Food Quote by Wendell Berry
““The consumer, that is to say, must be kept from discovering that, in the food industry—as in any other industry—the overriding concerns are not quality and health, but volume and price. For decades now the entire industrial food economy, from the large farms and feedlots to the chains of supermarkets and fast-food restaurants, has been obsessed with volume. It has relentlessly increased scale in order to increase volume in order (presumably) to reduce costs. But as scale increases, diversity declines; as diversity declines, so does health; as health declines, the dependence on drugs and chemicals necessarily increases.””
About This Quote
Source Essay: The Food Industry’s Volume Obsession, 1990
The food industry prioritizes volume and price over quality and health, leading to reduced diversity and increased reliance on chemicals.
In simple terms: Industry values profit over health.
Key Takeaway
Advocate for quality and diversity.
Themes
environment
health
economics
Mood
critical
concerned
Type
environmental
economic
When to use this quote
- Policy advocacy
- consumer education
- farm‑to‑table initiatives
Key Concepts
Sustainability
food safety
industrial scale
Questions to Reflect On
- How can consumers demand higher quality?
- What policies could balance profit and health?
A Different Perspective
May overlook economic necessity of scale.
![“[S]ometimes, when you are a food person, the possible irrelevance of what you are doing doesn’t cross your mind until it’s too late. (Once, for example, when I was just starting out in the food business, I was hired by the caper people to develop a lot of recipes using capers, and it was weeks of…” quote by Nora Ephron](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/d79/nora-ephron-1217_business_s-ometimes-when-you-are-a-food-person-th_980.jpg)
