The Nineties in America - Salem Press (2009)

cans were also uninformed regarding governmental
policies and agendas that altered agriculture,
both strengthening and weakening farming. Some
changes, particularly bioengineering, offered con-
sumers more choices but also provoked intense
controversies.
Despite governmental restrictions and uncon-
trollable factors, especially weather and foreign mar-
kets, agricultural researchers and producers perse-
vered and adapted during the 1990’s. Energy
legislation that decade reinvigorated many farmers
by encouraging alternative fuel manufacture but
caused critics to complain about subsidies for etha-
nol corn crops. Erratic agricultural situations during
the decade prepared agriculturists for challenges
confronting them in the twenty-first century.

Further Reading
Adams, Jane, ed.Fighting for the Farm: Rural America
Transformed. Philadelphia: University of Pennsyl-
vania Press, 2003. Incorporates information
about such 1990’s agricultural issues as biotech-
nology and community-supported agriculture.
Cochrane, Willard W.The Curse of American Agricul-
tural Abundance: A Sustainable Solution. Foreword
by Richard A. Levins. Lincoln: University of Ne-
braska Press, 2003. Agricultural economist com-
ments on agricultural conditions during the
1990’s, particularly surpluses and declines in
prices. Charts provide statistics.
Hallberg, Milton C.Economic Trends in U.S. Agricul-
ture and Food Systems Since World War II. Ames: Iowa
State University Press, 2001. Assesses such 1990’s
agricultural economic issues as prices, yields, and
exports. Chronology, tables.
Norberg-Hodge, Helena, Peter Goering, and John
Page.From the Ground Up: Rethinking Industrial Ag-
riculture. 2d rev. ed. New York: Zed Books, with the
International Society for Ecology and Culture,

2001. Discusses detrimental aspects associated
      with agricultural technologies and benefits of
      ecologically based methods.
      Smith, Deborah Takiff, ed.Agriculture and the Envi-
      ronment. Washington, D.C.: USDA, 1991. Empha-
      sizes balancing agricultural economic expansion
      with environmental protection. Photographs,
      charts.
      ___.Americans in Agriculture: Portraits of Diversity.
      Washington, D.C.: USDA, 1990. USDA yearbook
      profiles professionals whose work was represen-

tative of 1990’s agriculture. Section features the

1890 African American land-grant schools.

_______.New Crops, New Uses, New Markets. Washing-

ton, D.C.: USDA Office of Publishing and Visual

Communication, 1992. Notes how crops were ap-

propriated for industrial and medical applica-

tions in the early 1990’s. Examines biotechnol-

ogy, renewable fuels, and environmental topics.

Elizabeth D. Schafer

See also Agriculture in Canada; Air pollution; Ar-

cher Daniels Midland scandal; Armey, Dick; Bush,

George H. W.; Business and the economy in the

United States; Clinton, Bill; Genetically modified

foods; Mississippi River flood of 1993; Natural di-

sasters; North American Free Trade Agreement

(NAFTA); Organic food movement; Science and

technology; Water pollution.

 AIDS epidemic

Definition Spread of the acquired

immunodeficiency syndrome

During the 1990’s, education and health care practices in

Western countries, including the development of new ap-

proaches for treatment, contributed to a reduction in the rate

of new cases of HIV infection. At the same time, the AIDS epi-

demic continued unabated in much of the Third World.

As the decade of the 1990’s began, approximately

40,000 persons in the United States annually died

from acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS)

or AIDS-related diseases, accounting for approxi-

mately 2 percent of total deaths. The year 1995 rep-

resented a turning point, however, as both new hu-

man immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infections in

the United States began to level off, and deaths from

AIDS actually dropped by 25 percent.

Antiretroviral Therapy (ART) Several events con-

flated to produce these results. First, educational

programs emphasizing both non-promiscuity and

“safer sex,” particularly those addressed to a gay

community that was relatively well educated, had an

impact. The fight against AIDS in the 1990’s also was

marked by the introduction of new forms of highly

active antiretroviral therapy (HAART). Previous

forms of drug therapy utilized a variety of nucleoside

analogs, drugs that inhibited activity of the viral en-

18
AIDS epidemic The Nineties in America