[rapnie]

Yesterday in the investigative journalism program Zembla on Dutch TV they addressed how the entire agri sector was beholden in a vicious cycle of greed. Where in the supply chain from Monsanto to supermarkets huge profit margins were raked in. Large part of the blame is at the supermarkets. While farmers are left no choice but to apply extractive methods (furtilizers, pesticides) to farm their lands to keep their heads afloat. Even with their huge farms and professional production methods they are effectively exploited.

In this story the supermarkets say "We'll give consumers the choice", but for them that means choosing eco products that have ~40% higher price and they don't do that (~5% of sales is eco-friendly), so this doesn't work.

Once again it is politicians who need to take some tough measures, but they find powerful lobbies in their path plus they do not dare to take impopular measures that make products more expensive, for fear of losing votes. So for 50 years things got worse and worse.

One solution mentioned was what social enterprise True Price [0] is trying to establish: explicitly pricing the detrimental externalities that until now are shoved as costs to future generations. A pack of regular coffee with externalities priced in would go from, say, $5 to become $10, while a pack of eco-friendly coffee would go to $6.50. The surplus to the price should be reserved in a fund with which farmers can make the transition to sustainable agriculture.

[0] https://trueprice.org/