02x04 - Toxic Wasteland

[bunniefuu]

Type two diabetes, hypertension.

Lipid problems,
cardiovascular disease.

Cancer, dementia.

[narrator] The list of medical
problems tied directly

to the food we re
being marketed.

We are actually making
ourselves sicker by eating the

processed food that the
food industry has

told us is good for us.

An industry driven by greed.

The soda industry is
really exhibit A here.

And deception.

I knew I was onto
something good.

An industry that infiltrates
government agencies

designed to protect us.

And that s a common
strategy is,

get industry-friendly scientists
on these review committees.

An industry increasingly
powerful...

Billionaires are looking
at farmland as

just another
financial asset.

...and dangerous.

[Indistinct shouting]

They discredit people
who get in its way.

People were afraid to talk to me
in their front yard,

in the middle of nowhere.

This is unsustainable.
We are immolating the planet.

This is how we feed ourselves.

They re gonna make a whole
lot of money until the time

they re gonna die
anyways so, who cares?

[Cheering]

For over 70 years,
our leaders have told us

one thing under the
bright lights...

The protection of the lives and
property of Americans is the

responsibility of all
public officials.

I care, we re trying.

We have it so well
under control.

Help is here and we will not
stop working for you.

But for decades, America s
shadow government and its

powerful friends have spent
trillions of dollars on an

agenda that serves their
interests, not ours.

You guys paid for all this.

So, when the sh*t really hits
the fan, we re on our own.

This is not science fiction.

This is reality in
America right now.

The truth is, the rich
and powerful will do

whatever it takes to
save themselves...

While The Rest of Us Die.

[Helicopter chuff &
people shouting]

Presidents Day, 1996.

Vice President Al Gore
announces a plan to levy a tax

on Florida sugar growers to
help restore the Everglades,

where most of their product in
the state is produced.

The Florida sugar industry
controls more than


northern Everglades.

The Clinton administration
was going to be releasing

its Everglades
restoration plan soon.


were going to be turned into

reservoirs to provide
fresh, clean water

for the Everglades.

And he also announced that the
Clinton administration would

support a penny a pound
referendum,

to tax every pound of sugar
that was produced in Florida

to help pay for
Everglades restoration.

So, it was a very big deal.

That afternoon,
a couple hours later,

Bill Clinton was in
the Oval Office.

He was busy breaking up with
his girlfriend, Monica Lewinsky.

The president is in
the middle of an

intense conversation with
his young intern...

[Phone ringing]

...when his phone rings.

She later told Kenneth Starr s
investigators that she wasn t

sure who it was, but it was
somebody from Florida,

maybe named Fanjuli.

Forgive her if Fanjul is a
tougher name to remember than

all the brand names that
contain his company s sugar.

Alfy and Pepe Fanjul own and
run Florida Crystals,

which is one of the two
major players in

the Florida sugar industry.

Alfy is a Democrat.
Pepe is a Republican.

There s no doubt that having
the two top executives working

both sides of the aisle has
been very beneficial

for their business.

They were two of the most
dominant figures in,

in national politics.

Alphonso Alfy Fanjul is not
just another fat cat donor

he d been Clinton s campaign
co-chairman in the key

battleground state of Florida.

They spoke for 22 minutes.

It s never come out exactly
what they spoke about.

But we can say that the final
Clinton administration

Everglades Restoration Plan
had only 50,000 acres of

sugar fields that would be
turned to reservoirs,

not the 100,000 acres that
Al Gore had promised.

And the Clinton
administration did not

support the penny
a pound tax.

It s a pretty good sign that
you have a fair amount of

political clout when you
can get the President of

the United States on the
phone for 22 minutes

while he is breaking up
with his girlfriend.

The sugar industry just about
always gets its way.

America wasn t always addicted
to the white stuff.

It was only over the last
century that sugar

invaded the western diet.

Sugar originated in
India in 1200 B.C.

The Indians learned how to
boil down sugar cane

into a brown syrup.
And they called this khanda .

And that s where we get the
word candy from today.

The Europeans figured out
how to extract sugar

from sugar beets.

Big sugar operated in the


very similar to the way
it operates now.

It relies on cheap labor.

It relies on copious
amounts of water.

And sugar, itself,
is vastly useful.

I mean, it helps extend the
shelf life of products.

And so that increased
sugar consumption and

production even more.

You can find it in
absolutely everything.

And that s a supersized
problem. In 1980,

the average American
consumed 90 pounds

of added sugars per year.

And 15% of us were
considered obese.

By 2010, we d upped our
yearly consumption to



And obesity rates more than
double to almost 36% .

The food industry constantly
says to us: Well,

you need sugar to live .
But the truth is

glucose generates an insulin
response and insulin is

behind all of the chronic
metabolic diseases that

we know of today: Type two
diabetes, hypertension,

lipid problems, cardiovascular
disease, cancer,

dementia,
fatty liver disease.

There s a fairly
well-established correlation

between levels of added
sugar in the diet and

high rates of comorbidity.

So, when we have a pandemic,
who is it that suffers the most?

It s the communities that have
predominantly been exposed to

more sugary sweetened
beverages, for example,

and more sugar in their diets.

The story of the supermarket
is really evidence of

a food revolution
in America.

The customers are looking for
foods that are convenient.

Over decades,
the American diet has been

transformed by
ready-made foods.

Now prized for their
ease of preparation,

consumers first needed
to be sold on the

value of their convenience.

I buy as many foods that will
save me time as possible,

to save time to devote
to a family of

four children and a husband.

The key to this food
revolution was industrializing

the way food is produced.

It s called ultra-processing,
and it works by manipulating

and extracting food s natural
ingredients and replacing them

with preservatives,
artificial colors and flavors,

and sweeteners.

The push for processed food
began out of necessity in the


by the Great Depression and

a massive drought.

Dust on the rampage.
Dust that rides in the wind.

That follows the storm. That
spreads over increasing areas.

That piles thicker and thicker,
adding to the woes of the west.

To alleviate hunger and help
farmers climb out of debt,

the Roosevelt administration
uses public money to

prop up private
food producers.

We had all the food
in the northeast,

and we had a destitute
population in the southwest.

And somehow, we had to get the
food to feed these people.

And the problem was that if they
just put it on railroad cars

and sent it, by the time
it ended up getting there,

it would have all gone rancid.

And so, this was the beginning
of the food processing industry.

This was the beginning of
pulverizing wheat,

stripping of its fiber,
packing it into bags.

And this worked to solve
our starvation crisis

through World w*r Two.

After World w*r Two, this
policy became unnecessary.

Lots of food industries figured
out how to make money at it,

and so we doubled down.

And we went whole hog and we
said, you know, cheaper food.

I like Trix better than carrots.

By the 1960s, it s common for
American children to eat

breakfasts with more sugar than
a slice of chocolate cake.

Trix, the corn cereal with the
tangy taste of natural fruit.

Fruit colors too!
Who needs carrots?

You do, silly rabbit,
cause Trix are for kids.

Oh, what a sneak!
[Crunching]

Processed food backed by
massive advertising campaigns,

drives massive profit to big
corporations like General Mills

and General Foods, who
develop popular brands like

Betty Crocker, Pillsbury,
Birds Eye and Tang.

Consumers are soon adding those
products to shopping lists.

But removing all of
that fiber will

wreak havoc on
Americans health.

Fiber is really an essential
nutrient, for our microbiome,

for our intestinal bacteria.

But we ve taken it
out for shelf life.

Dietary fiber, also known as
roughage, is the fuel that

helps bacteria in the gut break
down foods for digestion.

It also helps boost
our immune system.

We are actually making
ourselves sicker by eating the

processed food that the
food industry has

told us is good for us.

The industry doesn t have to
tell us how much

they ve processed the
food we re eating.

The USDA released the first
mandatory nutrition labels

on food in 1990
by listing ingredients only,

they masked what processing
was doing to the product.

The problem is, it s not
what s in the food,

it s what s been
done to the food.

And you could not tell the
difference between sugar

that s, say, in fruit, versus
that which the company added.

As refined sugar becomes a
key ingredient in almost

everything, America sees a
skyrocketing number of

Diabetes cases, affecting
more than 30 million today.

The condition can also lead to
heart problems, kidney disease,

nerve damage even amputation.

Dentists also begin to see an
epidemic of tooth decay.

That s exactly what
Cristin Kearns saw.

She s a pediatric dentist who
uncovered the hidden history of

the Big Sugar lobby,
through more than

a decade of
painstaking research.

As a dentist, I know that the
sugar industry has really

infiltrated into my profession
for a very long time.

They ve sponsored dozens and
dozens and dozens of

scientific projects between
the 40s and the 70s.

And over 300 publications.

And I think we ve only
scratched the surface on

telling the story of what
the sugar industry has

been up to behind
the scenes.

Kearns became an authority on
sugar after first hearing the

industry tell its big lie at a
dental conference in 2007.

I was given a brochure by one
of the keynote speakers,

about how dentists
could help manage

type two diabetic patients.

And it didn t say anything
about reducing sugar.

And then, a second keynote
speaker ranked Lipton Brisk

sweet tea, which had 44 grams
of sugar, as a healthy drink.

And, I actually chased him
down and said:

How can you possibly say
sweet tea is healthy ?

And his answer to me was:
There is no evidence

linking sugar to
chronic disease .

And I was, literally, stunned.
I had no words.

Tooth decay is the number one
chronic disease in children.

You know, how could you
possibly say that sugar

is not linked to
chronic disease?

So, I started to wonder, had
the sugar industry influenced

what I was hearing at this
dental conference?

Kearns began researching the
sugar industry and stumbled

upon an industry how-to guide
for deceiving the public.

I typed in "sugar" to my local
library catalog and found

records to the Great Western
Sugar Company.

I'd never heard of the Great
Western Sugar Company.

I started looking through...

the finding aid and found
these boxes with references

to nutrition and policy.

The first folder that I
opened had a confidential

Sugar Association memo.

I knew I was on to
something good.

In 2009, pediatric dentist
Cristin Kearns discovered a set

of confidential sugar industry
documents that laid bare their

carefully constructed campaign
to keep Americans

addicted to their product.

I couldn t believe
that I d found that.

But I happened to be the first
one to look at these

confidential sugar industry
documents just sitting

unexplored in this collection.

Kearns had, in her hands,
the smoking g*n

records of a secret campaign
by the trade group

representing cane
and beet sugar.

And this was a public relations
campaign that set out to

influence the Food and
Drug Administration,

who at the time was evaluating
the safety of sucrose

for the first time,
in the 1970s.

So, all of the documents
I found showed how

the sugar industry
influenced that FDA report.

They also showed how the sugar
industry was mirroring the

successful campaign to shape
government policy and

public opinion launched by
Big Tobacco decades earlier.

The sugar and tobacco
companies definitely

use the same strategies.

And it s all about casting
doubt on that evidence,

linking a product to any
kind of harmful effects.

And then, pairing that
together with a PR campaign

to get the message out.

What cigarette do
you smoke, doctor?

The brand named most was Camel.
Yes, surveys show more doctors

smoke Camels than
any other cigarette.

Smoke Camels, the cigarettes
so many doctors enjoy.

The world s most
thoroughly tested filter.

That s snow fresh, filter Kool.

Kearns uncovered how the
sugar industry laid

its own trap to deceive.

The sugar industry was very
good at following a line that

the tobacco industry
has done quite well in,

which is to obfuscate science.

How the sugar industry
paid experts to

downplay health risks.

The sugar industry paid
scientists to find either that

sugar had very little to do
with a range of public health

outcomes or,
more successfully,

pointed the finger away
from sugar towards fat.

And that s why you had,
through the 1970s,

a very successful deflection
by the sugar industry of

regulation away from itself
towards the regulation

around the
consumption of fat.

Are you making the
most of your Marvel?

Marvel makes cooking
deliciously light...

And helps keep you
looking just right,

when used in a
calorie-controlled diet.

And so this started the
low-fat craze.

Example of that: skim milk.

It turns out that dietary fat
was actually good for us.

Dietary fat actually suppressed
cardiovascular disease.

We took that out,
and so basically,

we engineered our
products to be toxic.

And they didn t just make foods
that were unhealthy.

They actually promoted them
as being the better choice.

Try delicious Light
and Fit Greek.

It s no ordinary non-fat yogurt.
Be light and fit and satisfied.

In these folders, it listed all
of the research projects that

they were funding,

the scientific consultants that
they were working with,

the PR firms they hired,
the ways in which they were

connecting with the media to
get their messages across.

Their strategy was to publish
science that would be

conflicting with evidence that
might be linking sugar to

obesity or diabetes or heart
disease or tooth decay.

Along with paying scientists to
write reports in its favor

and masking its involvement
by hiding its funding

the Sugar Association pushes
back on findings it

doesn t like, a strategy
that s become common practice

in many parts of the
food industry.

The food industry has
tried to discredit people

who get in its way. They have
tried to discredit me...

hopefully, to this point,
to no avail.

But, you know, they,
they have their ways.

The sugar industry
definitely comments on

anything that I write. They
write a letter to the editor.

If I get media attention,
they re writing press releases

to try and counter what I say.

The sugar industry has done
very well in terms of messing

about with the science and
avoiding regulation.

The soda industry is really
exhibit A here.

A number of initiatives and a
number of local ballots across

the country tried very hard
to introduce something

called a soda tax.

The new tax that s leaving
a bitter aftertaste

is almost a week old.

A small tax a cent or
two per fluid ounce

to be able to dissuade
consumption and

use that money for
public health benefits.

And they did very well.

The Sugar-Sweetened
Beverage Act....

So, what does the
soda industry do?

They lobby very hard.

The American Beverage
Association,

opposing a tax on
sugar-sweetened drinks.

It s a bad tax.

This tax is only
going to hurt.

And successfully

I feel like I have the right to
drink soda and if I need to

gain a few pounds,
that s my right.

Even the news media becomes the
messenger for Big Sugar.

The sweetened beverage tax is
no more in Cook County.

Come back to Cook County.
Spend your money here.

The influence of the sugar
lobby extends to both the

US Department of
Agriculture and the

Food and Drug Administration
the government divisions

meant to regulate
the industry.

The heads of each of these
organizations can

come from the industry.
They go back to the industry.

They make sure that other
people from the industry

go back into government.

And so, there is this revolving
door that basically keep the

USDA and the FDA from being
able to be overhauled.

It s known as agency capture.

And the USDA and the FDA
are the most famous

captured agencies in
American government.

In fact, the scientific
committee that reviewed the

dangers of sugar for
the FDA was led by

a man named George Irving.

He also was a paid consultant
for the sugar industry.

So, he was responsible for that
safety review of sugar.

And that s a common strategy,
is to get industry friendly

scientists on these
review committees.

It works for the food industry
and ultimately,

it works for government,
too, because they make

$56 billion off the
tariffs each year.

The problem is, they have not
yet equated the costs of the

health care crisis that
they have caused.

They see this as
a separate silo.

So, let's do the math on this.

The food industry makes
$1.4 trillion a year.

Of which,


There's a lot of money
riding on this.

Health care in America cost
in 2015, $3.5 trillion.

Of that, 75% is chronic
metabolic disease,

of which 75% of
that could be reversed...

if we went back to the way
we ate back in 1970,

before this chronic
metabolic disease pandemic

took off like a moon shot.



is $1.9 trillion a year
going down a rat hole.

And 62% of all health care
dollars are paid for

by the U. S. government.

That is a trillion dollars a
year that the government is

paying so that the food
industry can make

its 657 billion.
This is unsustainable.

And all that happens is that
health care goes down the

tubes, our personal health
continues to shorten our lives,

and we are immolating the
planet in the process...

all to keep propped up
ultra-processed food.

The food system is structured
the way it is right now because

a very small group of people
had a very cunning

business strategy, that they
ex*cuted over a

period of years
and even decades.

This wasn t some sort of
passive evolution.

Jerry and Kanita Yandel had
been raising birds under

contract for Tyson Foods, which
is one of the largest meat

companies in the world and
the largest chicken producer

in the United States.

This couple raised animals
under contract.

But Tyson owned the birds,
it owned the feed.

It delivered whatever medicine
the birds needed.

And these farmers really had no
control whatsoever over the

health of the animals or the
success of their operation.

Local chicken farmers were
having a major problem.

There was a mysterious
disease that was jumping

from flock to flock of the
chicken houses.

We re talking thousands of
birds dying at a time.

They really kind of started
rotting while they were

still alive, and their
bodies were turning purple.

And, Kanita Yandel would have
to go out to these chicken

houses with her kids and cart
off thousands of dead animals.

This affliction put them
into bankruptcy

in a matter of months.

The farmer ends up
taking all the risk,

but the company gets
all the profits.

And that s basically the way
the meat industry has evolved

in the past 30 years.

[Clucking]

This weakening power of the
American farmer wasn t a

natural evolution it was a
corporate coup.

An overthrow by a handful of
huge companies who saw

a business opportunity
and seized it.

This is the story about a
few companies

taking over an
entire industry.

If the strategy which we have
established is maintained,

and the battle not faulted by
change in the midst of action,

we shall win.

When Herbert Hoover ran for
president in 1928 and famously

promised Americans a chicken in
every pot what he was really

saying was that the recent
uptick in American prosperity

was here to stay.

Back in the 1930s, when Tyson
Foods got into business,

chicken was like a luxury meat.
It was like lobster.

You know, you had chicken
on Sunday night.

But when Tyson got in the game,
it streamlined production and

prices fell year by year.

Did you know that poultry
is the nation s

third-largest
agricultural crop?

A $3 billion business?

Pretty chicks?
Yes, sir!

This animal happened to be
very adaptable to

the conditions of
industrial production.

You could stack the
eggs on trays.

You could heat them and raise
literally millions of chicks.

Do chickens miss scratching
in the barnyard?

Probably not.

They ve never known any
other life but this.

You could pack them
into crates,

and then put them in a building
where the temperature was

controlled perfectly, and the
feed was formulated perfectly

to make these animals gain
as much weight as possible

in as little
time as possible.

They ve got automated feeders,
automated watering systems.

I mean, we re really talking
about mid-sized food factories.

The chicken of tomorrow.

A broad-breasted bird with
bigger drumsticks,

plumper thighs and
layers of white meat.

Yes, sir!
Make mine chicken!

Chris Leonard spent nearly
a decade reporting on

agribusiness for the
Associated Press.

His book, The Meat Racket,
exposed the dark side of

America s food business.

The thing that struck me was
how overwhelmingly powerful

this company was.
In this town of Waldron,

there was an enormous
Tyson Foods chicken plant

that processed about a
million birds a week.

Out in the hillsides around it,
you had dozens of farmers,

all working under contract
for this company.

You know, we think about
farmers as this

stubbornly
independent bunch.

But what I saw when I went
down there was

overwhelming and
pervasive fear.

People were afraid to talk
to me as a reporter in their

front yard, on a farm in the
middle of nowhere.

I just thought to myself,
how could one firm have

so much power over
this entire region?

And you know the story
behind that is the story of

corporate consolidation and
the rise of monopolies.

And Tyson Foods has been
behind that story for decades.

At Tyson,
we re doing our best!

Golden, crispy Tyson Chick n
Chunks. Just for you!

Today, Tyson Food is the
leading producer of chicken,

beef, and pork controlling as
much as 20% of the market.

In the U.S., it s estimated one
in every five bites of meat

is of an animal
owned by Tyson.

The majority of the meat
that Tyson Foods sells

doesn t carry a label.

This is the meat that we eat
at cafeterias, in schools,

out at restaurants,
in nursing homes.

The rotisserie chicken
at the grocery store.

"Tyson continues to find
new ways to help put

a chicken in every pot."

The industrialization of
livestock farming

has been cruel
to the animals.

But it s also had a devastating
impact on the farmers.

These farmers who are
working as sharecroppers

in a way for the company.
They don t really own anything.

If you go to a town that
produces Tyson chicken and you

see that this company operates
the slaughterhouse,

the feed mill,
the bird hatchery,

the trucking lines that moves
the baby chicks to the farm and

the grown birds back to
the slaughterhouse.

And then it operates the very
sophisticated marketing arm of

the business that sells these
products directly to fast food

chains like McDonald s
or Wendy s.

Tyson was one of the first
companies to really bring

all these parts of the
business under one roof.

And that gave it not just
tremendous control,

but it allowed it to really
reap all the profits at

every link in the chain.

While innovation and buy-outs
fueled Tyson s growth,

another big push came from
the U.S. government

through antitrust laws.

This is the body of law
that governs

how big companies can get.

It's not like supply and
demand determine

the price of
something anymore.

It's the market power
of the monopoly.

And the monopolies use this
power to underpay people for

what people give them, in this
case, farmers raising animals.

And then the monopoly uses
the power on the flip side

to raise prices
for consumers.

That's why we have
antitrust laws.

But when you saw the Reagan
revolution come along,

there was this school of
thought that all that mattered

was the consumer price.

And so they took off the
shackles and they let companies

buy out their competitors.

The federal government allowed
merger, after merger,

after merger, after merger...

until monopolies had
taken total control.

What you see is the
industrialization of

chicken farming,
now gets coupled with the

monopolistic control of just
one or two companies.

What it has meant for
farmers is an absolute and

total loss of control
over their operations.

Nowhere is this more apparent
than in the company s so-called

tournament system , where
Tyson ranks its chicken

producers by how well they
fatten up their birds.

I ve never seen anything like
this in over 20 years of

covering American business.
Here s how it works.

What Tyson does is,
it collects all of the birds

from all of the farms in
a given week.

And then it measures each farm
on how well the farmer managed

to fatten up the birds, given
the feed that Tyson provided.

Critically, what Tyson
then does,

is it ranks all of the
farmers in a given week

against one another.

The farmers at the top
are paid a bonus.

But critically, that bonus
payment is taken out of the

paycheck of the farmer at the
bottom of the ranking.

So, they compete against each
other with each paycheck,

and divide and conquer.
And it works.

I met farmer after
farmer after farmer,

who explained to me how the
price they received for a cow,

for a pig or for a chicken
had nothing to do with

how hard they worked.
It had everything to do with

how much power Tyson Foods
had over their operation.

Tyson doesn t just have
power over the choices

its farmers make
it exercises power over

your own decisions
in the grocery store,

whether you know it or not.

Let s say you go into a
grocery store and

walk into the meat aisle.

You will see these beautiful
displays of dozens of different

products and dozens of
different brand names.

And it really gives you this
perception that

you ve got a lot of
consumer choice.

I think that s what we think of
when we think about capitalism.

The reality is, about four
companies control the

entire meat aisle of any
given grocery store.

The consumer has lost
the ability to vote

with their dollar.
So, right now,

the entrenched monopolies
are absolutely

winning the political fight.

And now, new players are
joining the battle over

food production armed
with billions of dollars and

a certainty that
they know best.

Essentially what we re seeing
is this billionaire class,

that is convinced that
technology is the

only answer to feeding the
world going forward.

Bill Gates is pushing the
failed green revolution.

He s pushing chemicals.
He s pushing GMOs.

He s pushing patents.

It s demonstrably false.

I ve chosen to take my
fortune through the

Gates Foundation and
apply it, overwhelmingly,

to these development projects.

Bill Gates spent decades
cultivating his persona as the

world s leading philanthropist
on global poverty,

hunger, and healthcare.

But he s also quietly making
moves in another area.

Agricultural productivity is
one of the most basic things

that can help the poor move to
a more prosperous life.

The 4th richest man in the
world is buying up farmland

nearly a quarter-million acres
of it across 18 states,

making him the top private owner
of farmland in the country.

He s being joined by other
billionaires all looking to

transform global agriculture
as we know it.

They re looking at farmland as
another financial asset,

which I think we
should be terrified by.

I mean, this is how
we feed ourselves.

[Bill Gates] There was a Green
Revolution based on new seeds.

It was one of the great
breakthroughs of all time.

Now, we need to bring that

[Tom] This, to me,
is not a recipe for

feeding the world
going forward.

What it s a recipe for
is rewarding investors like

Bill Gates for their investment
in these companies in the

short term. And in the long
term, destroying this incredibly

important resource and making
it more and more fragile at a

time when we desperately need
to make it more resilient.

January 2021.

Violent protests wrack
the Indian capital.

Tens of thousands of farmers
are protesting new laws they

say will make them vulnerable
to big corporations.

They made their way to
the iconic red fort,

a symbolic moment
in this resistance.

Bill Gates may be the face of
global health in the west.

But for many critics in the
developing world,

he represents something
more sinister

a corporate system that s
destroying the planet

and pushing farmers
to the brink.

Bill Gates, who has donated
billions to improve

public health in poorer
countries and so on.

You re saying, essentially,
he s a dictator.

When Bill Gates pours money
into Africa for feeding the

poor in Africa and
preventing famine.

What s he doing, he s pushing
the failed Green Revolution.

He s pushing chemicals.
He s pushing GMOs.

Pushing patents.

In his quest to transform
the food system,

Bill Gates and his foundation
have been quietly promoting

high tech solutions from
corporations like Monsanto

the maker of crops genetically
engineered to be resistant to

their own brand of toxic
pesticides that also require

farmers to pay a license fee
to use their seeds.

Nearly every village here
is a hotspot.

The suicide crisis inescapable.

It s a system that s sending
millions of farmers in the US

and around the world into debt
leading to an epidemic of

suicides in places like India
where farmers are k*lling

themselves by drinking
pesticides in a gruesome act

of symbolic protest.

An unfathomable number,
some thirty people a day in a

country where trying to
k*ll yourself is ill*gal.

Bill Gates, he s essentially a
techno utopian, you know,

he thinks that bigger and
bigger farm machines,

that more and more high-tech
seeds engineered to resist more

and more pesticides are the
only answer to, you know,

feeding the world going forward.

Not only are farmers
becoming dependent on

these dangerous chemicals,
critics also point out that

Monsanto s seeds are
monocultures: making them

vulnerable to disease and
ecological collapse.

What you ve gotten is this
incredible specialization.

Where, not only are farms
specializing in one or

two crops, but you also get
regional specialization.

Monoculture, the problem is
it uses up the soil.

We know that if you look at
sort of the history of

human civilization, loss of
topsoil is one of the things

that drives
societal collapse.

We re way more productive,
but we also

surrender topsoil at a
world historic rate.

What the Bill and Melinda Gates
Foundation is nudging

the planet towards is the larger
farms that involve monocultures.

We ve got all the data in the
world that says that, in fact,

polyculture of agro ecological
farming is an incredibly

important way to be able to
survive climate change.

And we have 8 million farmer
groups around the world

exploring this kind of
agriculture.

But what you have from the Bill
and Melinda Gates Foundation

is not the wisdom of


But what it is that a few PhDs
can figure out by themselves

without ever having to
trouble themselves with

engaging with the peasantry.

[Bill Gates]
There s no doubt that a

combination of
better seeds and

better inputs,
including fertilizer,

can raise African
agricultural productivity.

Call it scientific imperialism:
The idea that we can project

our expertise onto the world of
agriculture and sustainability.

I don t know who I m more
scared of: the billionaires

who are continuing to
extract everything they can

from our world, or the ones who
think they know how to fix it.

It s worth looking at how the
Bill and Melinda Gates

Foundation gets to
its solutions.

It kind of works like Microsoft.

And why shouldn t it
work like Microsoft?

Bill Gates learned everything
he knows from Microsoft.

And what did he learn
from Microsoft?

Well, monopolies
are a good thing.

There s something very
attractive to someone who s

made his billions through a
monopoly on a product

that was inescapable.
Finding in Monsanto

something of a kindred product
to Microsoft Windows.

In the same way that the seed
genetics is patented and

a closed box for farmers.

You sign a license in the same
way that you sign a license

when you when you tear open
a software packet for

installing windows
on your machine.

And it s pretty much the
same with Monsanto.

It s clear that their approach
is very much informed by

an intellectual
philosophy that denies

an intellectual
life to farmers.

Now they re just robots who
follow the damn instructions

on the side of the packet.

Critics of chemical agriculture
argue that corporations like

Monsanto have different
priorities and incentives than

farmers who pride themselves
as protectors of the land.

And what is best for big
agribusiness can ultimately

be deadly for
the rest of us.

We ve got to think of Big Food
like a for-profit hospital.

A for-profit hospital is
going to make the most money

off the sickest person
that doesn t die.

What Big Agri needs to do
is create the sickest,

most chemical and science and
intervention dependent

agricultural system,
that just doesn t die.

So, to them, the erosion and
destruction of the topsoil,

the vulnerability of
plants to insects,

the death of bees
and pollinators,

these are all good things.

Because you know how much it s
going to cost to create little

drone bees to replace
the bee system?

This is multi-trillion dollars,
because it s barely possible.

It probably isn t.
But if it is,

they re gonna make a whole
lot of money on it.

And if it s not, they re gonna
make a whole lot of money until

the time they re gonna die
anyways, so who cares?

It s their grandchildren
who are gonna die.

But in the Arctic circle,
some people do care,

and are preparing for a
doomsday scenario.

It is the plan B for the
most valuable

natural resource on Earth.

But can we guarantee that
nothing can ever go wrong?

Well, of course not,
we re not gods.

[Explosions]

Aleppo, Syria.
September 2015.

The Syrian government enlists
the Russians to launch

airstrikes on rebel troops.

Shelling schools and hospitals.

Even chemical weapons
are dropped.

[Indistinct shouting]


city is leveled,

including much of its
prized ancient ruins.

But for months, international
partners have been silently

coordinating the removal of
Syria s treasures

including a trove of
precious native seeds.

Amid the chaos, the seeds
are sent to the

safest place imaginable.

It s called the Svalbard Seed
Vault. And it looks as if a

spaceship has crashed into
the side of a mountain.

And it s up in the
Arctic Circle.

And it s a place where the
genetic knowledge of all the

world s civilizations are
kind of kept in ice.

The Svalbard seed vault in
Norway contains boxes from

all over the world,
housing seeds for plants

native to each region.

They re kept at the end of a


the mountain, which leads to
three separate vaults,

each about 89 feet long.

The seeds are stored at exactly


And the vault can hold more
than two billion of them.

It s very interesting to walk
down the rows and look at,

ah, here s a box
from North Korea!

Ah, it s very close to the box
from South Korea.

They seem to be getting along.

But it s no
garden-variety library.

The seed vault is a global
security imperative,

built to outlast climate change,
natural disaster and world w*r.

At best, the seeds encased in
the mountain s vaults

will provide the diversity
needed to adapt to

future life on Earth.

At worst, you re looking at the
planet s food supply.

Seeds need to be saved,
diversity needs to be saved,

because it s really the raw
material for evolution.

Because you need
natural selection,

or in the case of our
domesticated crops,

you need people to be able to
select among the traits that

exist to fashion new
varieties that are

adapted to new climates.

Or, resistant to pests
and diseases.

We need to save that diversity
if we re gonna have a

functioning agricultural system.

Cary Fowler is the mastermind
behind the seed vault

a concept that expands on
seed banks that

exist in nearly
every country.

Fowler was called to action
when he came across a comment

in a scientific journal
from the 70s warning

of catastrophic starvation on
a scale we cannot imagine .

So, we began thinking about
making a safety duplicate

a backup of all the seed
collections around the world.

And storing it in the safest
place we could imagine.

We came to think of that as
being Svalbard.

At 78 degrees north,
above mainland Norway.

Very close to the North Pole.
Farthest north you can fly

on a scheduled regular
commercial aircraft.

The seed vault is an
insurance policy, and it s

like your health insurance
or car insurance policy.

You don t want to use it.

I d be happy if somebody at the
end of my life, you know,

wrote my obituary and said,
This is the guy behind that

boondoggle near the North Pole
that was never used .

But, I m afraid that s probably
not what s gonna happen.

We ll continue to lose
diversity in regular seed banks.

And we ll continue to find that
we can get that stuff.

It didn t go extinct because we
have the seed vault.

Most farmers are so
dependent on

a very long distance,

tenuous and complicated supply
chain. And everything that s

produced is with razor
thin margins.

So, there s just enough. So, if
any branch of the supply chain

of all this stuff, all the way
to the supermarket,

the whole thing comes down.

And we ve really only got
two or three days of food

in the system to
support our eating.

At some point, we will realize
that things are incredibly bad

and that we need to
turn things around.

And that will happen when there
are five hundred million people

who are food insecure.

A billion people who
are food insecure.

Two billion people who
are food insecure.

How high does this number have
to get before we realize that,

actually, the exploitation and
the crisis that s part of the

system is endemic to it?

That will continue for as long
as we allow the food

corporations, the finance
corporations and the government

to dictate how it is that
we all get to eat.