COLIN TODHUNTER: The chemical-intensive industrial model of agriculture
has secured the status of ‘thick legitimacy’. This status stems from on
an intricate web of processes successfully spun in the scientific,
policy and political arenas. It status allows the model to persist and
appear normal and necessary. This perceived legitimacy derives from the
lobbying, financial clout and political power of agribusiness
conglomerates which, throughout the course of the last century (and
continued today), set out to capture or shape government departments,
public institutions, the agricultural research paradigm, international
trade and the cultural narrative concerning food and agriculture.
