Information about the Aspen Ideas Festival is here. I am scheduled for a session, The American Wellness Paradox, currently scheduled from 11:00-11:50 a.m., at the East Lawn Tent. This will be a discussion with senior HHS policy advisor, Calley Means. Here’s the blurb on it: “Americans are spending more than ever on healthcare, supplements, wellness trends, and “clean eating,” yet rates of chronic disease and metabolic illness continue to climb. As skepticism fuels the rise of movements like MAHA, debates over what Americans should eat have become deeply cultural, political, and economic. Two influential voices with sharply different perspectives on nutrition and food science explore how food systems, farming practices, consumer culture, and the wellness industry collided to create one of the defining public health debates of our time.”
by Marion Nestle
Dec
2
2025
What’s going on with soybeans? Farm Action to the rescue
If you are wondering about the effects of China’s not buying US soybeans (and the Trump administrations bailout of Argentinean soybeans), Farm Action says the real problem started decades ago.
Its analysis is well worth reading.
The numbers reveal how concentrated our agricultural system has become. In 2024:
- Soybeans were the number one U.S. agricultural export, worth about $24.5 billion.
- More than half of all U.S. soybeans were exported, and China historically bought more than half of that total (roughly $12.6 billion worth).
- Soybeans contributed $46.9 billion to total U.S. farm income.
The current crisis, it says, is “the result of decades of decisions that put export growth ahead of food security at home.”
Farm Action wants agricultural policies that will break the cycle of overproduction and bailouts.
- Grow food, not just livestock feed crops: Incentivize production of fruits, vegetables, and nutrient-dense crops for local markets.
- Reform subsidies: Redirect federal spending away from endless bailouts and toward programs that reward resilience and healthy food production.
- Rebuild local infrastructure: Invest in regional processing, storage, and distribution to give farmers alternatives to export markets.
- Break up corporate monopolies: Enforce antitrust laws to restore competition in input and processing markets.
How to do this, it does not say. But these goals are worth advocacy.
Start on them now.
We might get lucky.
