Woke Farm and Food Policies in the Post-truth Era: Calamitous Consequences for People and the Planet

The woke food movement, epitomized by the EAT-Lancet Commission, is a relatively recent phenomenon—more prevalent in high-income countries where food is comparatively abundant, and, within those countries, more associated with rich liberal elite groups than others. Perhaps this movement is doing some good, by generating interest and discussion about issues that matter. But it is easy to find instances where they have done harm and to see possibilities for more harm to come. This happens because the movement is essentially intolerant, insisting on imposing its views on others even if those views turn out to be ill-informed (or simply silly), and even if a majority may disagree with them. We have already seen calamitous consequences from misguided policies initiated by such interests—witness the global opposition to genetically engineered food, and particular examples such as Golden Rice, with their consequences for the poor—as well as a multitude of mostly more minor instances of food policy non-sense that collectively may loom large in terms of their overall social cost. Of current concern is the possibility that these forces are becoming more influential as we are all coming to depend more on social media and non-traditional sources for information about issues that are sometimes complex. When farm and food policies are made by plebiscite, and voters are ill-informed, policy non-sense seems more likely. Some further harm can be done, even without the involvement of government, given the role of market intermediaries as gatekeepers in the food chain, imposing private policies as de facto technological regulations at the behest of activist groups. Misguided foreclosing of technological possibilities has concerning implications for the supply side of the world food equation and the global incidence of poverty and malnutrition, and for the environmental burden of agricultural production, in ways that the woke food movement does not appear to understand or anticipate.