ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the sustainability of agriculture and food in this new economic format for living because farming provided the launch pad for civilization and remains essential for survival today. It also addresses the tragic consequences of treating food as only another commodity in an economic system where public and political decisions are dominated by profit and shareholder value and where the agenda of society is short-term material prosperity. Western society has chosen a dangerous route in seeking to globalize agriculture and food and intends to take the whole world into the high risk venture. Leaders of capital rich countries seek the moral high ground by arguing that the ideology of globalization is the panacea for solving world hunger. Financial capital under globalization has become highly mobile and all new and existing business opportunities are evaluated solely on the basis of return on investments.
