Mexico Between Feast and Famine w/ Prof. Enrique Ochoa (G&R 458)

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Green & Red – Mexico Between Feast and Famine w/ Prof. Enrique Ochoa (G&R 458)

Date: January 26, 2026
Hosts: Bob Buzzanco (C), Scott Parkin (B)
Guest: Prof. Enrique Ochoa (A), Professor of History and Latin American Studies, California State University Los Angeles

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Overview

This episode features Professor Enrique Ochoa discussing his recent book, Mexico Between Feast and Famine: Food, Corporate Power and Inequity. The conversation explores the evolution of Mexico’s food system from the post-revolutionary era to the present, examining the roles of state policy, neoliberal reforms, the rise of corporate food giants, and the parallel crises of dietary change and malnutrition. The episode weaves together historical context, political economy, resistance movements, and the ongoing impacts on communities and diets in both Mexico and the broader transnational context.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Genesis of Ochoa’s Interest & Historical Context of Mexico’s Food Systems

• Food as Social Welfare Policy (01:22–06:44)
  • Ochoa’s early research focused on the aftermath of the Mexican Revolution (1910–1920), when food systems were used as instruments for social peace and control under the new ruling elite.
  • The Mexican state established state-owned food stores (rather than food stamps) by the 1930s and 1980s (up to 25,000 stores), keeping food accessible to workers while subsidizing capital—a balance of social and economic stability.
  • “So that first book really looked at kind of food as social welfare policy … the rise of these policies that … balance both the demands of the urban sector as it's trying to keep in the coalition the rural areas, encompassinos.” (A, 03:06)
  • By the late 20th century, neoliberalism and the entry of U.S. capital led to the rapid growth of homegrown Mexican food corporations, such as Bimbo (bread) and Gruma/Mission (tortillas), yet malnutrition remained stubbornly high (20–25% of the population).

2. Rise of Food Corporations & Neoliberalism’s Impact

• Corporate Expansion Post-1980s Crisis (07:20–10:56)
  • Economic crisis in the 1980s led to IMF/World Bank structural adjustment, opening Mexico to foreign capital and requiring privatization of state-run enterprises.
  • The PRI’s ties to emerging food conglomerates facilitated the rise of national capitalist elites (often families of Spanish descent), benefiting from privatization and government favors.
  • Foreign firms like Walmart entered through partnerships and ultimately took over, while domestic firms like Gruma and Bimbo leveraged political connections.
  • “As the founder of Gruma says, ‘the PRI made me’… national capital is growing.” (A, 09:54)

3. Transformation & Industrialization of Agricultural Production

• From Campesino to Corporate Farming (11:36–15:07)
  • Land reforms empowered smallholders post-revolution, but over time subsidies and policies shifted to favor large producers, fueling migration from rural areas to northern agro-industrial zones and the U.S.
  • By the 1980s–2000s, foreign agribusinesses (e.g., Cargill, Archer Daniels Midland) gained a foothold due to liberalized investment laws and the erosion of protective rules.
  • “Through the 80s, there is definitely the displacement of campesinos and the consolidation of larger lands. By the 80s and 90s and 2000s, that moves to… goes on steroids.” (A, 14:47)

4. Mechanisms of Resistance & Adaptation

• State Control and Rural Pushback (15:54–19:34)
  • State mechanisms dominated rural areas via distribution of collective lands (ejidos), state banks, and purchasing arrangements—often co-opting or crushing resistance.
  • “Mechanisms for control and resistance are really firm… the Mexican state will work in a way that it will crush those rebellions and … co-opt the leadership.” (A, 17:08)
  • Independent peasant unions, Communist Party initiatives, and eventually armed and nonviolent resistance movements (notably post-1968) intermittently challenged this order, with mass migration remaining the most common response to dispossession.

5. The Supermarket Revolution & Supply Chain Centralization

• Walmart, Supermarkets, and Diet (20:14–25:23)
  • Supermarkets’ spread in Mexico lagged the U.S. but exploded post-1990s as international and then largely Mexican capital (Walmart, Chedraui, etc.) overtook local chains.
  • Post-1998, Walmart became dominant: “Walmart will be poised to really expand and no one will be able to keep up … Walmart has 2,500 supermarkets. There are about a thousand other supermarkets.” (A, 24:44)

6. Dietary Changes and Nutritional Polarization

• Rise of Processed Food and Health Impacts (25:23–29:13)
  • The supermarket and industrial food revolution led to an explosion of cheap, processed foods—Bimbo’s sweet breads, Hostess equivalents, and Coca-Cola/Pepsi products.
  • The Mexican diet shifted rapidly toward “junk food,” with highly processed staples replacing traditional maize-bean-chile diets, fueling diabetes and malnutrition epidemics.
  • “It’s going to be in many ways much, much more costly to buy to eat rice and beans for the average Mexican than to get chips and Pepsi or chips and Coke. So the junk food diet like here is going to be … very inexpensive, highly costly, but very inexpensive.” (A, 28:35)

7. Culinary Globalization, Marketing, and Identity Contradictions

• Global Export of Mexican Food, Authorship & Inequity (29:13–36:12)
  • While packaged/junk foods flood the mass market, a “haute cuisine” movement emerges among elites, often erasing indigenous women’s role in traditional food knowledge (notably, nixtamalization of maize).
  • Transnational corporations traffic in “authenticity” even as traditional producers are excluded and underpaid.
  • “The creation of the maize dough… that indigenous women develop about 3,000 years ago is a culinary process… All that gets stripped away from indigenous women. We don’t hear much about that at all.” (A, 34:17)

8. Corporate Coffee, Franchises, and Cultural Displacement

• Starbucks and Franchise Expansion (36:12–38:58)
  • Starbucks and other franchises (often Mexican-owned as holding companies) flood urban centers, displacing traditional café culture.
  • “A lot of that is controlled by Mexican capital. Again, it, I mean, it’s a franchise. But … the same company that … has been expanding … also has a number of franchises of Burger King… and other fast casual restaurants.” (A, 37:17)

9. NAFTA, Rural Displacement, Labor Migration, and Social Disruption

• Agriculture’s Collapse and New Precariat (39:50–43:45)
  • NAFTA devastated peasant farmers, especially in tomatoes and other staples, leading to mass migration by indigenous workers (e.g., from Oaxaca to Baja California and on to U.S. fields).
  • “It essentially rips folks from their community… in the process lose themselves in so many different ways … because of the anti-immigrant policies or the anti-indigenous policies in Mexico.” (A, 41:33)

10. Resistance: Zapatistas & Food Sovereignty Movements

• From Armed Rebellion to Policy Advocacy (43:45–49:32)
  • Zapatista uprising (January 1, 1994, NAFTA’s start) symbolized indigenous/rural opposition to neoliberalism and the commodification of maize, connecting food, land, and cultural survival.
  • “The market is the juggernaut. The market is going to destroy us. It’s going to lead towards … genocidal culturally in particular, because … the people of corn, the people of maize… those relationships were going to be destroyed.” (A, 44:40)
  • Recent left-leaning governments have selectively advanced food sovereignty ideas but without challenging corporate dominance; organized, unified resistance remains difficult due to the concentration of power and capital.

11. Ongoing Structural Challenges & Policy Status

• Corporate Adaptability & Government Limitations (49:32–52:22)
  • Food billionaires proliferate, agilely co-opting social critique: “Capital is quick and it’s nimble and it’s saying, okay, how can we be part of the solution here? Have smaller Cokes. Water, invest in water… that’s a whole environmental … disaster waiting to happen.” (A, 47:38)
  • Government policies (e.g., higher minimum wage, food initiatives) have reduced measured poverty, but the basics of corporate power and food injustice remain unchanged.

12. U.S. Policy Effects (Immigration, Remittances, Uncertainty)

• Deportations, Remittances, and Uncertain Futures (50:10–52:22)
  • Increased U.S. immigration restrictions and deportations create anxiety and potentially reduce remittance flows, leading to economic and social instability in Mexico.
  • “The administration is touting it. Yes. But we know it’s happening in so many … different ways within Mexico. What impact that’s having on Mexico, I think … remains to be seen.” (A, 50:23)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the contradiction at the heart of Mexican food policy:
  • “Mexico has these large food corporations that dominate the world market … And at the same time, of course, poverty, malnutrition has grown in absolute numbers.” (A, 05:41)
• On resistance to NAFTA:
  • “The Sabatistas are the great example. Right. They chose January 1st because that’s when NAFTA was going into effect. And among the things they said is enough, right. The market is the juggernaut. The market is going to destroy us.” (A, 44:23)
• On the double-edged sword of global food marketing:
  • “The campesino diet then all of a sudden gets celebrated as long as it’s not being produced by campesinos and eaten by them.” (A, 28:42)
• On indigenous women and the erasure of expertise:
  • “All that gets stripped away from indigenous women. We don’t hear much about that at all. … They’re talking about it as if they’re innovating this.” (A, 34:17)
• Hosts’ perspectives:
  • “What you just described, like, especially like in the late 19th century… in some of farm states you had 70, 80% rates of losing people losing their land. And that led to resistance. Things like the real Populists, not the bullshit that the media talks about today.” (C, 15:07)
  • “The capitalists are always innovative, if nothing else.” (B, 49:32)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Ochoa’s background & book’s origin: 01:22–06:44
• Rise of corporations & neoliberalism: 07:20–10:56
• Transformation of agriculture & migration: 11:36–15:07
• Mechanisms of resistance: 15:54–19:34
• Supermarkets, Walmart, & supply chains: 20:14–25:23
• Diet changes & health crisis: 25:23–29:13
• Global marketing & food “authenticity”: 29:13–36:12
• Starbucks/franchises in Mexico: 36:12–38:58
• NAFTA, displaced farmers, & migration: 39:50–43:45
• Zapatista, food sovereignty resistance: 43:45–49:32
• Corporate “greenwashing” & adaptability: 49:32–52:22
• Effects of U.S. policy on Mexico now: 50:10–52:22

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Conclusion

Professor Ochoa’s deep historical and political analysis reveals how Mexico’s food systems, from revolutionary reforms to neoliberal corporate dominance, have created profound contradictions: a world leader in processed food corporations alongside persistent malnutrition and rural dispossession. The podcast highlights the resilience and opposition of peasant and indigenous communities, the erasure (and partial commodification) of traditional food knowledge, and the ongoing struggle over who benefits from—and who is excluded by—modern food systems. Despite gestures toward reform and food sovereignty, the power of corporate capital remains largely unchecked, shaping Mexico’s present and future.

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Transcript

[A]

Welcome to Green and Red Scrappy Politics for Scrappy People, a regular podcast on radical environmental and anti capitalist politics. Brought to you by Bob Bozanko and Scott Parkins.

[B]

Welcome to the silky smooth sounds of the Green and Red podcast. I'm your co host Scott Parkin in Berkeley, California. And as always I am joined by.

[C]

Bob Bozanco in Niles, Ohio.

[B]

And today we have a return guest, Professor Enrique Ochoa, who is a professor of history in Latin American Studies at California State University in Los Angeles, who's a native of Los Angeles, grew up in the San Gabriel Valley, got his degrees from ucla. And we're going to be talking about Professor Ochoa's book which came out last year, I believe called Mexico Between Feast and Famine, Food, Corporate Power and Inequity. Professor Ochoa, welcome back to the Green and Red podcast.

[A]

Thank you, Scott. Thank you, Bob. It's great to be here. I appreciate you having me back.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, we're happy to have you. We're very happy to have you back. Maybe we could just kick off talking about the book a little bit. There's a many questions and as I was pondering the sort of kickoff question, maybe you could actually just start with what intrigued you about Mexico's food systems and what intrigued you to write this book?

[A]

Book, yeah. Thank you. Yeah, it's a, it's a great question. A lot of my research early on in graduate school and then my first book has been around kind of Mexico's food systems. My first book published it about 25 years ago now. Feeding Political Uses of Food Since 1910 looked at the way in which the food system was developed in Mexico after the Mexican Revolution, trying to address, right. The demands for land, the demands for cheaper food, for worker, control over food systems at the same time that the revolutionary state and the new elite emerging from the Mexican Revolution in 1910, the 1910, 1920 large uprising in Mexico as they consolidate their power and how the ruling class consolidates its power at the same time trying to, trying to bring in and incorporate the demand, the voices of workers, the some of the demands of workers is a way of buying social peace. And so that first book really looked at kind of food as social welfare policy. And a very, yeah, and a very in a much more kind of political economy approach to the rise of food programs as social programs in Mexico from 1930, in particular during the Cardenas administration, in a very similar way as FDR saves capitalism with his various plants. Right. How Lazaro Cardenas oftentimes seen as the pinnacle of The Mexican Revolution as a president also saves it in a slightly different way. And so that book looks at the rise of these policies that at the same time try to balance, balance both the demands of the urban sector as it's trying to keep in the coalition the rural areas, encompassinos. And the way that happens, but the way that, that then kind of leads to the development of a capitalist, of a full on kind of capitalist food system in which workers are not, well, workers are, are receiving definitely some benefits from that. And in particular I look at the rise of the Mexican Food Corporation, state owned food corporation. So instead of doing the food stamps, Mexico then creates a large number of food stores of government owned food stores, not unlike what Mandami is talking about, some 25,000 by the early 80s to keep basic foods relatively low. At the same time, that's a way of right, sustaining, sustaining capital because as workers are demanding higher wages, the state will intervene and, and help capital out and subsidize capital in that way. So anyways, that book focused on that with the discussion too around the countryside and then out and that that finished, I finished that work about 2000, late 90s at the time in which neoliberalism was right in full swing in Mexico. And at the same time that US capital begins to expand as a result of it, Walmart in particular in the Mexico. And at the same time that the Mexican national food companies also begin to expand and go overseas. And so that was for me really interesting to see that process of neoliberal food systems, how it builds on the past and how for example, if we look now, how we can see Mexico as the home of some of the world's largest food companies. This is like the pinnacle of neoliberalism. Look, Mexican companies have grown so much. It's not just dominated by the transnationals. Mexico has all these kind of food capitalists. And at the same time, of course, poverty, malnutrition has grown in absolute numbers and relative numbers still hovers about 25, 20 to 25% of the population. There's no dent in that process. That basic contradiction of how that happens, right. Mexico has these large food corporations that dominate the world market and dominate the U.S. for example, Bimbo, which is the world's largest bread and packaged bread producer, that kind of own, well, that is not just dominates the US market through Sara Lee and Oroweed and Thomas's English muffins and many others. And then of course Gruma, which is a mission and Guerrero Tortillas in the US which is again the Dominant holds. It holds a dominant place in the market and the connection with Walmart. So I wanted to focus on those more specific companies and their rise and the way that happens and that develops in a way that leads to this kind of growing inequality. And part of what I want to do is put it in the larger historical context to tell the big picture of Mexico's food system now and Mexico's malnutrition now. And. Right. Its place is of being one of the top two countries with the highest rates of diabetes, type 2 diabetes, at the same time that this is happening now. But it's really a product of this larger coloniality process that begins in 1519 with the conquest. And so I wanted to put that specific neoliberal context in that larger historical context.

[C]

I'm Italian, so food is, I think, similar. It's more of a cultural thing, and we think of it that way. And I think with regard to Mexican food, right, we often think of it as this almost kind of artisanal thing, right, with people making tortillas on the corner and selling or something like that. So the stuff he wrote about, I'm somewhat aware of it, especially because of nafta, which we'll certainly get to, you know, later, but I was not aware of how corporatized and how big it had become. When did that process begin? And is this mostly like Mexican capital? Is there. I know Walmart obviously is, but there are foreign companies who've come in. How did that emerge?

[A]

Yeah, so with. Beginning in the 1980s, right, with the. The economic crisis and the plummeting of the price of oil in 81 and 82 essentially led to the collapse of the Mexican economy. And in that process, right, there was the shift to bail out the Mexican economy through the IMF and World Bank. And as part of that, the IMF and World bank, right, imposed their structural adjustment policies, right, that opened up the Mexican food system to a much greater degree and the economy as a whole to imports and to the. To foreign capital. And so that some of that's beginning in the 70s, it really takes on it really. It becomes more established in the 80s and then becomes institutionalized, right, through NAFTA and through changes in the foreign investment laws and others. By the 90s, as that's happening, then there is, yes, the encouragement of private capital by the Mexican government then to expand. And any competition that the private capital was facing through the state sector was reduced because the Tortilla flour mill company in Mexico, right, is going to be sold off by the 90s. And so the privatizations, the effort as well to reduce subsidies and definitely benefits those companies. And so, so several of those, right, are really national national capitalists, many of whom are. Whose families have migrated from Spain at the turn of the century, are the ones that really take off during this period. And so yeah, these are national capitalists that are closely tied to. Yeah, that. That have connections with finance capital and global capital in the US and in Europe as well. So like for example, Mission Tortillas, Grumo Maseca, they pioneer. They pioneer. It was already invented by other people. But then they pioneer the use the dehydration of nixtamal of corn, Masa of masa, dehydration of it and then the rehydration of it. Right. This starts in the, in the 20s and 30s, but they really take off in the 40s and over time begin to perfect it, quote, unquote, to be able to do that and that. And a lot of that develops. And that company begins to grow and expand in Mexico really because of close personal ties, because of other kind of patron client relationships that the founders have with the rising Mexican capitalists coming out of the revolution. And then because of. Right. What might argue is cronyism, but is right, good capitalist public relations, the connection with the pri. So that the Gruma is really, as they say, as the founder Gruma says, the Pre made me. I'm part of the Pre, which is the Revolutionary Institutional party, right. The one party in Mexico from 1929 all the way to 1994 to 2000, excuse me. And he's a product of it. And so that national capital is growing. And then by the 1980s, many of those folks like Gruma, get special favors by the Salinas government, by the various neoliberal governments to. To then even take off even more. And that's the case with Bimbo, and that's the case with Gruma, and to a certain degree it's the case with Walmart. But we can go into that in a minute. Go ahead, Scott.

[B]

One question I have is around production, we're talking about how trade liberalization really affected grocery stores and distribution and things like that. But how has big ag, big aggregate business moved into the production of foodstuff that goes into, for example, the production of the tortilla? Are we. Have we been seeing that as well? That seems to be a trend here in the US where small farmers are being increasingly put out of business by big agriculture. We see big agriculture really asserting itself in a variety of places. I think of the Amazonian rainforest, for example, where they cut things down for cattle production or crop production. But how has that been happening in Mexico?

[A]

Yeah, that's definitely been happening, Right. And it's been speeding up since NAFTA and since the 90s. And it has a legacy, right, that is through the 20th century and the consolidation of the Mexican Revolution, Right. The policies that were put in place, although many of them were to support small agriculture, were there to support the campesinos and the campesino population, the peasant population that fought for the revolution, that demanded for land and liberty. Tierra y libertad, right, of Zapata's call. And saw those together, right? Many of those, yes, began to get in the massive land reform, access to land, either private land, but largely collective land, a healing land, so that they could keep it in their community for years and years. And originally, they were meant to be the basis of the creation of the production of small. Excuse me, the production of the basic staples in Mexico, of corn, of maize, of beans, of squash, of other kind of basic products, and then of wheat. By the 1940s and 1950s, as Mexico begins to modernize and see itself as an urban industrial country, very much right, Moving to the right, if you will, within the pre. And very closely connected to the US as well, in US Agricultural policy and the Rockefeller foundation and the Green Revolution, right. The emphasis is how do we expand and produce more basic grains to keep prices low for workers and keep workers buy social paces, keep workers at bay and their demands at bay. And so in that process, then, yeah, their subsidies to the small campesinos begin to dry up and begin to be shifted towards larger land producers, larger landholders, medium to large producers, many times in the north. So in the area in the central Mexico and southern Mexico, largely indigenous regions of Mexico, right. Those become increasingly impoverished and starved of land. And folks then again, beginning in the 40s and 50s, are forced to migrate more frequently to areas like to northern areas like Sonora, Sinaloa, where these larger farms are, and they work more seasonally and migrate home. So that begins to happen. And of course, it also means, right, coming to the US as well, because that becomes part of the migrant stream in that process. And so all that is happening as Mexican capital is consolidating its hold over agriculture with the 80s and 90s, right, and the aughts and the 2000s, then there. There is much more investment coming in. Again, there definitely is investment in those areas, too. Cargill. Cargill. Excuse me, Cargill. Yeah, Cargill. Yes, Cargill, Archer Daniels Midland. They're all involved early on, but yet have to work through until the 80s and early 90s. Have to work through Mexican companies and in theory own only 49%. The reality is they have more, but as the foreign investment laws change, they get. They're able to dominate. And so all along through the 80s, there is definitely the displacement of campesinos and the consolidation of larger lands. By the 80s and 90s and 2000s, that moves to. That goes on steroids to a much. A lot of it.

[C]

I taught us history. I taught us history for over 30 years. And that's very similar. Right, what you just described, like, especially like in the late 19th century. So you have this shift away from commercial or subsistence farming to commercial farming, which in some of farm states you had 70, 80% rates of losing people, losing their land. And that led to resistance. Things like the pot the real populace, not the bullshit that the media talks about today. Is there something similar? Does this become a political movement as well? Like farmers are saying we're getting squeezed out. Like in the US A lot of them like you described went north to work in factories, which in the 1890s were falling apart as well. Is there something similar? Do the farmers say, okay, we. We need to organize collectively. Do they create like banks or insurance companies or collectives or anything like that?

[A]

Yes, and so that definitely they. They begin to. And they do resist. However, the mech, the mechanism for control in the 20th century in the countryside are very strong. All right. That is the state, because the state is involved in distribution of lands and the creation of collective lands. Ejidos. Right. Which are in theory owned by the. By. By the community and governed by the community. The creation of different state banks that then operate in those areas and then the purchasing of the crops becomes really controlled by the become is a mechanism of control that the state has and that at the community level. The role of kind of community bosses and caudillos and caciques who then rise up and have much more connection with the state apparatus. They're able to control that. And so the mechanisms for control and resistance are really firm. It's so people definitely begin to resist. However, it's very difficult to. Especially in these areas. That being said, at various times, yeah. People begin to write taking up the banner of land and liberty in different areas, especially if they have more access to resources, are able to organize and do organize various forms of resistance and independent peasant unions breaking away from the state peasant union. So the role of the Communist Party in the forties and the fifties and the Communist Youth in particular will lead to the organization of these more independent mechanisms. Oftentimes though, the Mexican state will work in a way that it will crush those rebellions and work to and at the same time then give the whatever is being demanded. If they're demanding right. Increases in wages or increasing of the guaranteed price that they're purchasing the crops from. Right. The state will give in to that, but will crush the independent leadership or will work to. To co opt the leadership. And so again, this kind of. This very response authoritarian responsiveness of the Mexican state gets well. Is well honed. And so it really works to yeah, co op large numbers of folks. At various times in the 50s and really in the 60s, we begin to see the rise of folks and then say okay, this is not working, we need to begin to take up arms. In the case of Morelos, that happens in the 40s and 50s. And then after the 6 the crushing of the 68 student movement. Right. By the 1970s, we see the rise of several different revolutionary movements, youth movements, youth campesino movements, coalition taking up arms in various parts of the country. So that is definitely right occurring. There is definitely those that efforts of resistance by the 90s and 2000s. Yes. As more and more people are being displaced, as their credit crunches, there definitely is mass movement organizing in the countryside. And at the same time, many are just being forced off the land and don't have and are just trying to survive. And so are trying to just sustain their family income by working on their land. They still have access to land and then selling their labor to other farmers or going and in the process even working in nascent industry and having multiple streams of income which gives them really little opportunity to. And large numbers migrate.

[B]

Yeah. And we see a lot, we obviously we're seeing a lot of response to that right now. My, my question is think also thinking about just along this sort of corporate supply chain. The other piece that you talk about a lot in the book is around corporate grocery stores and Walmart, which is in Mexico, I think known as Walmex, also has very much asserted yourself. So could you talk about that a bit. And then also if there are other. Are there other corporate chains, corporate grocery store chains in Mexico which have achieved some of what Walmart has achieved.

[A]

Yeah, so it's a great question. Right, because and in that chapter, I call it the supermarket colonialism, something along those lines.

[B]

Because also happening here, it's fascinating the parallels that we see happening here.

[A]

The parallels, right. The parallels are striking. Yeah. And in the context of Mexico There are the rise of supermarket change happens much later than it does in the US right where it's in the US is beginning at the turn of the 20th century in areas. And then we see the beginning to rise in Mexico that comes much later, right into well after World War II. And then supermarkets initially, like in the US initially as well, are an elite phenomenon, right? They're catering to an elite group. And so there are by the 1980s, by the rise of neoliberalism, there are about four or five and you can't really call them national chains yet because they're not everywhere, but they're in big cities. And those are ones like yeah, Gigante Commercial, Mexicana Vera. And then there's some smaller regional ones like Chadauri, which will then take off really by in the 2000s and become well in the 90s and become more national based. And then by the 2000s and 2010s will really become an international scenario. So Chad is the owner of El super and at least in la and I think there's some El Supers up in the Bay Area. And Smart and Final, you all know Smart and Final, it's a discount chain. It's a very large discount chain. I guess it's west coast based anyway. And they also own that. So there are some. However, with the night during the 90s, as international capital comes in and tries to expand in the supermarket chain and large corporations, Tedesco and Tesco, excuse me, from England and the ones from France begin to move in to Mexico, they're working to create partnerships with these chains and Walmart is part of that. Right? Walmart creates a partnership in the early 90s with a which is a large chain. Again, these are the Mexican national chains are almost all founded by sons and sons of Spanish Spanish migrants who came at the turn of the 20th century or came after the Spanish Civil War, but not because they were right partisans, but because they were. And so they those efforts to make the. The connections and to make partnerships with the transnational companies begin to occur after 1994, where there's economic crisis and there's a. And the demand for capital that the national companies have. However, by 2000 or so, in most cases the large partner, all the foreign partners have left. Tesco leaves Mexico, the French folks whose name escapes me leave as well. But Walmart stays and by 1998 it buys out Aurada and they then form a still involved in it. But nothing then will begin in 1998. Walmart will be poised to really expand and no one will be able to keep up with Walmart. So Arreda, in many ways is like Walmart in, in the sense that it was meant to be. Yes. Built on supply, be able to large purchases at discount. It was a discounter and Mexico and it had, and it was really, it had agreements before with companies based with price, with, excuse me, not price club, with other companies in the 70s in the US and so they had a sense of it. And so when Walmart approached them, they think yes, this works for us. Walmart would then help to develop the supply chain a bit more. And by 1998 Walmart established itself in Mexico as now the owner of these, of both Walmart stores and out at our stores. And at that point between 1998 and about 2007 and 2008, they are going to create, they're just going to take over the market. There's just no, no other way to say that they're just going to take over the market and that Walmart is going to come to own, I don't know, 80% of the markets at this point. There's no, they have almost no competition of the market to Mexico. Yeah. Walmart has 2,500 supermarkets. There are about a thousand other supermarkets.

[C]

With this increased centralization, what impact does it have on the actual Mexican diet? I know I'm old enough to remember this kind of evolution in the US and now food is very different, highly processed, we have much higher rates of diabetes and cancer. And all this is something similar occurring like with the traditional diet.

[A]

Yes. And arguably to a much greater extent. Right. And definitely it's significant in the US but it takes off in a very brief period of time because again with the growth of stores from about 2:50 to about 2,000 over the course of 15 years, that's going to work to restructure the entire food system in so many ways. So yes, the rise of packaged foods, that's gonna, they're gonna create space then for. Yeah. The explosion of packaged foods. Bimbo, which produces packaged bread in Mexico but also has a line of donuts and sweet bread and Hostess like things and Houston Iceberg. That's right, yeah. And those began and they began to go to Houston in the 80s, but really then by the 90s and then with the rise. Right. Increased Mexican populations to a much greater degree. Yeah. And so the really packaged foods, processed packaged foods really take off all during this period. This is the period where we're going to see the growing rates of diabetes, of type 2 diabetes and other nutrition related diseases take off. Clearly There was, it was already building up before because we didn't speak about it, but Coca Cola and Pepsi Cola, right, come into Mexico in the 20s and 30s and 40s and really take off in various areas. But this is going to, the explosion is really going to happen in this very brief period of time at the same time that the chains are going to develop in order to supply Walmart in its various areas, they're going to have to then begin to control distribution, control the production site, control. Right. How, how the food comes in and therefore who's going to be able to sell to Walmart. Right. Is going to encourage larger producers who can produce food in the, and products in the way that meets the Walmart standards and that can afford not to be paid for 12 months or 8 months, however their billing cycle is. And so that's going to really encourage those larger companies and other than foreign capital investment in those other companies and suppliers. Yeah. And they're going to make it so that, yes, by the, throughout the 2000, it's going to be in many ways much, much more costly to buy to eat rice and beans for the average Mexican than to get chips and Pepsi or chips and Coke. So the junk food diet like here is going to be, it's going to be very inexpensive, highly costly, but very inexpensive. And so, yes, the basic foodstuffs that folks eat and historically have developed. Right. A very well balanced diet of, based on maize, based on. Right. Tortillas and the nixtamalization. Right. A highly healthy cuisine with beans and chile and other forms of greens. That kind of basic campesino diet will become out of the reach of many people. At the same time, when Mexican chefs trained in France and trained in New York and coming back will then develop this whole cuisine based on campesino foods and indigenous foods and then transforming them to make them more palatable, quote, unquote acceptable, more elegant for elite consumers. So right therein lies kind of the basic contradiction. Yes, the campesino diet then all of a sudden gets celebrated as long as it's not being produced by campesinos and eaten by them. And in the process, of course, yes, indigenous women are written out of the story of Mexican food.

[B]

And the way in which you distill economic material conditions down to the food sector is fascinating and fantastic. One question I have is as we see this, I think in the book, you call it nutritional polarization. Right. We're also seeing like a mass. There's the sort of junk food diet being sold to the bottom 90% or whatever, but we're also seeing this sort of like international marketing going on as well of Mexican food. And I'm wondering if you could. I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit. Everything from fast food to this more elite artisanal sort of food, which is you can go to a fancy restaurant here in the Bay Area and get.

[A]

Yeah. Yes. There are these seemingly similar processes and a lot of contradictions in that process. But yes, all this as well. Yes, the marketing, the globalization, if you will, of Mexico food. That happens. And again, Jeff Pilcher's written this and there's a nice little book called Taco that talks about this. It just came out in the Bloomsbury little book series. Definitely is exploding in part connected to. Right. The growth of Mexican migration to non traditional places. Right. Beginning clearly in the Bay Area, there was always large Mexican population in different sections and the west, but increasingly, of course, throughout Ohio, throughout various areas and then of course as well even into Europe and Australia and the like. And yes, the growth of that process is something that's taken off in many ways. Of course, summed in, in a lot of cases, yes, controlled by a small mom and pop, if you will, Mexican capital. But as those companies begin, the fast food chains and like we know, yes, though that's capital that's far from right. Mexican. Yes. The involvement of Mexicans are usually, yes. In the back of the house producing it and not in the ownership process. So we see, yes, the growth of. Yes. Taco Bell, Del Taco, I don't know. In Australia we're looking at as well, the Guzman and Gomez is a very large chain, of course, in which there is neither a Guzman nor a Gomez involved in it. But. Right. But in America. But in American, we have Outback Steakhouse.

[B]

Here in the US So maybe it's.

[A]

That's right. Okay.

[B]

Not owned by any Australian. For my.

[C]

That's how my people feel about Olive Gardens. There you go.

[A]

There you go. Yes, yes. And so again, those are all kind of similar processes occurring. And so that Mexican food, yes, is taking off and there are definitely Mexican capital involved in some of that. And again, I'm going to go back to the transnational tortilla company Gruma, the Grupo Maseca, because a lot of tortillas being produced especially for, again, more working class and chain restaurants are going to be tortillas that are coming from Mission Tortilla factories that now dot the landscape. Is the largest Right. Tortilla factory in the world, for example, is near us here in Rancho Cucamonga in the Inland Empire, so to speak of la, is that they're the ones supplying, right, the tortillas to these various Fast food companies, McDonald's as well, for their breakfast burrito as well as for many of the chain restaurants now with the kind of movement towards more haute cuisine, Mexican food as the good food movement and to a certain degree the farm, the table movement as well, right. Efforts address it. There's this notion, okay, no, those tortillas that are being produced in the factories in the. By men with machines, as I call it in that chapter, right, Those tortillas are, they're not. They're processed. Literally you can, yeah, keep it in the refrigerator for a year and a half and they'll still taste the same, right, because they're so highly processed. And of course, if it's produced in the. They're produced in the US Much of that, that that maize is GMO maize. And so that there is this push then for a more authentic, I'm going to quote those words, a more authentic kind of masa based, more directly, less processed tortilla. And again, and so there's always been that move, but in the higher end areas that's much greater. So again, I want to say that because the importance here is, right, the creation of the maize dough, of taking right, maize from the corn on the cob, from the cob, shucking it, producing it to create the dough that indigenous women develop about 3,000 years ago is a culinary process that makes the dough easier to, well, allows you to then make tamales or allows you to make tortillas, is able to be able to make it more pliable. But at the same time there's a scientific process that happens that is there's the adding of limestone or of lime or of calcium carbonate into the mix, adds, adds niacin and other nutrients in there to really create a very. Leading to the creation of a whole protein so that one can survive off a maize based diet. That, that, that comes from nixtama that's been through the nixtamazation process, unlike what happens. And we'll go back to the Italians there, Bob, or even folks in the Midwest or in the south, right, Folks then who are trying to survive on a polenta diet, on a diet of just the large grains. And you can't survive on that as the basis of the diet. One gets pellagra because there is. Because it's lacking in niacin and other. And folks begin to die on that. Right, the same thing in the south, if you're just surviving on it. But indigenous Women developed this other kind of, right. Brilliant scientific revelation and revolution that, that allows this to occur and allows then maize to be the diet in this area. Right. All that gets stripped away from indigenous women. We don't hear much about that at all. And more recent kind of efforts to go back to the traditional diet and the traditional creation of tortillas that indigenous women developed is happening now. And there are a lot of large companies that are, there are some important companies that are based in the US that are doing this and that are the basis of tortillas that are being sold at Whole Foods and then the kind of elite restaurants in the U.S. right. Those are also, yeah, being made without the discussion of indigenous women's and their knowledge. And they're talking about it as if they're innovating this. So again, those contradictions run really deep there. And my question always is, yes, this is Mexican food, right. But who's producing it? Who's get, who's earning the capital based on it? Whose knowledges are these and not being recognized? And, and yeah, what is the racialized, capitalist and gendered aspect of this process?

[B]

What one, one other, one other question I have that strikes me. I traveled in Mexico recently and the other American chain I saw a lot of when I was actually in Mexico City was actually Starbucks. And we haven't really talked about coffee so much in this coffee is a. Another staple that we've seen from Mexico. And I'm just wondering, this sort of, I wouldn't call it fast food imperialism, that's like McDonald's or something like that, but Starbucks in some ways comes out of it like a sort of elite. And it's where they've made a sort of fast food out of elite coffee. And I'm just wondering what your thoughts are on that going on as well.

[A]

At the same time, right. That there's the open. Yes. Opening of, of trade and the corporate managed trade or what they call free trade is happening.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Starbucks is beginning to move into certain parts of Mexico at the time and now. And there are kind of Mexican companies that act as holding companies that then buy the franchise for the stock. The really exponential growth of Starbucks all over the place, which then tend to replace and push out the more local cafe culture that existed in Mexico or in much of Latin America. For we can talk about Europe as well, whereas folks are resisting that. And so that, yes, we've seen that growth and a lot of that is controlled by Mexican capital. Again, it, I mean, it's a franchise. But some of those, but the Same company that, that then has been expanding and that is also has a number of franchises of Burger King franchises, not so much McDonald's franchises, but then other fast casual restaurants. I don't know, Olive Garden. Is there an Olive Garden? No, it's not Olive Garden, it's the other company. The name escapes in the moment. But Chili's and the other ones connected to Chili's. I forget what the name of that is. So those, the growth of those especially in middle class areas are taking off and in the process are. Yes, it's. They become important quick places where folks can go and sit or just take their coffee on the run. And the smaller coffee places, right. Are suffered for a fair amount of time. So that's the process is happening in that kind of growth. And so Mexican capital has worked to try to take advantage of that and then sell that. Sell those, those US based or the European based fast casual dining spaces as. Right. More modern, part of a greater modern type of food that's disconnected from Mexico. And of course, yes, some of that, some of those coffee beans may be produced in the highlands of Chiapas and Guatemala and other areas. But there's a great disconnect. Disconnect here is great. It's. I would argue it's even greater in Mexico.

[C]

When I was In Italy in 2018, there was a Starbucks either opening or just open in Milan. And the people there were aghast. And I don't know how many more, if any more have opened, but that there was massive resistance at all levels against that. I wanted to ask, which I think is very important, and this is how Kendall Scott and I met doing a lot of globalization work in the late 90s and around NAFTA, of course. And then so at the time we, I think I read quite a bit actually at that point on Mexican agriculture. And I remember something that stuck with me was about the Mexican tomato farmers and how NAFTA had just wiped out. I forget like a mass of number, over half, I believe. And I was curious, I'm assuming that kind of dynamic occurred probably all in. In many different areas. Right. Not just in tomatoes. And then this, I think also ties into immigration. You know, what happens to people when they're driven off this kind of subsistence economy. When they're driven off the land.

[A]

Yeah. And so with nafta, right. The growth that already existed, right. The places in the northern part of Mexico that was really supplying a lot of wheat and even of vegetables and oftentimes winter vegetables for the US Market. Right. Some are hurt initially but many also are able to regroup. And so though so still tomatoes, broccoli and then of course in other places, berries, strawberries, Driscolls, all that. Right. There's an abundance of berries and winter vegetables for the US Market that are being produced in the northern states. In Baja California, for example, in the region of San Quentin, which is about 40 miles south of Ensenada, an area that is very dry, very arid, becomes the place, right. Where berries and berry production grows significantly expands throughout the 2002. And those who are working there on theirs, right. Oftentimes they are, yes. Mestizo owned companies that have connections to. To US Distributors or US companies like Driscolls is a great example of this. However, the workers largely are coming from Oaxaca, from the state of Oaxaca are indigenous workers who are forced off their land during this period, the 80s 90s are and coming and begin to come up to work seasonally and then go back. But then after a certain period of time realize they can't go back and then end up living in the areas of the north. And maybe if they migrate, they're migrating to the Central Valley of California and then some up, even up to Washington and the Apple, depending upon the season. And so that in this part of Baja California there are large indigenous Oaxacan, many different languages being spoken in this area producing for the US market. And it essentially rips folks from their community in many ways, right? Because of their indigenous ways of governing and their indigenous knowledges, they're able to maintain community in the sense of still keep going the different community duties that they have in the community and keep and being a fairly strong cohesion that allows them to then organize, right. And then to rise up at different times and challenge. There's the berry strike of a few years back in Driscoll, around Driscoll that was connected from Washington all the way down. A lot of that is because of that migration. The folks begin to organize based on it and then have relatives in these other areas. But yeah, there's that disconnection from the home community and it transforms folks lives, right. All of that is this is. We would say this is a primitive development phase where folks are then uprooted and are forced to become something else and in the process lose themselves in so many different ways because of the way the market is set up because of the anti immigrant policies or the anti indigenous policies in Mexico. And of course even here the folks that the anti indigenous sentiment that exists maybe among mestizo communities and among the larger, the more dominant English speaking Communities that have no knowledge, right. That folks are coming into the school ready to speak a third language and yet they say they don't speak Spanish and therefore they need to speak Spanish, even though of course, that not. That's not the dominant language. But we don't know that because we don't know the rest of the world and we don't care. It's, oh, they're about to learn a third language. If it was an upper middle class kid in my, in our neighborhood here, it would be, oh, how amazing their language there. It's like you don't know English. And so again, there's that kind of devaluing that happens. And yeah, one final question for me.

[B]

Related to this is that we've seen movements in Mexico rise up to push back on this. Most notably is the Zapatistas. But there's anti neoliberal movements in Oaxaca and other places like that. And the Zapatistas in particular, they rose up with the initiation of NAFTA in January 1994. Could you talk about that a little bit? Just this sort of pushback that we see from movements of people in rural areas. Really?

[A]

Yeah, a significant pushback. And the Sabatis are the great example. Right. They chose January 1st because that's when NAFTA was going into effect. And among the things they said is enough, right. The market is the juggernaut. The market is going to destroy us. It's going to lead towards. It's going to be genocidal culturally in particular, because as the market opens up and the flood of Midwestern maize or corn comes in, it's going to drive the prices down and essentially the way of life, of being the people of corn, the people of maize, with the worldview and with the sense of what that means to be connected to maize. The maize isn't just something one consumes as a consumer and shoves in our mouth. There's food we just don't shove in our mouth, that it's connected to the land, it's connected to the gods as well. It's connected to the way that life came about, that those relationships were going to be destroyed, were being destroyed. But with NAFTA notion we're going to fully be wiped out. And so some kind of a clarion call to say no against the juggernaut that was there. And as the Sabatista did this, others were doing it in different ways. Right. And then when the Sabatista did it in that very high profile way of taking up arms briefly, but calling attention to it the connection with other community groups, right, Raising very similar issues occurring in some. Right. In more militant organizing and others in trying to find other ways to do it. And so that resistance is ongoing. It's, it's, it takes various forms and of course it hasn't been wiped out. Right. NAFTA didn't do it. Just the, the initial conquest didn't do it or, or any point in this period that that resistance occurs and is always finding ways of adapting to try folks trying to maintain their diet and their work, their connection the world be. But it's extremely difficult in so many ways. So the resistance is there in a variety of ways. Now with the more left of center president Lopez Obrero and now a Claudia Sheinbaum, a lot of the more radical, the more critical agrarian works folks in agriculture are able to get, are able to get some of their policies passed and approved. And really efforts to have a more of a food sovereignty approach. While there's not a lot of money necessarily behind those initiatives, but they're being accepted excursively and in some ways in certain areas they are. There is much more of a focus then on, on another model and that this other model, a more model that's based on more humane and on food sovereignty ways, is something that goes back in Mexican history and culture is being increasingly accepted. Again, that being said, nothing's being done to right. Limit capital. So it's being talked about, it's being validated at the same time, right. Wages have risen in Mexico and so the poverty and access to food is poverty in its measurement has diminished more than a bit because of the increase in the minimum wage over the past several years in Mexico. That being said, it's still highly precarious. So the resistance is there. Again, I talk about it in the chapter seven and there's a lot that really could be done, much more to bring out the various forms of resistance, however, in a national sense, in a more organized, unified way, no, that's much more difficult to develop and to connect. And again, the power of these billionaires because throughout the time that we're talking about, from the 90s to about 2000s, right, the number of billionaires in Mexico grew from one Carlos Slim in 1994 to dozens. And about one fourth of those are food billionaires and those are powerful folks. And again, capital is able to. So when the state is saying, yes, obesity is, yes, type 2 diabetes, right. Capital is quick and it's nimble and it's saying, okay, how can we be part of the solution here? Have smaller Cokes. Water, invest in water. And of course what that does to the aquifers. What that does. Right. That's a whole environmental. Right. Disaster waiting to happen. And also it's okay. How do we then adapt and make more nutritious foods? So again, the PR and their pivot recognizing the importance of paying lip service in more than wave is a way that's showing up capital in so many ways. Green energy and green technology. Who's the biggest, the most green company there is and they award each other, of course. Yeah. Is Walmart. Right. Walmart uses all these windmill farms, all these wind farms in Oaxaca in various parts that used to be community based lands a hilos that then because folks have been forced to flee, then they have to. They rent it out to the Spanish company and then Walmart's using that and it's green energy.

[B]

The capitalists are always innovative, if nothing else.

[A]

Exactly. Right. That innovation is ongoing and of course it has the close connection to the state and we haven't seen the state really work to impinge on it.

[C]

I remember moving to Houston, I went out the first time and someone said I want a Mexican Coke. And I was like, what's that? And it's sugar instead of fructose, which is fine, but like they treating it as if it's like a healthy alternative, like it's health food.

[A]

Coca Cola has used that in a way to then. Yes, boost.

[C]

Trump wants more Mexican. Well, my last question is a little more generic, which is like what's happening today with regard in the United States?

[B]

Right.

[C]

We have restrictions on immigration, more deportations. I'm assuming fewer remittances. How's that affecting Mexico right now?

[A]

Yeah, no, that's a good question. It's a good question. Yes. In terms of. I haven't looked at the remittances, but yes, there's definitely clear impact. Right. That it's having on deportations and folks that are self deporting. Which is happening. Right. In large numbers. Not quite being talked about. The administration is touting it. Yes. But we know it's happening in so many. Yeah. Different ways within Mexico. What impact that's having on Mexico. I think there's still. There's. I think a lot of discussion sometimes it's always around. Around kind of folks who are fleeing because after Covid and are moving in and are raising the prices of apartments in Mexico City oftentimes centers on that. But I think to a certain degree, yes, folks that are self deporting are bringing dollars as well. And what kind of impact that's having. Right. That. That remains to be seen. The President Scheinbaun has been. Right. Rather firm in the context of trying to work with the administration to a certain degree and not overly upset them, but still maintain their independence. Right. It's a tight rope. It's a fine line. It's hard to know. But again, the fear of what that means, what Trump talks about. Right. Using the military to go in to Mexico as well. And even though now they took it off the agenda, but it could be back on tomorrow. Right. All that creates significant uncertainty, clearly. And terrorizes the population. Clearly the population is terrorized here. But also what that means, do we go back? Will we not all that uncertainty is there economically. I don't think we've seen any kind of major shifts as a result. I don't think at this point with the tariffs and what tariffs are on or off. Again, like everywhere else, it's. It's this chaos. We don't quite know this.

[B]

Yeah. It's flooding the zone. That's his goal. That's terrorized by flooding the goal. Flooding the zone.

[A]

Yeah. And it's. Yeah. I don't know. It's working in some way.

[B]

I think we're going to wrap it there. This has been a great conversation. Really appreciate you coming on, folks. We've been talking with Professor Enrique Ochoa, who's a professor at CSU California State Los Angeles and author of Mexico Between Feast and Famine, Food, Corporate Power and Inequity. And his previous book, which is about the previous era, is called Feeding the Political Uses of food since 1910. The way in which you really break down politicization and corporatization of food, as in so many ways, I think is really important and really important study. So I really appreciate you coming on.

[A]

Thank you very much. Yeah, thanks for the conversation. It's really great.

[B]

Yep. Folks, if you like what you're hearing, please check us out on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Bluesky. If you're watching this on YouTube, hit that subscribe button if you listen to an audio platform to give us a rate and review. And if you really like us, go to greenandredpodcast.org and hit the support button or become a [e-mail] or org. Excuse me, greenandredpodcast.org GC I got the capitalist mentality in my head already, folks. We'll talk to you again soon. And make trouble and misbehave.