“Why do we engage in the practice of agriculture?” is a central thesis of Mark Bittman’s Animal, Vegetable, Junk: A history of Food, from Sustainable to Suicidal. This not-as-rhetorical-as-you’d-think question is asked from an economic and justice perspective: do we practice agriculture to 1) provide the food, fiber, and materials needed for people to thrive; or 2) to trade commodities on a global marketplace with the goal of squeezing every last dime out of the transaction?