https://www.netflix.com/title/80134814

This film examines the value of sustainable farming from a well-being of the land and health of society to the cause of an economy built around a locally grown food system. In order to have a sustainable food system it needs to be built on quality nutrition, community, and ethical agricultural practices. This is very different from today’s industrial production that is focused on quantity and profit. The importance of local farming and the impact of it has on the community, land relates to food activism and food security. In the beginning, Chef Rick, who opens the film by reflecting on his decision to source local ingredients. He told us that, he kept asking himself about he was going to make great food if he didn’t have any connection to the people who are growing that food. Throughout the documentary it is critical of industrial farming. The main focus of the film is central Illinois farmers Marty and Kris Travis and their grown son, Will. The family is very passionate about the way they work Spence Farm, the small plot of land they repurchased in 1999 after a prior generation had to sell it the decade before. Marty is a seventh-generation farmer who has watched his land and community fall victim to the pressures of big agribusiness. The Travises only started turning a profit after attending a meeting of Chicago restaurant chefs looking for a locally grown organic produce supply chain. The chefs would place an order for whatever underserved produce they needed the next season and the Travises would figure out how to organically grow it.Every season the film checks in with Marty Travis who shares what it’s like on his farm during that particular time of year. It was interesting to me to see what life is like through the eyes of Marty Travis and to learn a little bit about what he experiences each season. Their neighbors, traditional farmers farming a thousand acres or more and are making $400 an acre. While Spence Farm is making in $2,200 on each of their 160 acres. The film shows us the economics of farming without the high chemical input costs that have become the new way of farming and producing. he Travis family recruits other small struggling farmers, some give credit to the family for saving their own operations. From the film we learn that most of the farming land in Iowa is used to grow corn and oats. The raw product of these crops means that the farmers are entirely at the mercy of markets. Their crop prices have nothing to do with the quality of their output in a given year. From this we could say that the sustainable farmers in the film have more control over what they choose to grow and charge for their yield.