Issues > March/April 2005 (#107) > Food Concentrates

Food Concentrates

by World Watch Magazine

 

As local farmers were squeezed by agribusiness and local retailers replaced by giant "box" stores, savings from all this "efficiency" were said to be passed on to consumers. With revenues of food retailers equivalent to small nations, the numbers tell the real story.The following is reprinted with permission from World Watch Magazine.








Share of world’s top 100 national (as GDP) and corporate (as revenues) economies that are corporations, 2003

 

  

51

 

Rank of Belgium among top 100 economies, 2003

 

  

18

 

Belgian GDP, 2003

 

  

$248 billion

 

Rank of Wal-Mart among top 100 economies, 2003   

 

  

19

 

Wal-Mart revenues, 2003

 

  

$247 billion

 

Worldwide revenues of the top 30 food retailers, 2001

 

  

$1 trillion +

 

Percent of total accounted for by the top 10 companies

 

  

57

 

Percent of total accounted for by the biggest food retailer, Wal-Mart

 

  

21

 

Worldwide revenues of seed companies, 2002

  

$23 billion

 

Percent of total accounted for by the top 10 companies

 

  

31

 
Worldwide revenues of agrichemical companies, 2002  

$27.8 billion
Percent of total accounted for by the top 10 companies   80
Number of 33 U.S. food processing industries in which consolidation from 1973 through 1992 led to lower consumer prices   4
Number in which the effect was zero or unknown   6
Number in which it led to higher prices   23
Percent of total price-fixing fines worldwide paid by food and agriculture cartels in recent years   85
Retail price of bread made from one bushel of wheat in Canada, 1975   $30
Farmers’ price for one bushel of wheat in Saskatoon, Canada, 1975   $3
Retail price of bread made from one bushel of wheat, 1999       $90
Farmers’ price for one bushel of wheat, Saskatoon, Canada, 1999   $3

•         •         •         •

 

Reprinted from World Watch Magazine, May/June 2005

SOURCES: Size and rank of economies, and agricultural industry revenues and shares: ETC Group, "Oligopoly, Inc." (Communiqué #82); food industry consolidation's effect on prices: A.M. Azzam, "The Effect of Concentration in the Food Processing Industry on Food Prices," Center for Agricultural and Food Industrial Organization, University of Nebraska/Lincoln; bread and wheat prices: National Farmers Union (Canada), "The Farm Business, EU Subsidies, and Agribusiness Market Power."

 

Worldwatch is an independent research organization that works for an environmentally sustainable and socially just society. For more information, visit them on the web at www.worldwatch.org.

Filed under: Factory farming, Food miles, Industrial agriculture

For Your Health | posted April 19, 2005