The 'Responsible men' talk, but miss the point

The “Responsible men” gathered in Shepparton last week to consider national and global food security.
FoodbowlUnlimited and The Global Foundation combined to auspice what they deemed “a significant public conference” to benefit people ranging from your neighbour to others throughout the world.
Speakers featured Australia’s Federal Minister for Agriculture, Mr Joe Ludwig, who kept his talents well-disguised, and Visy Industries executive chairman of, Mr Anthony Pratt, who gave the keynote address.
Most conference attendees held significant influence in our communities and because of that were positioned to make decisions about the unfolding of our world, here and overseas.
Corporate and private agendas were obvious on Tuesday and it is unlikely any participants left with a sense that the security they sought was to be found in something quite different from what was advocated.
The business as usual paradigm is broken and the security discussed on Tuesday is not to be found in repeating what has obviously not worked, rather it demands society’s re-shaping to permit the dispersal of wealth, opportunity and within that, social access and equity; in fact a steady-state economy.

Federal Minister for
 Agriculture, Mr Joe
 Ludwig.

A film recently shown in Tatura, watched by 13 people, clarified the catastrophe of industrialising our food system, while Tuesday’s talks, in essence about the maintenance of that broken structure, attracted about 170 people, including a Federal Government Minister.
The urgent need for growth that sustains our corporate world has resulted in many sins, but corporate propaganda portrays those iniquities as societal benefits, but in reality they about enriching a few while marginalizing many.
Contrary to that, a steady-state economy is grounded in equity and access seeking sustainability, quality and wealth distribution in everything it does as opposed to the ultimately destructive and unsustainable binge on quantity that began in the industrial revolution and reached its zenith in the 20th century, but has begun to unravel in the past decade.
Tuesday’s conference had the honourable intention of searching for a way to ensure a reliable and ongoing food supply, but seemed to overlook, or purposely ignore, ideas that could solve the challenge.
The solution is in the creative destruction of what exists leading to a whole new way of doing business that is not solely about profit and growth.
The emphasis must be on doing things on a human scale avoiding the present distorted measure of success that clearly is quantitative as opposed to qualitative.