Globalization and the nutrition transition

A distinction must be made between the nutrition transition and the wider socioeconomic process of globalization, which refers to the process by which goods, people, and ideas spread throughout the world. The subject has been the source of much excitement in sociological and political circles recently, to which the topic of food can add a suitably gentle corrective. Globalization of food is, of course, nothing new. Plants have moved and been moved around the globe for centuries. Today, many are grown

Table 4.1

Top economic countries and corporations, 2001 (from Davidson, 2001)

The richest Ranking by country Country or corporation Food role GDP or revenue 1999 player ranking or corporation (millions of US$)

1 1 United States 9152 098

2 2 Japan 4346 922

3 3 Germany 2111 940

4 4 United Kingdom 1441 787

5 5 France 1432 323

6 6 Italy 1170 971

7 7 China 989 465

8 8 Brazil 751 505

9 9 Canada 634 898

10 10 Spain 595 927

23                                1 General Motors 176558

25                                2 Wal-Mart Stores Retailer 166 809

26                                3 Exxon Mobil 163 881

27                                4 Ford Motor 162 558

28                                5 Daimler-Chrysler 159 986

32 27 Indonesia 142 511

33 28 Saudi Arabia 139 383

34 29 South Africa 131 127

38                                6 Mitsui 118 555

39                                7 Mitsubishi 117 766

40                                8 Toyota Motor 115 671

41 33 Portugal 113716

42                                9 General Electric 111 630

44                                10 Itochu 109 069

45                                11 Royal Dutch/Shell Retailer 105 366

                                                                  Group

46 35 Venezuela, RB 102222

47 36 Israel 100840

48 12 Sumitomo 95 701

57 17 BP Amoco Retailer 83 566

72 29 Philip Morris Processor 61 751

                              and tobacco

75 44 Pakistan 58154

88                                41 Nestlé Processor 49 694

97                                46 Metro Retailer 46 664

99 52 Bangladesh 45961

100                              48 Tokyo Electric Power 45 728

Countries are indicated in normal type; company rankings are shown in bold.

All countries produce food; only those corporations with direct food interests are noted in this column.

far from their site of original cultivation. The same has happened to animals: cows, poultry, pigs, sheep, and goats. What is new about current globalization is its pace, scale, and extent, primarily fueled by government and private market forces.

Table 4.1 combines World Bank figures of national Gross Domestic Product (GDP) (World Bank, 2001) with estimates of corporate turnover from the Fortune 500 (Fortune, 2001). Produced by CAFOD, an international aid agency (Davidson, 2001), it seeks to measure relative economic “punch”. Of the richest 100, 48 are companies and 52 are countries. When ordered, one notes that Wal-Mart (26th), a retailer, had revenues greater than the GDP of Indonesia (32nd), Saudi Arabia (33rd) or South Africa (34th). Phillip Morris (72nd), a tobacco company which in 1998 was also the world’s largest food company, had a turnover greater than the GDP of Pakistan (75th). Nestlé (88th) had a turnover greater than the GDP of Bangladesh (99th).

The diverse reach of modern food corporations is considerable. Food companies are in discrete markets, mostly either in production or trading of raw commodities – such as Cargill, the world’s largest grain trader, a private corporation – or in value-adding industries such as food processing. Table 4.2 provides a picture of the world’s largest food global corporations. These are key framers of the food system.