Infographic of the Week: Cotton vs Carrots
Farm Bill Hackathon, Food+Tech, Infographics, Policy — By Beth Hoffman on December 9, 2011 1:17 pm
This week’s Infographic of the Week was created by Laura Scherling and Laurence Wilse-Samson as part of the Farm Bill Hackathon. Scherling is a designer at The New School’s Communications and External Affairs Office and Laurence Wilse Samson is a PhD candidate in the Columbia University Economics department.
The graphic compares the money given in subsidies to eight cotton farms in California to that spent on the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program supplying snacks to elementary schools in the state. By shifting those cotton subsidies from cotton to fruit, 320 additional low-income schools could be served.
The team worked virtually with Kari Hamerschlag of the Environmental Working Group to produce the graphic. Other graphics from the event can be found here and here.
Beth Hoffman has reported on food and agriculture for ten years, airing on NPR, The World, Latino USA, Living on Earth, KUER and KALW , and studied the food system in depth as a fellow and co-lecturer in the Africa Reporting Project at UC Berkeley’s School of Journalism. Hoffman competed a year long documentary project cooking with immigrant women in their homes, has traveled to India, Uganda and Ethiopia to report on rice production and chicken farming, and did a multipart series for KUER on the artistic, cultural and environmental connections we have to food.
In addition to spending many hours on-farm in Utah, California and abroad, Hoffman also married into an Iowa farm family and is currently working with her husband to slowly convert the land into a sustainable orchard and hog farm. She currently lives in Albany, California. Hoffman’s previous work can be found on her website at bethaudio.com.
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