Why Walmart's Death Grip on Our Food System Is Intensifying Poverty

[Judi Lynn]

AlterNet / By Stacy Mitchell
Why Walmart's Death Grip on Our Food System Is Intensifying Poverty

The real effect of Walmart's takeover of our food system has been to intensify the rural and urban poverty that drives unhealthy food choices.

March 26, 2013 |

This article was published in partnership with GlobalPossibilities.org.

When Michelle Obama visited a Walmart in Springfield, Missouri, a few weeks ago to praise the company's efforts to sell healthier food, she did not say why she chose a store in Springfield of all cities. But, in ways that Obama surely did not intend, it was a fitting choice. This Midwestern city provides a chilling look at where Walmart wants to take our food system.

Springfield is one of nearly 40 metro areas where Walmart now captures about half or more of consumer spending on groceries, according to Metro Market Studies. Springfield area residents spend just over $1 billion on groceries each year, and one of every two of those dollars flows into a Walmart cash register. The chain has 20 stores in the area and shows no signs of slowing its growth. Its latest proposal, a store just south of the city's downtown, has provoked widespread protest. Opponents say Walmart already has an overbearing presence in the region and argue that this new store would undermine nearby grocery stores, including a 63-year-old family-owned business which still provides delivery for its elderly customers. A few days before the First Lady's visit, the City Council voted 5-4 to approve what will be Walmart's 21st store in the community.

As Springfield goes, so goes the rest of the country, if Walmart has its way. Nationally, the retailer's share of the grocery market now stands at 25 percent. That's up from 4 percent just 16 years ago. Walmart's tightening grip on the food system is unprecedented in U.S. history. Even A&P — often referred to as the Walmart of its day — accounted for only about 12 percent of grocery sales at its height in the 1940s. Its market share was kept in check in part by the federal government, which won an antitrust case against A&P in 1946. The contrast to today's casual acceptance of Walmart's market power could not be more stark.

Having gained more say over our food supply than Monsanto, Kraft, or Tyson, Walmart has been working overtime to present itself as a benevolent king. It has upped its donations to food pantries, reduced sodium and sugars in some of its store-brand products, and recast its relentless expansion as a solution to "food deserts." In 2011, it pledged to build 275-300 stores "in or near" low-income communities lacking grocery stores. The Springfield store Obama visited is one of 86 such stores Walmart has since opened. Situated half a mile from the southwestern corner of a census tract identified as underserved by the USDA, the store qualifies as "near" a food desert. Other grocery stores are likewise perched on the edge of this tract. Although Walmart has made food deserts the vanguard of its PR strategy in urban areas, most of the stores the chain has built or proposed in cities like Chicago and Washington D.C. are in fact just blocks from established supermarkets, many unionized or locally owned. As it pushes into cities, Walmart's primary aim is not to fill gaps but to grab market share.

More:
http://www.alternet.org/food/why-walmarts-death-grip-our-food-system-intensifying-poverty

[dkf]

1. If that's true I hate to see what Costco has done.

That's where I do most of my grocery shopping.

[Sherman A1]

2. Interesting when you consider this information

with the thread on shoppers abandoning Wal Mart because they find empty shelves, dirty stores and no help. One wonders if the right hand knows what the left hand is doing at companies such as this? Their primary aim might be to grab market share, which is entirely what the expansion into the food retailing business has always been about, but if you are out of stock and customers are leaving, just how much market share can you grab?

[Doctor_J]

3. Walmart & Hate Radio

the two worst things to ever happen to America. They are responsible for 90% of the death spiral we've been in for a generation.

[Heather MC]

4. I don't do Walmart. I guess i am becoming the lucky few

The are no walmarts within 10 miles of me. They are easy to Avoid.

The last time I was in a walmart I saw an endcap, filled with about 100 giant bottles of cooking oil. Then as I was walking down the aisle, I saw about another 200 cooking oils different brands all Veggie Oil.

Why does on store need so much stuff?
There is something wrong with a system that is so large it has to over produce everything, not because a demand for it, but because they have to fill their ridiculously over-sized stores with shit.

If it does not implode soon, the amount of waste that Walmart creates will destroy us. Long before it's ability to crush mom and pop stores ever will.