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Yours,
Ed
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Criticism of ADM

ADM’s receipt of federal agricultural subsidies have come under criticism. According to a 1995 report by the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, “ADM has cost the American economy billions of dollars since 1980 and has indirectly cost Americans tens of billions of dollars in higher prices and higher taxes over that same period. At least 43 percent of ADM’s annual profits are from products heavily subsidized or protected by the American government. Moreover, every $1 of profits earned by ADM’s corn sweetener operation costs consumers $10, and every $1 of profits earned by its ethanol operation costs taxpayers $30.”[11]

In 1994, the New York Times wrote “the Clinton Administration’s policy on emission-reducing renewable fuels — in essence, ethanol made from corn — is little more than a politically inspired gift to farmers and corn processors, especially the Archer Daniels Midland Company”. [12]

ADM’s lobbying and campaign contributions have encouraged the continuation of the United States federal sugar program (of trade barriers and price supports) by Congress, costing US consumers roughly $3 billion a year.[11] ADM also lobbied to create and perpetuate federal ethanol subsidies. Some commentators have concluded that the ADM experience demonstrates the need for campaign finance reform.[11]

In July 2005, the International Labor Rights Fund filed suit against the Nestle, Archer Daniels Midland, and Cargill companies in Federal District Court in Los Angeles on behalf of a class of Malian children who were trafficked from Mali into the Ivory Coast and forced to work twelve to fourteen hours a day with no pay, little food and sleep, and frequent beatings. The three children acting as class representative plaintiffs are proceeding anonymously, as John Does, because of feared retaliation by the farm owners where they worked. The complaint alleges their involvement in the trafficking, torture, and forced labor of children who cultivate and harvest cocoa beans which the companies import from Africa.[13]

Archer Daniels Midland, along with Cracker Barrel and Nestle Purina Pet Care, achieved the lowest score (15 out of 100) of all rated Food and Beverage companies in the Human Rights Campaign’s 2008 Corporate Equality Index, a measure of Gay and Lesbian workplace equality.[14]

The company is now facing its first-ever markets campaign, as the environmental group Rainforest Action Network is imploring the halt of agricultural expansion into tropical rainforests in Brazil and Southeast Asia.[15] Like other agribusiness, ADM only processes the raw materials from crops grown by third parties. However, ADM is a major purchaser and trader of the agricultural commodities that are motivating the destruction of rainforests and has a controlling interest in Wilmar, the company most responsible for new industrial palm oil plantation expansion in Indonesia, and one of the largest investors in biofuels. As such, ADM has the ability to significantly influence the market.

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The reason I brought up Rosen’s post is that I got the feeling from the wide response to it that us intakers of news and information are starting to think more about what you posted about … where do I get information I trust and am willing to act on? Wikipedia seemed so speculative when it started, and now is indispensible for many things … at the same time people have developed individual levels of trust for it, and for their uses of it.

One thing that seems cool about bilumi is the way one person can create an item, more can review it, and even more can quick-rate the review. And then another can flag something that goes wrong. Seems like a neat way to weave together community production of content.

With several newspapers going under people are talking more about a kind of end of professional journalism. The article you mention suggests ‘That journalists affirm and enforce the sphere of consensus, consign ideas and actors to the sphere of deviance, and decide when the shift is made from one to another— none of this is in their official job description. You won’t find it taught in J-school, either. It’s an intrinsic part of what they do, but not a natural part of how they think or talk about their job. Which means they often do it badly.’

I wonder if bloggers and more casual journalists are better at deciding what is worth treating as worthy of comment? Or is the idea that they automatically have more personal perspectives since they are untrained?

http://journalism.nyu.edu/pubzone/weblogs/pressthink/2009/01/12/atomization.html