The people take food as the sky, and agriculture is the foundation of a country.
Since the beginning of the agricultural society, the great working people have constantly explored ways to increase agricultural output, waged fierce struggles with nature, and finally achieved great victories for thousands of years.
With the advent of the industrial age, the proportion of output value created by agriculture declined, and some countries took the opportunity to use agriculture as a tool to kidnap food-poor countries.
Wall Street in the United States is well aware of this, and vested interest groups not only harm weak agricultural countries, but even seriously exploit the interests of their own farmers.
When it comes to agrarian civilization, then the Asian region, especially East and Southeast Asia, is definitely a leader.
Asians were among the first to master advanced agricultural technology, and thanks to this advantage, the Asian population has been able to maintain a high level at all times.
Although the technology is advanced, but the cultivated land resources in Asia are very general, represented by the Himalayan plate, frequent crustal movement has made the Asian region form a folded landform, the most intuitive embodiment is mountainous.
▲ The Central Plains of the United States
Taking China as an example, in the vast land area of 9.6 million square kilometers on the mainland, there are actually a few plains suitable for farming, such as the northern plain, the northeast plain, the long-term middle and lower reaches of the plain and the North China plain, and the overall proportion is not high.
With the leadership of the Party Central Committee and the joint efforts of the people of the whole country, China can now easily meet the food ration needs of the people, and the per capita protein intake is also increasing day by day, which is also a great achievement in the world.
It is no exaggeration to say that the country with the best arable land resources in the world should be today's United States.
▲ American arable land
Thanks to its natural resources, the United States is known as "the land of God's mercy."
The oceanic monsoon climate brings plenty of water, making the land very evenly rained and avoiding extreme droughts and floods.
The abundant water system engulfs the soil with a huge amount of sedimentary organic matter, which washes out the great plains and greatly improves the fertility of the soil.
▲American agricultural machinery operations
Since the 18th century, the inhabitants of this land have relied on agriculture as one of their main industries.
Even as the Industrial Revolution swept the world, the large farmers in the South could still rely on farming to obtain as much wealth as industry, which was enough to see the excellence of American arable land.
Today, the United States is not only the world's largest industrial country, but also the world's largest agricultural country.
In addition to dollar hegemony and high-tech addition, the combination of agriculture and finance is also one of the important means for the United States to harvest the world's wealth.
For example, the United States has the world's largest soybean production, about 1.3 times that of second-place Brazil, twice that of third-place Argentina, and 9 times that of fourth-place China.
▲ Soybeans bind US financial hegemony
Because of the spot as a support, Wall Street controls the pricing power of soybeans and sets industry standards for collecting and storing soybeans through futures tools, while protecting its own soybeans, it suppresses soybeans in other countries.
First, the trading value of soybeans was locked in financial leverage, and then the spot was exchanged for US dollars, which squeezed the transaction value of soybeans to the greatest extent.
In the process, in addition to soybeans, Wall Street controlled soybean derivatives in the same way.
For example, the pricing power and storage standards for agricultural products such as soybean meal (high-quality feed for obtaining animal protein), soybean oil, corn, pork, etc., and promote the listing of these futures products on exchanges in the United States.
In addition, U.S. agriculture has huge planting advantages and pricing advantages in cotton, wheat, tobacco, oats and other varieties, which have helped the United States harvest the world for many years.
Seeing this, some people will definitely think:
Since the agricultural advantages of the United States are so huge, then the farmers in the United States must be rich and bleed!
▲ Karen's injured leg
To understand this question, start with the experience of Karen Schneider, the "small farmer".
Karen is only 6 years old and is currently recovering at home because his left leg was torn apart.
From the photo, the wound on Karen's leg extends from the middle of the thigh to the ankle, the potholed muscles can no longer regain their former elasticity, and the dark red scar is shocking, it is almost like escaping from a minefield.
As for the reason for Little Cullen's injury, it is estimated that few people can think of it.
One day in October 2017, Karen's father, Keller, drove a tractor to feed cattle, and little Karen climbed up and down to help, as usual.
Suddenly, little Cullen stepped on the air, and his left leg fell into the hydraulic cylinder, which was directly torn by the rotating machinery.
▲ Cullen is driving agricultural machinery
Keller frantically calls the emergency number, and luckily, Karen's leg is saved, but the disability will stay with him for the rest of his life.
This is not the first time an accident has occurred on the farm.
In 2016, Karen's older brother, 8-year-old Kohler, was driving a tractor when he accidentally hit another younger brother, Malik, leaving the latter in hospital for several months.
Seeing this, while sympathizing with little Karen, I believe that many people will wonder, what can this example illustrate?
The answer is that Cullen Jr., Kohler Jr., and Malik Jr. have to passively help their parents who run the family farm, and even drive dangerous farm machinery.
If you don't think one example is representative of the U.S. agricultural community, look at another set of data.
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, child labor is alarming among the U.S. agricultural population, with about 8 percent of workers under the age of 16.
Given the lack of rigor in rural sampling in remote areas and the deliberate concealment of family farmers, the true figure for this ratio is probably higher.
Child labor has continued to rise over the past few decades, yet both the U.S. Departments of Labor and Agriculture have studiously avoided the issue.
▲ Cullen who fell disabled
In 2009, the Spanish newspaper Revolt delved into the reality of child labor in the United States (many of whom are from Spanish).
After months of collecting evidence, the newspaper came up with a number:
About 400,000 child laborers work in agriculture in the United States.
In addition to this, there are several numbers that stand out:
"A large number of children under the age of 8 become full-time or part-time child labor," says Davis Strauss, president of the American Farm Worker Employment Training Program Agency.
Child labor accounts for 20 percent of deaths from agricultural work in the United States because they do jobs that require irritable farm machinery and highly toxic pesticides — according to the U.S. Farm Worker Employment Training Program Agency.
▲ American children
At least 1,000 child laborers are injured in agricultural accidents every year – according to The New York Times
More than 100 child laborers die each year from agricultural accidents — according to the National Emergency Center database
Behind the gloomy cases and a series of cold numbers are the tragedies of countless families.
Poor child laborers have exposed to the world the dark side of the United States, the world's largest agricultural country, with their lives.
Some people will say that our rural children in China have helped their parents do farm work since they were young, such as cutting hogweed, breaking corn, and harvesting rice.
▲Children in rural China help their families
The answer is naturally no, the mainland implements 9-year compulsory education, and school-age children will go to school, otherwise it is illegal.
As for children helping their parents in their spare time, it is not a full-time job, and naturally there is no child labor.
Even in the United States, if a child helps his parents feed his or her livestock in his spare time, he or she harvests some produce is stigmatized as child labor, which is an irresponsible act of buttoning his hat.
When we say "child labor in U.S. agriculture," we mean children who work long hours in agriculture and who work almost as hard as normal adult workers.
▲ Historical American child labor
We know that the great advantages of American agriculture, in addition to natural quality arable land, are important for two important reasons:
Batch cultivation of land and joint mechanical operations.
However, this model only occurs in large farms, because large farmers own the vast majority of arable land resources.
In addition, there are about 2 million households in the United States that operate small family farms.
▲ Father teaches Karen how to feed cattle
These family farmers have limited arable land, and even if they produce abundant crops every year, the profits for them will not be too high.
Because their business model has never kept up with the predatory efficiency of Wall Street.
When capital discovers that the dollar plus agricultural spot method can harvest the whole world, how can they forget about the domestic farmers?
"Equal treatment" is indeed a good quality of American capitalists, and their objects of exploitation are not divided into targets, as long as they are as long as they reach, they are all objects of my exploitation.
Family farms can't keep up with spot prices, they don't hedge their risks with financial instruments, and they often work hard for a year without earning a decent income.
In order to reduce costs, family farmers raise their children from an early age to work in agriculture.
For example, Karen above, who began to work with his father when he was less than 6 years old.
▲The history of child labor in the United States has a long history
However, young children are not yet mentally and physically mature and can take on extremely limited work, so parents often put them in charge of driving agricultural machinery.
The salary of agricultural machinery drivers in the United States is very high, and some family farms cannot afford to buy large agricultural machinery, so they will lease agricultural machinery, the rental price is already expensive, plus the salary of a driver, which makes many families stretched.
So, after renting back the machinery, some parents began to train their children to drive.
Driving is relatively simple and repetitive, so it's easy for kids to get started, and over time, kids think it's their nature to drive these large farm machines.
In the short term, this model does save families money, but people forget that there are great dangers in driving agricultural machinery, and even if they are reminded, adults are not willing to listen, and only after a tragedy will adults become sober.
▲ American child labor interviewed (picture from CCTV News)
Since 2014, Farm Safety America has been calling for an end to child labor, but the government has dismissed such voices.
The U.S. government only wants 2 million family farms to grow enough cash to help Wall Street's greedy jackals carry out financial kidnapping, and these 2 million families, in order to cope with the never-ending bills, can only let this system be passed on from generation to generation.
Resources:
Some of the content in this article about child labor on family farms in the United States is referenced in the "5-Year-Olds Work Farm Machinery, and Injuries Follow" published on June 29, 2018
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