on which we build our call for a more radical
approach to how food is grown and produced is the following:

l The model of food and agriculture put in place in the mid-

20th century has been very successful in raising output but it
has put quantity before quality.
l Humanity has moved from an agricultural/rural to a hyper-
market/urban food culture in a remarkably short time, a
process beginning to roll out fast in the developing world at
present.
l While policy attention has traditionally been on agriculture,
it is what happens off the farm in terms of processing, retail
and food service that is in effect changing the food economy,
not least for the labour force which can too often suffer low
wages and poor conditions.
l Throughout the world, diet is changing in ways that carry
huge health implications and challenges. This is in part due to
trade liberalization and in part to consumer aspirations; in this
respect, there is both a ‘push’ and a ‘pull’ in the food system.
l Food, nutrition and health challenges are global. Countries
like Brazil, India and China are already in the grip of a double
burden of food-related disease: degenerative diseases (heart
disease, cancers, diabetes and obesity) take a heavy toll in all
countries. At the same time mass hunger persists.
l An individualized medical model of food and nutrition is
predominant and is presented as the only source of appropri-
ate solutions to food and health challenges.
l The environmental pressures on food production are reach-
ing crisis scale, from over-fishing (a reality facing Canada and
the European Union), through the loss of soil to grow food in,
to not enough water for agricultural production and irrigation.
l Without an ecologically integrated perspective, food policy
will remain unable to provide long-term consumer confid-
ence or food supply and distribution security.
8 FOOD WARS

l There is rising evidence of injustice within the food system.

This includes the maldistribution of food, poor access to a
good diet, inequities in the labour process and unfair returns
for key suppliers along the food chain.

AN OUTLINE OF THE BOOK

This is a book about ideas of how the future of food is to be
shaped and conceived. We address this task by setting up a
conceptual framework in Chapter 1 of three paradigms. There we
discuss in detail the character of the Food Wars, the assumptions
of the paradigms that inform this book and what we mean by a
paradigm. We argue that food policy often has a troubled rela-
tionship with evidence – sometimes lagging, sometimes leading
it. How much evidence is needed to change policy?
Chapters 2 to 7 deal in detail with the evidence in support of
our conceptual framework as it relates to health, food policy and
the dynamics of the food system. We start by looking at the
evidence of how the world’s diet is changing and facing the
problems of both under-consumption and over-consumption,
often within the same countries. There is the mythology that the
rich world suffers heart disease while the poor world suffers
hunger. Diet-related diseases such as heart disease are becoming
rapidly more prevalent in low- and medium-income countries.
We show how diet- and health-related problems are growing in
scale, not diminishing, as might be assumed with better food
supply. Newer concerns such as obesity and diabetes are rising,
in addition to the ongoing costs of heart disease.
In Chapter 3 we look at how public policy has responded to
evidence about diet and disease. We give a short historical over-
view of changing conceptions of public health and the import-
ance of nutrition, arguing that nutrition is a battleground be-
tween those who see it as framed by social objectives and those
who believe that targeting only ‘at risk’ individuals is a more
effective intervention. We review how governments have tended
to rely upon health education as the mechanism for improving
public health, setting dietary goals and offering guidelines which
put responsibility upon individuals for their own health. We
question this food policy strategy.
The success or failure of food policy will be dependent on
how it relates to the workings of the food economy and affects
 INTRODUCTION 9

particular food business interests. In Chapter 4 we present an

overview of what is meant by the food system/economy, arguing
that, while consolidation and concentration of the power of the
food industry is a long-running trend, the scale and pace of this
change are new. The food industry is relying on a twin strategy
to take it into the future: first, relying on technology and ‘tech-
nical fixes’ to resolve most problems; and second, aligning itself
with the interests of consumers.
While most food companies today will describe themselves
and their activities as ‘consumer-led’, we argue that such an
epithet is too superficial. We propose that a better grasp of food
and consumer culture would help public policy analysts face
what is happening in modern food markets. In Chapter 5 we map
out what we see as the new consumer culture and landscape.
Even at the basic market-led level, the rich-world consumer is
developing a very different conception of food: convenience,
snacking, ready meals, an eating-out culture and a food lifestyle
that meet time constraints, and that recognize the newer role of
women in society.
Chapter 6 turns to another war zone: essentially a conflict
over food quality. Our case is that the food supply chain is com-
mitted to producing a range of foodstuffs in environmentally
unsustainable and wasteful ways that militate against human
health. Today’s food supply chain, while seemingly appropriate
for the past, is now shown to damage and threaten the environ-
ment. Food, a means for life, is threatening its own continued
production. Too many policy-makers still believe that they can
merely ‘bolt on’ an eco-friendly niche market to the crisis of food
and the environment. A re-orientation of the entire food supply
chain is needed if both human and environmental health are to
be delivered.
In the commercial context, there is no respite in the tragedies
continually hitting rural and farming communities. While farm-
ers and the land are being squeezed, oligopolies from agribusi-
ness to food processing, retailing and even food service dictate
the workings of the food supply chain. We suggest that much
public policy response to date has been at best reactive rather
than proactive; and in many instances, NGOs and the business
and scientific communities, albeit differently, have been more in
tune with wider societal trends about food and health than
policy-makers and government. But, as we argue in Chapter 7,
future food and health choices must ultimately be resolved in
10 FOOD WARS

public discourse: designing and reworking the institutional

‘architecture’ of food policy to deliver public goods is a pressing
challenge. There are limited public forums for delivering, let
alone creating, an integrated food and health policy. There is a
crisis of institutions and of governance (that curious English
word that refers to the science and practice of government) at all
levels – local, national, regional and global. The processes of
government are too often trapped in ‘boxes’ of responsibility,
with no one retaining overall responsibility across the different
compartments.
Our objective in this book is to contribute to the debate and
to suggest that there is already available a wide range of policy
options and alternative voices. In Chapter 8 we argue that policy-
makers too often assume that they have little choice and con-
sequently discourage the alternatives. But we think that there is
a new era of experimentation underway and through our ‘para-
digms’ we show that there are different ways of assessing and
making choices.
A new conception of health – linking human and ecological
health – has to be at the heart of a new policy vision. To deliver
healthy consumption requires a different set of priorities within
the food supply chain. We need to generate new areas of know-
ledge about food and health. Food policy in general needs to
develop a range of alternative food scenarios, at the very least as
‘insurance policies’ against unforeseen crises and to tackle the
unacceptable legacy from the last century of disease, ill health
and environmental damage.
This book offers a panorama. We argue that throughout the
20th century, food caused problems in public and corporate
policy and, vice versa, public and corporate policy caused
problems for the world of food. Numerous crises have sparked
incremental reforms, most recently over food safety. But still,
the framework of public policy on food is too fragmented and
restricted. Problems are addressed too often in an ad hoc or
interim manner when what is required is a systematic framework
for addressing food policy, integrating core drivers such as
health, business, environmental impact, consumer experience
and policy management. This more coordinated approach may
still be in embryonic stages but it already finds itself in an arena
of considerable conflict. There is some way to go in the Food Wars
before there is Food Peace.
 THE FOOD WARS THESIS 11

CHAPTER 1
THE FOOD WARS THESIS
‘If you know before you look, you cannot see for knowing.’

Sir Terry Frost RA (British artist 1915–2003)

CORE ARGUMENTS
Different visions for the future of food are shaping the
potential for how food will be produced and marketed.
Inevitably, there will be policy choices – for the state, the
corporate sector and civil society. Human and environ-
mental health needs to be at the heart of these choices.
Three broad conceptual frameworks or ‘paradigms’ pro-
pose the way forward for food policy, the food economy
and health itself. All make claims to raise production and
to deliver health benefits through food. The challenge for
policy-makers is how to sift through the evidence and to
give a fair hearing to a range of choices. This process is
sometimes difficult because the relationship between evid-
ence and policy is not what it seems. The world of food is
on the cusp of a far-reaching transition.

INTRODUCTION
The world is producing more food than ever to feed more mouths
than ever.1 For the better off there are more food and beverage
product choices than it is possible to imagine – globally 25,000
products in the average supermarket and more than 20,000 new
packaged foods and beverages in 2002 alone.2 Yet for many
people there is a general feeling of unease and mistrust about the
12 FOOD WARS

future of our food supply. Food and problems associated with

producing and consuming food generate political and policy
crises and are regular fodder for media coverage. In addition,
along with the food production successes of the past 40 years in
reducing famine, hunger continues hand in hand with excess.
The optimism of the 20th-century food policy planners that, with
good management and science problems associated with food
would disappear, has not been fulfilled. Food’s capacity to cause
problems has not lessened.
As we will show, new relationships are already apparent
throughout the entire food supply chain, from the way the food
is produced to its consumption. Increasingly, alternatives to the
prevailing structures of the food economy are also being widely
mooted. No wonder there are such arguments about food. The
pace and scale of change engender reactions; forces within the
food supply chain are often at odds with each other about their
vision for the future; there are competing versions of what the
future could be, over which partisan forces argue. Our simple
conclusion is that food policy-making matters more now than
ever before.
To set the context for the future of food policy over the next
two decades, we see the world of food supply currently in the
throes of a long-term transition: from a food policy world domin-
ated by farming and agriculture, agribusiness and commodity-
style production, to one dominated by consumption: major
branded food manufacturers, food retailing and food service.
This transition is causing new tensions, challenges, threats and
opportunities along the whole food chain, from farm to consumer,
which we call the Food Wars: the precursor to what we argue is a
fundamental reframing of the assumptions about the way we will
come to analyse, research and carry out food production, the
Food Wars encompass competing visions and models for the
future of food supply driven, in part, by emerging new scientific
understanding and accompanying technologies, but also by food
politics and shifting demographics in terms of patterns of diet-
related disease and illness as well as consumer-lifestyle choices.
In this chapter we set out to capture this complex pattern of
change by suggesting a new conceptual model of three compet-
ing frameworks or ‘paradigms’ for food which we term the
Productionist paradigm (the dominant and current model), the
newly emerging Life Sciences Integrated paradigm and the
 THE FOOD WARS THESIS 13

Ecologically Integrated paradigm. But first we need to set out

some basic assumptions about food policy and the food supply
chain that informs this conceptual model.

FOOD POLICY CHOICES

Throughout this book, we use the terms ‘food and health policy’,
‘food policy’ and ‘food and farming policy’: those policies and the
policy-making processes that shape the outcome of the food
supply chain, food culture and who eats what, when and how,
and with what consequences. Our task here is to unravel the
strands of competing interests and policy objectives. There is no
one food policy or one food policy-maker: there are policies and
policy-makers, all of which contribute to the overall process.
Food policy-making is essentially a social process. The shape
of the food supply chain is the outcome of myriad decisions and
actions from production to consumption; it can involve people
and organizations who may not even call themselves policy-
makers. For example, the food industry, when it sets specifica-
tions for food products, is in part determining the nutritional
intake of consumers; health-care planners, when facing the
burgeoning costs of managing the rise of certain diseases (such
as diabetes and some cancers) are making decisions that are
‘policy’, dealing with the results of how food is produced and
consumed. Equally, competition authorities or town planners,
when making decisions about retail market share or the siting of
supermarkets, are determining issues as diverse as prices, access
to food shops and local culture. The value of this very broad
conception of food policy is that it helps to make sense of what
otherwise remains a disparate, inchoate jumble.
Food policy is contested terrain: a battle of interests, know-
ledge and beliefs. The sort of food economy that exists is the
result of a set of conscious policy choices made in the past,
including both state and corporate decisions, involving funding
for particular types of food production and processing, the
setting of research priorities and national and strategic objectives,
the provision of education and information, the creation of rules
for trade and safe food and law enforcement and sanctions when
things go wrong.
14 FOOD WARS

Our conception of food policy is that it should embrace

decision-making along the whole of what is known as the food
supply chain. Figure 1.1 is a simplified version of what is meant
by the food system3 or food supply chain – a term originally
promoted by agricultural economists who now use a different
term – ‘value chain’ – to analyse how, from farm to consumer, raw
commodities get value added to them. The important point to
note is that analysis from a food-chain perspective assumes that
change in one part of the chain, intentionally or not, has an
impact on other parts. Increasingly, analysis from a food-chain
perspective is used to understand trends and the global restruc-
turing of the food supply.

Supply of Agricultural Inputs

eg fertilizers, pesticides, vet drugs, GMO seeds

Primary Production
eg farmers, fisherman, fish farmers

Primary Food Processing

eg on-farm, dairies, abattoirs, grain mills

Secondary Food Processing

eg canning, freezing, drying, brewing

Food Distribution
eg national/international, import/export

Food retailing Food Catering

eg supermarkets, shops eg restaurants, hospitals, schools

Domestic Food

Source: WHO

Figure 1.1 A simple version of the food supply chain

 THE FOOD WARS THESIS 15

KEY CHARACTERISTICS OF THE

FOOD SUPPLY CHAIN
The model of the food supply chain in Figure 1.1 allows us to note
some key characteristics of the modern supply system. We can
summarize these under four main arguments:

Pressures ‘off the farm’ dominate the food system

Traditionally, for the last century, agriculture has dominated food

policy thinking and still dominates international budgetary
debates (for instance about the rights and wrongs of subsidies).
The food supply chain is today driven by forces away from the
farm, yet policy still focuses on commodity-producing agricul-
ture. Pressures off the land are more important in framing the
food economy than politicians often like to admit. Today, the
main drivers of the food supply chain are the powerful forces of
processors, traders and retailers, in turn focusing on capturing
consumer needs.

Consumption is the key to understanding the food

system

Power in the modern food economy is increasingly driven by

concerns about the consumption end of the food supply chain.
With the rise to dominance of food retailing, the retailer is a
broker – between primary producers and consumption – and is
a powerful figure in the corridors of power. Yet individual retail
consumers are diverse and usually unconscious of their collective
influence: they can be badly organized and they carry most of the
health costs of current food supply, yet they are made responsible
for their own diet-related (ill) health since they are ultimately
answerable for what they eat – put another way, food production
is being posited as a victim of consumer choice!

Public and corporate interests do not correspond

The pace of development and the structure of the food chain is

being increasingly shaped by a small number of powerful food
16 FOOD WARS

conglomerates. While this has been an evolving process, con-

solidation in the food industry has now reached a new level of
influence in key markets. These corporate interests see food
policy-making as part of their business strategy and are often
well represented in the food policy arenas. This can be double-
edged: on one hand, industry interests are frequently more aware
of public objectives and unhappiness than the supposed public
guardians themselves, and on the other hand, industry is hardly
likely to give due weight to policy that conflicts with its immedi-
ate financial and market positioning. This raises a problem for
what we call food governance – the role of public democratic
control, accountability and public responsibility – an issue raised
throughout this book but particularly addressed in Chapter 7.

Health has been marginalized in the food economy

Although the food supply chain model in Figure 1.1 is a simpli-

fied description of the food economy, it can imply support for the
view that human and environmental health are an outcome of
the smooth running of the food supply chain. In fact, health can
fall down the gaps between sectors and is not seen as a prime
responsibility of any one group. Human and environmental
health ought to be the connecting tissue between and within all
the economic sectors and be intrinsic to the whole food supply
chain. A valuable debate has begun from an environmental
health perspective; there now needs to be debate beginning from
a human health perspective.

THE WAR OF PARADIGMS: TIME FOR A

NEW FRAMEWORK?
There are structural tensions between different interests, views
and economic investment patterns in food policy which are far-
reaching in their consequences. Despite many illusions to the
contrary, there is in the real world of food politics much jostling
for position and attempts to impose rules on others. Our concern
here is that the outcome of these conflicts and the compromises
that are hammered out in policy meetings constantly shape the
food supply chain. The overriding framework of food policy in
 THE FOOD WARS THESIS 17

relation to health, humanity and society as a whole requires

major re-working. It is the whole picture that is our concern.
The choices that we explore in this book can perhaps best be
understood in three ways: first, there are a number of key battle-
grounds in the Food Wars; second, the outcome of these global
conflicts is of immense significance for human health, that is, of
individuals, societies and environment, ie ecological health;
third, new ways of thinking about the future of food suggest that
a paradigm shift is underway.
If a paradigm is a set of assumptions from which new know-
ledge is generated, a way of seeing the world which shapes
intellectual beliefs and actions, then science is a process, not an
endgame of neutral fact-finding; it expresses values even in its
facts. We use the term ‘food paradigm’ to indicate a set of shared
understandings, common rules and ways of conceiving problems
and solutions about food. A paradigm for us is an underlying,
fundamental set of framing assumptions that shape the way a
body of knowledge is thought of.
The term ‘paradigm’ is associated with the work of Thomas
Kuhn, the philosopher of science who first popularized the term.4
In fact, he merely built on a concept spelled out by Ludwig
Wittgenstein (1889–1951), the Austrian philosopher. Kuhn took
Wittgenstein’s concept of paradigms and applied it to science as
a process of making ideas: a set of ‘universally recognised scien-
tific achievements that for a time provide model problems and
solutions to a community of practitioners’. Kuhn was interested
in how scientific understanding went through momentous crisis
points and what determined why one accepted framework of
thinking fell by the wayside while another triumphed in its place.
(For example, the work of Isaac Newton transformed how humans
thought of the physical world; nearly three centuries later the
new physics of relativity which Albert Einstein and others intro-
duced created another paradigm shift which replaced the New-
tonian worldview, transforming and superseding its tenets.)
Kuhn himself was said to have used the term with at least 21
different shades of meaning,5 and academics today use the term
‘paradigm’ more fluidly or metaphorically than even Kuhn
originally intended.
The food system that developed rapidly after World War II
exemplified a way of thinking that we call the Productionist
paradigm: it remains the dominant worldview, but one which is
18 FOOD WARS

now contested in respect of the future of food by newer ‘models’,

chief amongst which are two emerging frameworks, which we
call the Life Sciences Integrated paradigm and the Ecologically
Integrated paradigm. Both are grounded in the science of biology,
but each interprets biological and societal systems in ways that
offer differing choices for our food future: how food is produced,
who produces it and how it is sold; questions of social justice,
where the food is produced (global versus local sourcing) and the
place of food in human health. Figure 1.2 illustrates how we see
the situation in the era of the Food Wars.

Agricultural
Revolution

Life Sciences Integrated

Paradigm
Industrializ-
ation of
Food

Productionist
Food
Paradigm Wars
Chemical
Revolution

Ecologically Integrated
Paradigm
Transport
Revolution

1800s 1900s 1950 2000 2050

LEGEND:
= Key battlegrounds in the Food Wars. These include:
• Diet, health and disease prevention
• Environmental crisis
• Capturing the consumer
• Controlling food supply
• What sort of food business
• Competing visions and ideologies

Figure 1.2 The era of the Food Wars

THE PRODUCTIONIST PARADIGM

Very powerful forces are lining up behind these new paradigms
for food – but it should be realized that the existing Productionist
paradigm still has influence – as is evidenced, for example, by the
continued failure to fundamentally reform the European Union’s
Common Agricultural Policy. We argue that the status quo is no
 THE FOOD WARS THESIS 19

longer a viable option because the very methods it uses, such as

animal husbandry, chemical inputs and its patterns of trade, are
making it a poor policy option, no longer serving the public
interest. We see the assumptions of this paradigm being chal-
lenged on many fronts and failing in credibility in significant
areas.
The origins of the Productionist paradigm lie in the indus-
trialization of food over the last 200 years and its concomitant
advances in chemical, transport and agricultural technologies.
Over this period food supply in many parts of the world has
moved from often local, small-scale production to concentrated
production and mass distribution of foodstuffs. Such a shift is a
defining characteristic of the Productionist paradigm (even
though it should be noted that much global food production is
still local or regionally based).
With the arrival of industrialization and the explosion of
urban populations in the last two centuries, social division of
food became even more politically sensitive. Reliance on trade in
food commodities, such as spices and sugar,6 already consider-
able for some foods, grew; pressures to intensify production
accelerated, increasing rural poverty: increased output from the
land reduced the actual labour required on the land. The features
of this agricultural revolution include: the increased use of inputs
and of plant and animal breeding, the growth of fewer but larger
farms, mechanization and a reliance on fossil fuels.7, 8
For us the Productionist paradigm goes far beyond the farm:
it typified the whole 20th-century outlook – in particular from
the 1930s onwards – in which the food supply chain became
production-led in order to increase the quantity of food over other
priorities. It developed a science base to further the goals of
increasing output. Universities, colleges of agriculture, extension
services and a whole panoply of support were gradually incorpo-
rated into this paradigm, which came to dominate food policy
after the shortages and failures of the pre-World War II period.
The production-driven model was built not just upon the agri-
cultural revolution of the 18th century onwards (and of the
chemical and transport revolutions too), but on the capacity of
food processors to preserve, store and distribute food en masse.9
The triumph of the Productionist paradigm was cemented in
the experience of mid-20th century starvation, food shortages,
and maldistribution in many countries.10 Throughout the world,
20 FOOD WARS

governments created new national and international policies

designed to increase production by applying large-scale indus-
trial techniques that applied modern chemical, transportation,
processing and farming technologies. The overarching goal of
this paradigm was to increase output and efficiencies of labour
and capital for increasingly urbanized populations. It is an irony
that, while historically one of its policy goals was to increase
national self-sufficiency and production, its surpluses are now
being used to weaken the self-sufficiency policies of many devel-
oping countries who are being urged to open their local markets
to global trade.
Now, half a century on from the consolidation of the Pro-
ductionist paradigm, it is under strain and showing up major
limitations. Although Productionism has been successful in
raising production in line with an unprecedented rise in world
population, 1.9 to 2.2 billion people in the world are estimated to
remain directly or indirectly untouched by modern agricultural
technology.11 Health and environmental strains are threatening
its survival: matters such as oil shortages, climate change, labour
‘efficiencies’, water depletion, pollution and public concern
about animal welfare and the nature of plant and animal breed-
ing. There is also a serious battle over who owns the food supply,
not just in terms of companies (which we discuss in Chapter 4)
but also of the intellectual property, even the genetic basis, of
foods.12
To achieve its objectives, industrialized production historic-
ally focused on monocultures (single crops in a field) rather than
diversity, but this created a reliance on artificial inputs (pesticides
and fertilizers) and energy-intensive engineering both on and off
the farm. The sustainability and profitability of the Productionist
paradigm is now far from certain, with agribusiness and politics,
as well as markets and consumers, now questioning how our
food is produced.

TWO NEW PARADIGMS OF FOOD SUPPLY?

The limitations of the Productionist paradigm manifest them-
selves in the increasing number of Food Wars over such issues as
the health implications of chemicals used in production and the
 THE FOOD WARS THESIS 21

treatment of animals, through environmental damage and pollu-

tion and global trading practices to corporate control and power
and the mistrust of consumers. But there are two strong alterna-
tive paradigms emerging, and we gather these under two con-
ceptual frameworks: both offer human and environmental health
benefits and both are grounded in new understanding of the
science of biology.
Out of the Food Wars, therefore, we see emerging two poss-
ible science-informed visions for the future. They are competing
paradigms for the future of food, both seeking to transform the
Productionist paradigm. One is what we call the Life Sciences
Integrated paradigm and the other the Ecologically Integrated
paradigm. (Figure 1.2 on page 18 situates both paradigms his-
torically in the context of the Food Wars.) Both derive from a
common root: the argument that the 21st century will be the
century of biology. 13 ‘Bio’ is now the language of innovation
and represents a fundamental shift in the understanding of
life: if the 20th century was characterized by the emergence of
post-industrialization and ‘information’, then the 21st century
promises to be the age of biological science. It is already giving
rise to new controversies, for example over genetically modified
foods and cloning. Languages in many tongues are being forced
to inject new ‘bio’-words into their lexicon: there is now biopro-
cessing, bioprospecting, bioprivacy, bioextinction, biodiversty,
bioscience, bioinformatics, biovigilance, biosafety, bioterrrorism
and, of course, biotechnologies.
In short, the future of the food economy will rely more upon
the biological rather than the chemical sciences to deliver its
vision for production, even though the chemical sciences will
continue to play a prominent role in the medium term. As most
of us know, a critical battle has been waged over the application
of biotechnology to plants designed to resist specific chemical
weed killers. The industrial nature of the Productionist paradigm
is being softened and reshaped by new biological thinking.

THE LIFE SCIENCES INTEGRATED PARADIGM

The Life Sciences Integrated paradigm describes the rapidly
emerging scientific framework that is heralding the application
Exploring the Variety of Random
Documents with Different Content
The Project Gutenberg eBook of Wild flowers
of the north-eastern states
 This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United
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laws of the country where you are located before using this
eBook.

Title: Wild flowers of the north-eastern states

Being three hundred and eight individuals common to
the north-eastern United States

Author: Ellen Miller

Margaret C. Whiting

Release date: June 13, 2024 [eBook #73825]

Language: English

Original publication: New York: G. P. Putnam's sons, 1895

Credits: Joeri de Ruiter and the Online Distributed Proofreading

Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced
from images generously made available by The
Internet Archive)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WILD FLOWERS

OF THE NORTH-EASTERN STATES ***
WILD SENNA: Cassia
Marilandica.
 Wild Flowers
of the

North-Eastern States

BEING THREE HUNDRED AND EIGHT INDIVIDUALS COMMON TO

THE NORTH-EASTERN UNITED STATES, DRAWN AND DESCRIBED
FROM LIFE BY

ELLEN MILLER
AND
MARGARET CHRISTINE WHITING

WITH THREE HUNDRED AND EIGHT ILLUSTRATIONS THE SIZE OF

LIFE

G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
NEW YORK LONDON
27 WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET 24 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND
The Knickerbocker Press
1895
 Copyright, 1895
BY
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS

The Knickerbocker Press, New York

 Dedicated
TO
MARY GOODRICH WHITING
AND
MARY ESTHER MILLER
 INTRODUCTION.

It was with no desire to compete with scientific botanies that this

collection of flowers was gathered together, but with the hope of
making their acquaintance more easy to non-scientific folk than the
much condensed manuals of our flora are able to do. The
opportunity of introducing a plant, with that graceful amplitude
which forestalls human meetings, is denied to the scientific botanist
by the needful restrictions of his formulæ, and there remain unnoted
by him (because beyond the scope of a special terminology)
numberless traits of race-habit, and personal details of growth
belonging to the plants, to which the unlearned observer will attach
a degree of significance, incommensurate, perhaps, to their scientific
value. To the simple Nature-lover each growth possesses a personal
quality more desirable than the catalogued facts of its existence, and
which offers an invitation to his thought beyond the knowledge he
may gain from books.
Supplementary, then, to the scientific classification, there is a
place for the mere lover and observer, who shall display the results
of his study in the most direct terms, that require no glossaries of
explanation, nor, if it may be avoided, any dissection of flower-
growths. Too often the amateur is dismayed, in his effort to name a
plant, by the botanical need of a microscopic analysis, which calls for
a preliminary training, and in its process destroys the flower he
seeks to know. If it were possible for a pictorial botany to be
prepared for English readers in the common vocabulary, the
destructive element which, at present, occupies a painfully large
place in the study of all popular science, might be confined to the
needs of the higher student, and no longer pursued by children, or
the merely curious observers of our common forms of life. The effort
to verify what has already been established, which, in some
intellectually alert localities, threatens the more delicate of our
annuals and biennials with extermination, might be avoided, if we
were able to recognize the commoner sorts of plants by their general
character, their gesture, color, and habits, leaving scientific analysis
for serious study.
The present collection of flowers common to the North-eastern
United States, which was started as a personal pastime, has taken
its present shape under the belief that it were well to make a
beginning towards a floral portrait-gallery; it is from this point of
view, rather than from the purely botanical, that the drawings have
been made and the descriptions written. Days have been pleasantly
spent in searching for a specimen which would show most typically
the particular trick of growth, the characteristic gesture which
individualized it from all other plants; often a flower has been drawn
and described as it grew, surprised in its familiar haunt. Effort has
been made to gather within the prescribed limits as great a diversity
of growths, and as many variations of types in each family, as was
feasible. Because of the desire to localize the collection, somewhat,
the flowers of the seaboard have been excluded. A few shrubs, and
even one small tree, the Witch Hazel, have been included, because
their flowers or fruit form such essential features in the floral
calendar, or possess so strong a hold upon the wayfarers’ affections,
that their presence has seemed inevitable. In the case of two vines,
the Carrion Flower and the Virginia Creeper, the drawings were
made from the fruit (companioned by the figure of the single flower)
for the obvious reason that the blossoms of the one are
inconspicuous, and of the other so malodorous, they offer small
temptations to a near acquaintance, while both are recompensed
with highly decorative berry-clusters. The drawings of the flowers
are the size of life; in every possible instance the growth also is
given without reduction.
That every flower-lover will find some favorites omitted, is
altogether probable, in a selection of three hundred individuals from
among the hosts which invite representation. The extreme dry
weather of the previous season must be held accountable for several
noteworthy, and much regretted, blanks in the list.
 The choice of botanical terms has been intentionally confined to
those which long usage has so wrought into the common speech
that they have practically ceased to belong to strictly scientific
nomenclature. The floral families have been arranged in the order
employed in Gray’s Manual; the individual members of a genus, and
of a family, have been placed in their usual sequence of bloom, that
the flower-gatherer may know when to reasonably expect the
successive blossoming of any special set of plants. It is impossible
however to be arbitrarily definite in any such classification of
Nature’s methods. Nor are we able to do more than to approximate
accuracy in describing color; modifications, even direct
contradictions, of the normal or usual type are constantly
discovered, which we may impute to variations in soil or
temperature, but whose appearance follows laws we dimly
apprehend. Of one thing only may we be sure: Nature tunes her
seemingly fickle choice to harmony, whatever the key; always there
remains a perfect adjustment of color between stalk and stem and
leaf and blossom.
By the generosity of Mrs. Fanny D. Bergen, of Cambridge, Mass.,
the lists of folk-names for many flowers have been greatly enriched.
Recognition is due also to Dr. B. F. Robinson, and to his assistants of
the Harvard Herbarium, for very kind aid in the botanical
classification of specimens.

Deerfield, Mass.,
April 3d, 1895.
 CONTENTS.

PAGE
Crowfoot Family, Ranunculaceæ 1
Barberry Family, Berberidaceæ 32
Water-Lily Family, Nymphæaceæ 36
Pitcher-Plants, Sarraceniaceæ 40
Poppy Family, Papaveraceæ 42
Fumitory Family, Fumariaceæ 46
Mustard Family, Cruciferæ 50
Rock-Rose Family, Cistaceæ 60
Violet Family, Violaceæ 62
Pink Family, Caryophyllaceæ 76
St. John’s-Wort Family, Hypericaceæ 90
Mallow Family, Malvaceæ 94
Geranium Family, Geraniaceæ 96
Holly Family, Ilicineæ 104
Staff-Tree Family, Celastraceæ 106
Buckthorn Family, Rhamnaceæ 108
Vine Family, Vitaceæ 110
Milkwort Family, Polygalaceæ 112
Pulse Family, Leguminosæ 116
Rose Family, Rosaceæ 144
 PAGE
Saxifrage Family, Saxifragaceæ 178
Orpine Family, Crassulaceæ 188
Sundew Family, Droseraceæ 190
Witch-Hazel Family, Hamamelideæ 192
Evening Primrose Family, Onagraceæ 194
Gourd Family, Cucurbitaceæ 204
Parsley Family, Umbelliferæ 206
Ginseng Family, Araliaceæ 220
Dogwood Family, Cornaceæ 224
Honeysuckle Family, Caprifoliaceæ 226
Madder Family, Rubiaceæ 238
Composite Family, Compositæ 246
Lobelia Family, Lobeliaceæ 356
Campanula Family, Campanulaceæ 364
Heath Family, Ericaceæ 370
Primrose Family, Primulaceæ 408
Dogbane Family, Apocynaceæ 418
Milkweed Family, Asclepiadaceæ 422
Gentian Family, Gentianaceæ 436
Borage Family, Borraginaceæ 440
Convolvulus Family, Convolvulaceæ 444
Nightshade Family, Solanaceæ 450
Figwort Family, Scrophulariaceæ 452
Broom-Rape Family, Orobanchaceæ 484
 PAGE
Vervain Family, Verbenaceæ 486
Mint Family, Labiatæ 492
Pokeweed Family, Phytolaccaceæ 518
Buckwheat Family, Polygonaceæ 520
Birthwort Family, Aristolochiaceæ 528
Laurel Family, Lauraceæ 530
Mezereum Family, Thymelæaceæ 532
Sweet-Gale Family, Myricaceæ 534
Orchis Family, Orchidaceæ 536
Iris Family, Iridaceæ 564
Amaryllis Family, Amaryllidaceæ 568
Lily Family, Liliaceæ 570
Pickerel-Weed Family, Pontederiaceæ 596
Cat-Tail Family, Typhaceæ 598
Arum Family, Araceæ 600
Water-Plantain Family, Alismaceæ 610

The Cover-Design by E. M.: Derived from the Green Dragon

(Arisæma Dracontium) Plant.
 Wild Flowers
OF THE

North-Eastern States.

CROWFOOT FAMILY.
RANUNCULACEÆ.

Hepatica. Hepatica triloba.

Liverwort.
Liver-leaf.

Found in April and May, on hillsides, along the edge of woods, and
in rocky ground.
The leaf-stems and flower-stems rise from the ground to the
height of 4 or 6 inches.
The leaf is heart-shaped, and 3-lobed, of a tough, strong fibre that
often survives the winter. Its color is dark green above and dull violet
beneath.
The beautiful flower is composed of 6 to 9 petal-like calyx-parts,
of an oval shape, and thin texture, whose color varies from light to
dark violet, and from lavender-tinted white to a very pink-lavender,
or lilac; the stamens are many, and thread-like, and of a pale straw
color. Close beneath the flower are 3 reddish-brown, downy little
leaves, bearing the semblance of a calyx. The flower is set on a
slender, very downy stem, which springs from amidst the leaves.
The harmony of color in this plant as seen in the flower and leaf is
striking, a preponderance of violet showing throughout. It is very
downy, the young leaves being covered with long silky hairs. The
numerous half-opened flowers and buds are slightly nodding, but
become more erect when fully spread in the sunlight. The Hepatica
is often frequented by small lavender butterflies, in size and color
resembling the blossoms,—when they rise and flutter in the soft
spring air, it is as though the flowers themselves are taking flight.
HEPATICA: Hepatica
triloba.
Marsh Marigold. Caltha palustris.
Cowslips.

Found in late April and early May, in swamps or wet meadows,

with its roots in the water.
The branching stalk, from 6 to 10 inches in height, is thick, stout,
hollow and juicy, and grooved at the joints; its color is a shining light
green.
The leaf is very broad, almost round, with a heart-shaped base,
the margin finely cut in slight scallops; the texture is thin but
leathery, while the surface is smooth and glossy; the color is dark
green. The leaf is set at the junction of the flower-stem with the
stalk.
The flower has 5 (or more) rounded petal-like calyx-parts, of a
delicate texture that shows a few veins on the inside; it is shaped
like a shallow cup and colored a beautiful polished yellow, tinged
with green; the many stamens are yellow; the pistils form a
conspicuous fringy center. Two or three flowers, on simple, or
sometimes leafy foot-stems, form a terminal group.
The buds are round and quite green, turning yellow as they grow;
the blossom opens very wide, and is slightly odorous,—it is in
marked contrast to the coarser stem and leaf, which have a sprangly
gesture. The first sunshine flower of spring.
MARSH MARIGOLD: Caltha
palustris.
Wind Flower. Anemone nemorosa.
Wood Anemone.

Found in thickets that yet are open to the sun, in early May or
perhaps late in April.
The single stem, about 6 inches in height, is round and smooth
and green, showing purple at the foot. It bears a whorl of leaves
about midway its height, and a single flower upon its summit.
The compound leaf has from 8 to 9 wedge-shaped leaflets, that
are sightly creased on their midribs, and irregularly notched on the
edges; the texture is delicately thin, and the color a lovely green.
Three leaves on their short reddish stems are placed in a whorl.
The flower is like a shallow cup formed of 5 oval, petal-like calyx-
parts that curve like shells; it is of a very thin texture and slightly
veined, and its color is pure white, often rosy tinted on the outside;
the many dainty stamens are a pale straw color, and the pistils are
gathered into a light green center.
A more charming plant could hardly be imagined,—stem, leaf, and
blossom are alike perfect in growth and harmony of hue. Its bud
nods, but the fully open flower lifts itself lightly atop the slender
swaying stem. The Wind Flower is social in habit, and gathers in
lovely fellowship with its kind upon a favorable hillside.
WIND FLOWER: Anemone
nemorosa.
Tall Anemone. Anemone Virginiana.

Found during July and August in meadows, roadsides, and woods.

The single stalk usually forks midway for the flowers; it grows
between 2 and 3 feet high, and is slender and slightly rough to the
touch. In color it is light green.
The compound leaf is 3-divided, the middle leaflet being 3-parted,
and the side leaflets 2-parted; the margins are notched, and the
fibre is tough, while the surface is rough-hairy; the color is green.
The leaves grow in a whorl of 3 about the stalk.
The flower is a shallow cup, composed of 5 petal-like calyx-parts,
hollowed like shells, of a greenish-white color; the pistils are many,
rising in a cylindrical greenish head in the center; the stamens are
numerous, and pale. The flowers are set on long slender stems
which rise from the whorl of leaves; these stems often fork again at
half their length, where in that case, they bear a pair of small leaves,
from which the 2, or more, secondary flower-bearing stems arise.
Less gregarious than its early sister, the Tall Anemone grows
solitary, or in twos and threes,—frequently beside an old stump. The
cylindrical or elongated head turns brown and becomes cottony
when the seeds are ripe. The tall elegance of this plant is
noteworthy; it bears its leaves, flowers and seeds with an air of
distinction, and the long wand-like stems suggest the strings of
some musical instrument on which the wind may play, according to
the old tradition that the Anemones love to bloom when the wind
blows.
TALL ANEMONE: A.
Virginiana.
Early Meadow Rue. Thalictrum dioicum.

Found in rocky woods and hillsides during April and May.

The branching leafy stalk grows from 1 to 2 feet high; smooth,
round, and fine of fibre though strong; in color, green.
The leaf is 3 or 4 times divided, terminating in groups of 3 leaflets
on short slender stems; the leaflets are small, rounding, slightly
heart-shaped at the base, and their margins are notched in rounded
scallops; the texture is exceptionally fine and thin, the surface
smooth; the color, a fine cool green.
The flower is small and composed of 3 or 4 or 5 little, petal-like,
pale green calyx-parts. Different plants bear the pistils and stamens;
the flowers of the former are inconspicuous and sparse in
comparison with those of the stamen-bearing plant: from these the
many stamens, pale green faintly touched with tawny at the tips,
droop on slender threads like little tassels. The flowers grow in loose
clusters, on branching stems that spring from the leaf-joints.
The Early Meadow Rue is unobtrusive in color and form, but most
graceful in gesture, and fine in the texture and finish of all its parts;
the leafage has a fern-like delicacy, and the flower tassels of the
stamen-bearing plant are airily poised.
EARLY MEADOW RUE:
Thalictrum dioicum.
Tall Meadow Rue. Thalictrum polygamum.

Found in June in wet meadows, both in the shade of thickets and

in unsheltered fields.
The stalk, usually 3 or 4 feet high, attains, it is said, to even 9 feet
sometimes; it is branching, and somewhat zigzag in growth; round,
slightly ribbed, and smooth; green or purple, especially near the
joints.
The leaf is highly compound, being composed of 3 long-stemmed
divisions which are parted into 3 or 5 short-stemmed groups of 3
leaflets each; these leaflets are rounding in shape, entire,—save for
the 1 to 3 round scallops at the tips,—of a fine and thin texture, and
smooth surface; a network of delicate veins shows underneath; the
color is a beautiful, cool, dark green, lighter underneath. The
arrangement is alternate.
The flower is without petals; the numerous thread-like, white
stamens, with their green tips, spread into feathery tufts, and are
set on tiny stems in loose terminal clusters, and also in lesser groups
on stems from the angles of the upper leaves.
An elegant plant, beautiful at all seasons with its distinguished-
bearing, charming flower clusters, and quaint lavender-hued seed-
heads; and especially attractive at the turn of the leaf, when its
foliage takes on a delicate crimson tint toned by a grayish bloom.
TALL MEADOW RUE: T.
polygamum.
Rue Anemone. Anemonella thalictroides.

Found in woods and on shady banks, in May.

The slender, erect stalk, 5 or 6 inches in height, is fine and
smooth; in color, a light reddish-tinged green.
The leaf is compound, each part being set on a slender, rather
long stem; the leaflets are small, broad, heart-shaped at the base,
and 2- or 3-lobed near the tip; the texture is exceedingly fine, and
smooth to the touch; the color is a dark grayish-green. The leaves
form a whorl about the summit of the stalk, from which the flower-
stems rise.
The flower is formed of 5 to 8 petal-like calyx-parts, which are
oval, slightly convex, of a fine and delicate texture; in color, white,
tinged with pale pink. The stamens are many, small, and orange
yellow; the several pistils gathered in the center are green. The
flowers are poised on slender stems, in groups, generally of 3,
springing from the leaf-whorl.
The flowers and leaves rise from the earth together, the
undeveloped flower, with bowed head, enfolded by the leaflets; as
the plant pushes upward the blossoms grow, the central one
developing first, the side ones later. At first the stamens and pistils
are gathered together in a close green ball in the middle,—when the
central flower has shaken out its yellow-tipped stamens fully, the
side flowers begin to grow; thus the plant stays in bloom a long time
—nearly two weeks.
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