5@5: Agribusiness still dominates food | Food safety starts on the farm | Making restaurants better for workers

Opinion: Big Meat, Big Dairy dominate plant-mased protein market

The natural products industry sees this move all the time: When Big Food can't pivot quickly enough, its behemoths simply buy up the organic, healthy or good-for-you brands that are chomping at their market share. Michigan State professor Philip Howard writes in Civil Eats that the same phenomenon is happening in plant-based proteins, further consolidating the food industry.

Opinion: Why won't the United Nations listen to small farmers about feeding the world?

The United Nations is hosting a food summit today "to help solve the world's nutrition crisis," but it's bound to fail because corporate interests have overtaken the event, activists Elizabeth Mpofu and Henk Hobbelink write in The Guardian. Small farmers produce about one-third of the world's food, but the U.N. organizers ignored this, instead giving agribusiness a lead role that will undermine the work of small farmers, fishers and producers around the globe, they write.

Study: COVID-19 mutations spread through the air more efficiently

Keep that mask on tight. According to the University of Maryland School of Public Health, people infected with the Alpha variant of the COVID-19 virus exhaled as much as 100 times more virus into the air as did people with the original strains of the virus, Science Daily reports. The study, which was conducted before the Delta variant began circulating in the United States, also found that loose-fitting cloth masks don't stop the virus from becoming airborne.

Food safety starts on the farm, Equitable Food Initiative reminds growers, workers

Workplace development organization Equitable Food Initiative is marking National Food Safety Education Month with a reminder to growers, farmworkers and packers that they are responsible for food safety. Consumers' concerns about food recalls, foodborne outbreaks and foodborne illnesses ranked second in a recent survey about social responsibility and sustainability issues, Food Safety News reports.

Innovative restaurateurs look to make the industry more humane

The pandemic led many service workers to re-evaluate their lives and, especially, their jobs. The New York Times looks at how some restaurants are improving pay, creating a work-life balance for employees and eliminating the reliance on tips.