Como você diz "Schumpeterian Gales?"

Where to begin with this NYTimes piece, Survival of the Biggest: Supermarket Giants Crush Central American Farmers -- where to start?

You could start with admiration. I assume that every word is true, it has a stunning depth that few other papers could dream of bringing to this story, and equally inspiring breadth, as it covers much of Latin America. The writing is good, as is the editing and the photography. Nobody but the Times could do this story.

Or you could start with bias. Nobody else could be so blind to reality. Poor people, living miles away from the Hudson and the D-line can get an assortment of inexpensive, high-quality vegetables, reliably supplied in a clean environment.

So the Times takes four (web) pages describing how difficult it now is for low quality producers and unhygienic processing facilities to prosper:

Squatting next to his field, Mr. Chinchilla's rugged face was a portrait of defeat. "They wanted consistent supply without ups and downs," he said, scratching the soil with a stick. "We didn't have the capacity to do it."

Across Latin America, supermarket chains partly or wholly owned by global corporate goliaths like Ahold, Wal-Mart and Carrefour have revolutionized food distribution in the short span of a decade and have now begun to transform food growing, too.

The megastores are popular with customers for their lower prices, choice and convenience. But their sudden appearance has brought unanticipated and daunting challenges to millions of struggling, small farmers.

No doubt if cold fusion were perfected, the Times would interview minority oil-field workers who risked displacement.

All the info they need to refute their story is, well, in their story:

Farmers who do not or cannot afford to change fast enough to meet the standards set by supermarkets are threatened.

Do the writers read their stories? How's this for appetizing?

Mr. Chinchilla, 46, drove his battered, 20-year-old pickup, laden with crates of tomatoes, into his cooperative's spacious packing shed. The building and the business are in decay.

The water had been cut off. Toilets no longer flushed. The roof was missing over the bathroom, its floor covered with bird droppings. The live-in caretakers who sort the co-op's tomatoes had only an open pail of rainwater to wash their hands. They wore no gloves while handling the fruit.

Typically, each farmer is growing less than an acre of salad tomatoes in rustic greenhouses that are fast deteriorating. Their production has plummeted because of the blight that dries out the plants, which then yield very small tomatoes.

Schumpeterian gales can bring some pain. But American farmers went through this same development a couple of centuries ago, and some ended up enjoying work as computer programmers and writers for the New York Times.

Hat-top: The Intellectual Activist

Posted by jk at December 29, 2004 01:03 AM