The White House will host a virtual event seeking commitments to advance the Biden-Harris Administration’s goal to end hunger and reduce diet-related diseases by 2030.

The White House recently held the first Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health in more than 50 years. At the event, they released a National Strategy, outlining five pillars to improve food access and affordability, integrate nutrition and health, empower consumers to make healthier choices, support physical activity, and enhance nutrition and food security research.

On Friday, March 24, the White House will call on all sectors to make commitments that will support the implementation of the National Strategy. Streaming online, the event will be available to watch HERE.

These new actions will complement the first round of commitments made by stakeholders around Conference last Fall. Companies and organizations behind these initiatives include Albertsons, Chobani, Danone North America, DoorDash, Google, Kroger, The Rockefeller Foundation, The James Beard Foundation, and FoodCorps.

Chobani is working to help several schools around the country meet child nutrition standards, while encouraging other businesses to do the same.

“Chobani has always believed that food is a force for good. We were founded on the principle of providing greater access to nutrition; better food for more people remains our mantra. Our White House commitment is a promise to our communities…it is a very focused, measured approach to ending child hunger one school at a time. We are adopting schools in our backyard—New York City, upstate New York and Twin Falls, Idaho—and collaborating with each school to help improve food and nutrition security for their students,” Mark Broadhurst, Senior Vice President for Public Affairs and Accountability, tells Food Tank. “We plan to create a playbook and encourage other companies and community groups to fight child hunger by adopting a school in their community.”

Google has pledged to cut food waste in half for each “Googler” and send zero waste to landfills by 2025. As part of this work, they are collaborating with partners to ensure surplus food reaches those in need.

Danone North America is looking to improve the nutrition profile of its products while investing in education for consumers, shoppers, and health care providers. They are also committing to support community-based impact programs to improve access to healthy foods and advance nutrition research.

“Danone’s investments will serve to improve food access and affordability, integrate nutrition and health, empower consumers with the knowledge to make healthy choices, and enhance nutrition and food security research,” Miguel Freitas, VP of Scientific Affairs for Danone North America tells Food Tank.

And DoorDash is partnering with 18 cities around the U.S. and combat hunger by addressing transportation barriers to healthy food.

“As part of our ongoing work to broaden food access, DoorDash is proud to support the administration’s call to action as part of the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health,” Max Rettig, Vice President, Public Policy & Social Impact, DoorDash tells Food Tank. “Whether through powering the delivery of charitable food via Project DASH or providing customers a way to leverage their SNAP/EBT benefits, local delivery can help reduce transportation and other barriers by giving people experiencing food insecurity access to nutritious food in a convenient and dignified way.”

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The highest authority on the climate crisis, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has released AR6 Synthesis Report: Climate Change 2023, a summary of five years of reports which sounds the alarm once more about the enormous impact that global food systems have on climate change.

Over 30 percent of all human-caused greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions originate from the world’s agri-food systems, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). The new IPCC report emphasizes that in order to prevent the worst of the climate crisis, the world’s food and agricultural systems require significant transformation. 

The increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather and climate events has exposed millions to food and water insecurity, is slowing agricultural productivity, and is costing billions of dollars in ecosystem damages annually, according to the report. The worst impacts are experienced by small-scale farmers, peasants, pastoralists, fisherfolk, and other rural people in Africa, Asia, Latin America, Small Islands, and the Arctic.

“Small-scale farmers in the Global South are being hit first and worst by climate change—though they did not cause this crisis. The world’s poorest countries are also drowning in debt, with little ability to invest in building resilience to climate change. These countries urgently need support, climate finance and wholesale debt relief to build resilient, diversified food systems,” says Million Belay, a member of the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (IPES-Food) and General Coordinator for the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa in a statement.

The IPCC repeatedly points out that the cost of prevention is significantly lower than the cost of adaptation and disaster management.

“It’s an economic no-brainer,” says Bronson Griscom, Vice President of Natural Climate Solutions for Conservation International. “The barrier is actually financing everything upfront, to avoid a larger cost tomorrow. But there’s no longer much of any kind of rational argument against it.”

The IPCC report states that the solutions to the climate crisis are known and available, they just require implementation.

Notable mitigation measures related to food systems that the panel recommends are improving forest, cropland, and grassland management, as well as reducing food waste and loss. Reducing tropical deforestation has the greatest potential for reducing GHG emissions of any singular solution from any sector. Adaptation measures for agriculture systems include agroforestry, community-based adaptation, farm and landscape diversification, and urban agriculture.

The report also notes that Indigenous Peoples, and other traditional knowledge holders who are not classified as Indigenous Peoples, have thrived living sustainably with limited resources, in some cases for thousands of years.

The authors highlight the need to value these other knowledge systems to successfully respond to the climate crisis. Indigenous and local “worldviews and knowledges” are essential for realizing “locally appropriate, socially acceptable solutions,” the report states.

There have been five synthesis reports released since the IPCC was created in 1988— one in 1990, 1995, 2001, 2007, and 2014. Different lengths of this most recent one can be found here on the IPCC website.

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New research in Agronomy reveals that during a recent upsurge of locusts in the Horn of Africa, the use of traditional insecticides harmed local bird and honeybee populations. But Somalia selected a treatment option that can control swarms while protecting human health and wildlife. The results suggest a path toward sustainable locust management. 

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) describes the Desert Locust as “the most destructive migratory pest in the world.” In a single day, their mobile swarms can consume the same amount of food as 35,000 people, threatening both food security and agricultural producers’ livelihoods.

The research paper focuses on Ethiopia and Somalia, which recently experienced the most extreme infestation of locusts in 25 years according to the World Bank, and Kenya, which saw the worst outbreak in more than 70 years. In these countries “the massive invasions of [the Desert Locust] overwhelmed existing control capabilities,” the authors state. 

As swarms surged, Ethiopia and Kenya responded with the application of insecticides classified as organophosphates and pyrethroids. While these control agents can successfully kill off locusts rapidly at scale, past upsurges in Western Africa have shown re-invasions are possible within weeks. 

These chemicals are also known groundwater pollutants and soil contaminants. The authors note that during the recent locust invasion, limited monitoring of the environmental impact of insecticide application occurred. But, they add, it is safe to assume “negative environmental side effects” that “were widespread but remained largely unreported.”

The paper estimates that spraying of these chemicals led to the mortality of “thousands” of birds and the displacement of tens of thousands. And in Ethiopia—one of the top ten natural honey producing countries in the world, according to research from Injibara University—honey production declined by as much as 75 percent. This is due to honeybee deaths, a reduction in honeybee lifespan, and delayed development caused by the insecticide treatment. 

“The fight with highly toxic pesticides against the devastating outbreak of desert locust in years 2019 to 2022 created very high costs for people and the environment,” Alexander Müller, Founder and Managing Director of TMG – Think Tank for Sustainability tells Food Tank. A co-author of the paper, Müller continues: “The revenue loss for the honey producers can be estimated around US$500 million. An initial True Cost Analysis of the loss of environmental services (pollination) is 15 times higher! And the question arises how much biodiversity, and especially insects, has been destroyed with this action.”

In contrast, Somalia’s response to the locust swarms included the bio-insecticide known as Metarhizium acridum with promising outcomes. Treatment resulted in the disintegration of swarms within days and “more importantly,” the authors state, the locusts lost their appetite. Thoroughly tested, M. acridum also “protects the environment and human health” unlike organophosphates, according to the researchers. 

To make the treatment of M. acridum even more effective, however, the paper recommends combining the response with another intervention: predator birds. 

While a bird’s consumption of locusts can vary by season or geography, they can slash locust populations by as much as 50 percent in 17 days. Though promising on its own, the application of M. acridum can actually reduce locust populations further. Locusts affected by the bio-insecticide tend to move to the top of crops to bask in the sun. And once locusts are exposed, birds can more easily locate them, further reducing swarm sizes. 

The authors find that the use of M. acridum, either alone or in combination with predator birds, is most effective as an early means of control. 

“We need an innovative early warning system and better early action to make the fight against locusts and other pests and diseases more efficient and less dangerous for people and the environment,” Müller tells Food Tank. “[The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] has warned us that climate change will make such outbreaks more frequent and will change the spread of the risks.”

And if utilized correctly, the authors conclude, the paper’s recommended approach can manage locusts “before they develop to threaten crops, pastures, and ultimately livelihoods.”

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The International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (IPES-Food) released a special report sounding the alarm on global food insecurity and debt crises. The report finds that 349 million people are facing acute starvation and many more will experience hunger with food prices remaining at historic highs and countries failing to meet debt repayments.

In “Breaking the Cycle of Unsustainable Food Systems, Hunger, and Debt,” IPES-Food reports that the COVID-19 pandemic and Russian invasion of Ukraine contributed to rising food prices in the last two years.

“Although there has been some easing of food prices in recent months, it is unpredictable what the fallout from the interplay with the debt crisis will be,” Jennifer Clapp, Canada Research Chair in Global Food Security and Sustainability at the University of Waterloo, Ontario and co-author of the report, tells Food Tank. “But we are seeing food price inflation remaining higher than overall inflation, and this is deeply troubling.”

And now authors state that low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) are threatened by a worsening debt crisis. IPES-Food finds 60 percent of low-income countries and 30 percent of middle-income countries are at high risk of defaulting on their debt. According to the report, Zambia, Sri Lanka, and Suriname defaulted already. Meanwhile, countries including Ghana and Pakistan are at risk of doing so.

The report highlights four critical ways that unsustainable food systems deepen the debt crisis for dozens of LMICs. These nations face import dependencies for food and fertilizers, which forces them to rely on cash crops to repay debts and prevents them from diversifying crops. Additionally, decades of divestment from social services and domestic agricultural production have further exacerbated the challenges. As food prices spike and crash, farmers find themselves unable to compete with large corporations. And the worsening climate crisis is increasing uncertainty, destroying harvests and deepening farmer debt.

Skyrocketing import costs on energy and fertilizer are also straining producers. Nations that already depend on foreign aid will continue to feel the effects of inflation beyond just food products, according to IPES-Food.

The report’s authors lay out three recommendations for policy solutions to address the dual crises of debt and food insecurity. International institutions must meet the moment by scaling up both debt relief and development investments for struggling nations, they argue. They also believe these institutions must implement policies that address decades, if not centuries, of wealth divestment from Global South nations. Policy recommendations include taxing agribusiness for price hikes and debt reparations based on ecological destruction.

The report also suggests reimagining the structure of existing, and forming new, independent financial institutions. Bold reform could expand the autonomy of less developed nations in negotiating debt arrangements.

Another solution includes the introduction of safeguards such as critical reviews of lending practices between Global North and South nations within existing institutions like the International Monetary Fund or World Bank.

“Any new initiative for climate financing or debt restructuring must not repeat the mistakes of the past, damaging conditionalities and colonial power relations,” Lim Li-Ching, IPES-Food Co-chair and Senior Researcher at Third World Network, tells Food Tank.

“And rather than using public money to guarantee private investments, we should rather find ways of repairing historical injustices and return resources to the Global South, while deterring climate destruction in the first place.”

The report suggests democratizing decision-making in global food systems and financial institutions, including the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Diversifying who gets a seat at the table is an important factor in solving this complex problem, the report argues.

“In fulfilling their domestic mandates, big central banks are inadvertently triggering debt distress for countries across the world when they raise interest rates because their actions are raising the costs of servicing debt worldwide,” Clapp tells Food Tank.

IPES-Food argues that independent financial institutions can help moderate the stresses of international crises, rather than perpetuating these dependent relationships between richer and poor countries.

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The Blackwood Educational Land Institute is a regenerative farm based in Hempstead, Texas working to engage young people through community-powered agriculture.

The organization formally began in 2000 as a nature camp, designed to inspire a new generation of farmers but grew into an educational farm dedicated to soil health and regeneration. Over the years, what started with a metal barn and straw bale house grew into an educational farm dedicated to soil health and regeneration. Today, their operations include chicken coops and beehives on the original property in Hempstead and an urban rooftop farm in nearby Houston.

Most of the Institute’s programming revolves around youth engagement. Students stand to benefit greatly from active learning on farmland, according to reports by the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies and the North American Colleges and Teachers of Agriculture. Immersion in field schools such as Blackwood can offer an applied learning experience that weaves different disciplines together.

“A lot of people’s eyes glazed over when I started talking about buzzwords like nature conservation because they just do not understand it,” Cath Conlon, CEO and Founder of the Blackwood Educational Land Institute, tells Food Tank. The Institute offers workshops, field trips, and weekly day camps to students from elementary through high school and internships for college students.

Through these opportunities, students have the chance to learn about the full life cycle of food, from farm to plate. They are also taught lessons in carpentry, science, writing, nutrition, and native pollinators. Teachers can bring their classes to courses on permaculture, service learning, and the scientific process of food growth from seed to table, which are facilitated by Blackwood staff.

Conlon believes that farmers must have a versatile skill set to survive, let alone prosper. They need to be an accountant, marketer, a herbologist, a soil scientist, and a community builder. “A farm without people will never succeed,” Conlon tells Food Tank. “That human component is ever more important today than what it has ever been before.”

Another integral component of the Blackwood Farm Philosophy is soil quality. The Institute protects the land through crop rotation, compost, and land stewardship of the coastal prairie ecosystem.

“We can talk about nature all day long and we never have to talk about food, but if we talk about food all day long, we can’t help but talk about nature. As soon as I put food in front of nature, it was a game changer.”

Blackwood Educational Land Institute is working with The Land Institute to test out a perennial hybridized grain crop, known as intermediate wheatgrass. While annual grain crops make up 80 percent of global grain produced for food, they tend to exacerbate soil erosion, water pollution, and fossil fuel dependency, according to research from Cornell University.

The Institute is in a humid environment that is traditionally challenging for growing this type of grain. However, Conlon’s farming operations have been able to produce intermediate wheatgrass successfully for the past few years. And perennial crops like this are efficient at storing carbon in the soil, minimizing synthetic fertilizers, and providing livestock feed.

“What the soil is trying to do for us is generate nutrition. If we are tilling and using treated water, then we are not creating conditions that are conducive to great life,” Conlon tells Food Tank.

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Photo Courtesy of Blackwood Educational Land Institute 

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In 2019, a landmark EAT-Lancet report described how to nourish people and save the planet, proposing a “planetary health diet” consisting mostly of whole plant-based foods.

But a new study in The Lancet Planetary Health moves the science forward by suggesting the planetary health diet falls short in essential vitamins and minerals such as iron, zinc, calcium, and vitamin B12. For women aged 15–49 years, it provides just 55 percent of the recommended intakes. Deficiencies in these vitamins and minerals can lead to severe and lasting effects, including compromised immune systems and increased risk for infections; hindered child growth, development, and school performance; and decreased work productivity; all of which ultimately limit human potential.

The reason for these shortfalls is that animal source foods make up just 14 percent of the planetary health diet. Iron and zinc in beans, for example, are not as readily available for the body to use as iron and zinc in meat. The planetary health diet is likely to be highly protective against noncommunicable diseases such as obesity, heart disease, diabetes, and cancer, which are among the top contributors to the global burden of death and disease. However, this new study suggests it could unintentionally lead to another form of malnutrition, with its own public health burden.

Based on this finding, the researchers have suggested modifying the planetary health diet. One option is to increase nutrient-dense animal source foods and reduce whole grains, legumes and nuts because they are high in phytate, which inhibits absorption of iron, zinc, and calcium. However, since they can protect against noncommunicable diseases, another strategy could be to reduce the phytate in these foods through crop breeding and processing, including soaking, fermenting and sprouting.

According to the EAT-Lancet report, however, these changes would increase the diet’s environmental impact, particularly the increase in red meat. Could this conundrum provide the incentive to inspire concerted approaches to produce more animal source foods sustainably than had been envisaged in the original report?

Other approaches and trade-offs must also be considered. For example, staple food fortification could be further improved and scaled to make up for shortfalls. While this cannot fully replicate the health benefits of intrinsically nutrient-dense foods, it could help bridge the gap in essential vitamins and minerals while being more environmentally sustainable.

Or can individuals just take a vitamin and mineral supplement to meet their needs? While this is a reasonable option for many, there are important considerations. First, supplements such as iron pills can have side effects. Second, iron supplements can exacerbate infections such as malaria if not properly treated simultaneously and only given to those with iron deficiency. And third, there are many practical constraints to be overcome to make supplements, and the necessary healthcare access, widely available worldwide.

Perhaps the most compelling evidence for the challenge of women aged 15–49 years consuming enough nutrients, particularly iron, is that over 20 percent in the US and UK are iron deficient. These are high-income countries where a diversity of healthy foods, healthcare and iron supplements are widely available, and where robust fortification policies and implementation are in place. Yet iron deficiency is still widespread.

So, what is the solution? Can a planetary health diet ever provide adequate vitamins and minerals? What is clear is that a combination of actions is needed to improve access to diverse nutrient dense and healthy foods. This includes increasing their desirability, convenience, safety and affordability through incentives and subsidies, improving fortification policies and implementation, and improving access to healthcare and supplements.

Is this possible? The evidence suggests it is. But efforts to achieve healthy and sustainable diets must ensure micronutrient adequacy using all the available approaches, tailor recommendations according to the local context, equitably involve local stakeholders impacted by any dietary or policy changes, and be transparent about trade-offs. Preserving human health and protecting our planet are more important now than ever. All of society must rise to the challenge, now, to address these integrally linked and equally important challenges.

Of course, it is possible, and it must be done. Sooner rather than later.

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I’m on my way from Anaheim, California—where I attended the Natural Products Expo, or Expo West—to Austin Texas, where Food Tank will be active at South by Southwest. It’s a busy week for us!

Throughout the years I’ve been attending Expo West, I’ve noticed an interesting trend. The event highlights companies and new products focusing on organics, regenerative practices, plant-based ingredients, and the like. And there’s been a marked increase, over the past few years, in companies proclaiming the ways their products are good for the planet.

To this I say: Great! But words printed on food packages aren’t enough. We have to hold them accountable to meeting realistic climate goals.

At Expo West, I was able to moderate a couple discussions with business leaders thinking about these important questions. One panel focused on how to boost consumer adoption of climate-centered innovations (a mouthful!), and another centered around innovative retail models to improve food access.

I’ve talked before about greenwishing—when businesses appear to take sustainability seriously by making commitments that are, in actual fact, insufficient or completely wishful. Whether we like it or not, our current global food system is organized around big companies, and we can’t simply ignore them. Just as Food Tank does with our Chief Sustainability Officer network, we have to invite food business leaders to the table to showcase the achievable—and very much urgent—goals they should prioritize.

At Expo West, we were able to highlight the companies putting climate impacts at the forefront; brainstorm ways to help consumers better understand environmental, climate, and social impacts of the foods they’re eating; spotlight best practices for socially and environmentally sustainable food procurement; and show large companies how to give smaller entrepreneurs a leg up so they can really show off their world-changing ideas.

This weekend, at SXSW, we’ll be able to highlight food system transformation through a different lens: the arts.

I’m particularly excited for the films and series Food Tank is featuring. We’re showing “Wild Hope: Coffee for Water,” about coffee farmers in Mozambique. A film I’ve mentioned before, “Food 2050,” is created by Media RED and The Rockefeller Foundation to highlight food system visionaries. And “Hope in the Water” is an amazing docu-series from our friends at Fed by Blue, focusing on marine food systems—and afterward, I’ll chat with blue foods expert Jen Bushman, celebrity chef and advocate Andrew Zimmern, and Asif Khan from Picture Motion.

We’ll also be highlighting food policy victories like the Food Donation Improvement Act in an official SXSW panel with chef and advocate Tom Colicchio, Nyeti Shah from WeightWatchers, and Lisa Barden from Keep Austin Fed.

And on Sunday, March 12, is our “All Things Food” Summit, co-hosted with Huston-Tillotson University and Driscoll’s, and you’re invited for FREE! You don’t have to be in Austin to join—we’ll be streaming all day at FoodTank.com.

We’ll be having conversations on Indigenous foodways. How chicken and egg production are changing to be more sustainable. The future of meat and protein. Rethinking urban food systems. A fireside chat with Congressman Earl Blumenauer from Oregon. Mark your calendars to join us at FoodTank.com!

We’re also incredibly excited for the debut at SXSW of Food Tank’s original theatrical production “Little Peasants,” which I talked to you about in last week’s newsletter. The play showcases how workers of a fictional coffee chain called “Mermaid Coffee” are treated during union organizing campaigns. In addition to the performance, we’re convening a panel discussion to highlight how working families are truly at the center of the growing food movement.

The food labor movement that’s gaining power right now is so, so important toward the goal of keeping businesses accountable to people and the planet.

Even though I’m dead tired, weeks like this remind me why talking to people is so important. I know it sounds corny, but it’s genuinely how changes are made: One conversation at a time.

And I want to make sure I’m representing your voice, too, as Food Tank showcases the good food movement. So let’s chat about what you want to see from food businesses, food arts organizations, food procurers, food consumers. Email me any time at danielle@foodtank.com. I look forward to hearing your voice!

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

Photo courtesy of Rob Maxwell, Unsplash

The post At National Events, Let’s Keep Food Businesses Accountable to People and the Planet appeared first on Food Tank.

The nonprofit Women Advancing Nutrition Dietetics and Agriculture (WANDA) is working to achieve nutrition equity in the United States by uplifting the voices of Black women and girls in food. 

The organization “is a manifestation of wanting to see what I did not see, which is every Black woman and girl transforming themselves into the food sheroes that we know our communities desperately need,” Tambra Raye Stevenson, CEO and Founder of WANDA tells Food Tank. 

By empowering these food sheroes—which Stevenson defines as “every woman from nana to mama to auntie to sister” who are committed to healing and transforming their communities—WANDA strives to overcome injustices in food and agriculture systems. 

Stevenson argues that the dominant narrative in the United States has portrayed Black women as “oppressed and suppressed.” But she sees an opportunity to change this. Stevenson recognizes “the power of being the storyteller of Black women in food and uplifting their voices, amplifying their work, and showing that there can be another way in how we see and show up in the food system.” 

Recently WANDA introduced the Black Food Census to collect better data on Black foodways in the United States. “Data equals documentation to create the change that we want,” Stevenson tells Food Tank. The survey is designed to answer questions such as “How is Black food showing up in all forms of media and publication? Who are the influencers? And how does that shape the way we look for the resources in our communities?”

The organization hopes the findings will illuminate the diversity of Black foodways and help to make programs targeting food and nutrition security more inclusive. 

To advance this mission further, WANDA is also advocating for a food bill of rights, an intersectional policy framework that will take a holistic approach to food and agriculture systems in the country.

“We have been creating these ad hoc, piecemeal, band-aid approaches to policy,” Stevenson tells Food Tank. “Yet if we actually have a unifying framework that informs how we value the food from the place of a collective…then it would be obvious that people should have access to land to grow food, food people should have access to food that is healthy, that speaks to their culture.”

Listen to the full conversation with Tambra Raye Stevenson on “Food Talk with Dani Nierenberg” to hear more about the power of food sheroes, why the Food Bill of Rights is “an extension of freedom,” and Stevenson’s recent article that makes the case for the African heritage diet as medicine. 

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Join Food Tank on March 12 for “All Things Food” at SXSW 2023 (Official Event) at Huston-Tillotson University (King-Seabrook Chapel). The event features 50+ speakers, three food film viewings, including the film “Food 2050,” the new docuseries “Hope in the Water,” and “Wild Hope: Coffee for Water.” And the event will have the theatrical debut “Little Peasants” written by Food Tank co-founders Danielle Nierenberg and Bernard Pollack. The event is hosted by Food Tank, Huston-Tillotson University, and Driscoll’s. Also, you will enjoy a delicious breakfast, lunch, and a fabulous reception with live entertainment. The program runs from 9:00AM – 7:30PM.

“Food Tank is excited to be back at SXSW to celebrate farmers, food workers, chefs, businesses, and policymakers who are working to transform our food and agriculture systems for the better—leaders who are changing not only the way we eat, but the way we think about food and where it comes from,” says Food Tank President Danielle Nierenberg. “And it’s an opportunity to remember that delicious, safe, healthy food should be everyone’s right.”

Speakers include (in order of appearance): A-dae Romero Briones, First Nations Development Institute; Alex Racelis, University of Texas Rio Grande Valley; Jehiel Oliver, Hello Tractor; Dr. Rupa Marya, Deep Medicine Circle; Dr. Sweta Chakraborty, We Don’t Have Time; Andrea Chu, Vital Farms; Sandra Vijn, Kipster; Matt Dillon, Farmer Focus; Mary Beth Albright, Washington Post; Shannon Cosentino-Roush, Finless Foods; Kerri McClimen, Niman Ranch; Taeryn Kim, Wildtype; Evadne Cokeh, ButcherBox; Andre Menezes, Next Gen Foods; Chloe Sorvino, Forbes; Emily Ma, Google; Alejandra Sanchez, Driscoll’s; Riana Lynn, Journey Foods; Denise Osterhues, Kroger; Natalie Byrne, Blankspace; Pierre Thiam, Yolélé; Kathleen Strand, Builders Vision; Jess Baum, Bonterra Organic Estates; Teresa Welsh, Devex; Tiffany Washington, Dobbin-Kauv Farm; Viraj Puri, Gotham Greens; Jacob Pechenik, Lettuce Grow; Marc Oshima, AeroFarms; Nadia Chaudhury, Eater Austin; Stuart Appelbaum, Retail, Wholesale & Department Store Union; Michael Foster, Former Wayne Farms Poultry Worker; Wallace Woodson, General Mills Worker in Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Danielle Nierenberg, Food Tank; Joi Chevalier, Cook’s Nook; Luke Saunders, Farmer’s Fridge; Niyeti Shah, WW; Paul Newnham, Sdg2 Advocacy Hub; Karen Magid, Huston-Tillotson University; Adrian Lipscombe, 40 Acres Project; Robert Nathan Allen, Little Herds; Dana Catherine Vettel, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD); Julia Collins, Planet FWD / Moonshot; Shayna Harris, Supply Change Capital; Ralph Yznaga, ATX Publications; U.S. Congressman Earl Blumenauer; Geoff Luck, Wild Hope Initiative; Tom Leach, Media RED; Sara Farley, The Rockefeller Foundation; Matte Wilson, Sicangu Food Sovereignty Initiative; award-winning writer, director, and producer Brian Peter Falk; Andrew Zimmern, 4-time James Beard award and Emmy award winner; Jennifer Bushman, Fed by Blue; Asif Khan, Picture Motion; and more!

More information can be found HERE. The event will also stream live at FoodTank.com.

Note: VIP press passes available by contacting Bernard Pollack at bernard@foodtank.com

Programming like the “All Things Food” Summit at SXSW is made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

The post “All Things Food” at SXSW on March 12th – 50+ Speakers, Delicious Food, Film Viewings, and Much More! appeared first on Food Tank.

The Shellfish Growers Climate Coalition is working to support shellfish growers in the United States and Canada as they drive climate action and sustain aquatic ecosystems.

In 2018 a group of seven shellfish farmers partnered with The Nature Conservancy to form the Coalition, spurred by concerns over the climate crisis. Today, the group represents more than 270 farmers, harvesters, hatchery operators, wholesalers, and restaurateurs. 

The Coalition pushes for change by sharing personal stories about the ways the changing climate has affected the lives and livelihoods of members. They also provide resources to help producers and other advocates call on lawmakers and demand sound climate policy. 

Urgent action is needed as extreme weather events, including hurricanes, increase in frequency and threaten to wreak havoc on shellfish farms. Even when a farm is spared from the worst of a storm, producers may still suffer, explains Sally McGee, Project Manager for the Shellfish Climate Coalition.

Typically, shellfish cages float on the water’s surface, but when a storm is predicted to move through the region, farmers face a difficult decision. “Either they cross their fingers and hope the storm will miss them, or they’ll have to take everything out of the water or sink their entire farm [to avoid damange],” McGee tells Food Tank. The process can result in “a long time when they’re not selling oysters.”

But farmers don’t have to wait for hurricane season to see the repercussions of the climate crisis. And while it affects producers differently depending on their region, the changing climate leaves nobody untouched. 

In the Gulf of Maine, for example, farmers are noticing that the increasingly acidic waters are making animals’ shells brittle. And in Mobile Bay, an estuary in Alabama, the salinity is so low that farmers are losing their entire crops. Producers are also experiencing changes to water and air temperatures along with an increasing frequency of harmful algal blooms that prevent them from harvesting.

“All these things are happening as a result of climate change,” McGee tells Food Tank “And the farmers see it every day.”

Declining shellfish populations represents a blow to aquatic ecosystems. As filter feeders, oysters improve water quality. Oyster reefs also provide wildlife habitats and protect against erosion along waterfront areas. “That oyster reef is going to provide a buffer and reduce the wave energy that comes to shore, so they do a lot,” McGee says. Shellfish, and oysters in particular, are “total powerhouses.”

Listen to the full conversation with Sally McGee on “Food Talk with Dani Nierenberg” to hear more about the ecological importance of shellfish, why the Shellfish Growers Climate Coalition uses storytelling to drive change, and how the Nature Conservancy’s Supporting Oyster Aquaculture and Restoration (SOAR) Program is building resilience.

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United Nations member states are meeting for the third time in less than a year to reach a consensus on the High Seas Treaty. Advocates including World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) argue that the Treaty is critical to conserving 30 percent of the oceans and protecting aquatic food systems.  

WWF reports that just 1 percent of the high seas—which lie outside of national jurisdiction—is currently protected. But change may be underway. At the recent U.N. Global Biodiversity Conference (COP15), 196 countries agreed to protect and conserve at least 30 percent of the ocean and ensure 30 percent of degraded areas are under restoration by 2030. 

Pepe Clarke, Oceans Practice Leader at WWF International says that the Treaty is an “essential precondition” to achieve this goal. The Treaty, if adopted, will create a process to establish marine protected area (MPA) networks in areas that lie outside national jurisdiction. And it will establish a global minimum standard for environmental impact assessments. 

These changes serve to benefit blue food systems, says Andreas Hansen, Senior Policy Advisor for Ocean and Conservation Finance at TNC. He explains that regulations set by international bodies will need to comply with standards for environmental impact assessments set by the Treaty. This encompasses fisheries and aquaculture, helping to ensure that they are managed more sustainably.

But reaching an agreement has proven challenging, Hansen says. The oceans “don’t belong to anyone, and they belong to everyone. So they’re a classic example of a global commons,” he tells Food Tank. 

Currently, a patchwork of governance bodies and organizations regulate parts of the ocean, “but you don’t have a governance mechanism that looks specifically at conserving and sustainably using marine biodiversity in the high seas,” Hansen tells Food Tank. The Treaty would serve as a “truly powerful new legal tool.”

U.N. member states have engaged in formal and informal talks around a High Seas Treaty over the last 15 years. And at the end of 2022, during the Fifth Intergovernmental Conference to negotiate a legally binding agreement, they failed to reach a consensus. 

At the start of the latest round of negotiations, Hansen expressed hope that the global biodiversity framework established during COP15 would serve as a necessary incentive. 

But Dr. Laura Meller, Oceans Campaigner of Greenpeace Nordic has expressed concerns as discussions dragged on. “Negotiations have been going around in circles, progressing at a snail’s pace, and this is reflected in the new draft Treaty text,” she says. “It is far from where it should be as we enter the endgame of these negotiations.”

In a statement read during the Conference, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged countries to come to an “robust and ambitious” agreement: “With flexibility and perseverance, you can secure an outcome to help ensure our ocean will be healthier, more resilient, and more productive, benefiting our planet and human kind.” 

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The apple breeding program at the University of Minnesota’s Horticultural Research Center recently released its latest apple variety. The variety Triumph, the apple contains two different genes for resistance against apple scab, the most common fungal disease impacting apple trees in Minnesota.

With hot, dry summers and extremely cold winters, the university’s apple breeding program works to grow and produce in a climate where apples are not traditionally grown. Their research has produced 28 different cold hardy varieties, including Honeycrisp and SweeTango, in its nearly 115-year history. The Triumph apple is the most recent release since the start of the program in the early 1900s.

Despite the university’s success developing new varieties, “most of the varieties that you would buy in the supermarket, with the exception of Honeycrisp, will not grow here,” David Bedford, Senior Research Fellow at the University of Minnesota’s Horticultural Research Center tells Food Tank. “This would be pretty much a non-apple growing area, except that our program put some effort into it.”

The Triumph apple, the child of Honeycrisp and Liberty varieties, contains two forms of genetic scab resistance. Caused by the fungus Venturia inaequalis, apple scab can be found around the world wherever apples are grown. Scab is the most common disease for apples across the United States and can cause up to 100 percent crop loss and can significantly reduce fruit marketability, according to the New Hampshire College of Life Science and Agriculture.

The best way to manage and prevent scab is to plant disease resistant varieties, according to the Univerisity’s Horticultural Research Center. The other option is to apply fungicides, which can be costly, difficult to apply, harmful to the environment, and can only be used to prevent infection rather than treat it. The Triumph apple, with double the resistance to scab than most apples on the market, “cuts down the chances of the pathogen mutating. The odds are that it will be much more difficult for a pathogen to get through two genetic hurdles,” Bedford tells Food Tank.

Research from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency outlines that climate change is altering weather patterns globally by impacting humidity, rainfall and temperatures. As a result of climate change, the perfect region for growing apples is slowly creeping northwards. While the University of Minnesota focuses on apple breeding for cold climates, “breeding for climate change is just coming to the forefront,” Bedford continues. “Hopefully climate is changing slowly enough that conventional breeding can hold on.”

The University of Minnesota’s Horticultural Research Center reports that warm, humid, and rainy weather in the spring and summer creates ideal conditions for apple scab. And a recent study from the Institute for Breeding Research on Fruit Crops suggests that climate change poses many major threats to apple production worldwide. “We’re seeing more extremes in everything, including rainfall. Rainfall is what really makes this apple scab pathogen comfortable,” Bedford tells Food Tank.

After 30 years in research and development, Bedford claims that the Triumph apple is a “triumph over apple scab.” Bedford tells Food Tank, “There are really three stakeholders that win in this scenario. First, the environment is better for not having used as many chemicals. The grower is happy to not put on as many chemicals. And the consumer gets fruit with fewer chemicals applied.” This makes Triumph a good option for home gardeners and organic farms, “it’s a great low-maintenance tree,” says Research Technician Kate Scapanski.

Each new apple takes close to 30 years from initial breeding until it is released to the market. Each seed takes between five and six years to mature to bearing age. At this point, researchers taste the fruit. The University of Minnesota has 20,000 trees with fruit that researchers taste once a week during the growing season. “Any given week, there can be 300 or 400 apples that are ready to be tasted. A big day can be tasting 500 to 600 apples a day,” Bedford says, “It’s not as much fun as it sounds!”

The University of Minnesota’s main breeding priorities are texture and flavor; if an apple doesn’t impress the jury of tasters, they take it out of the running. This leads to about 4,000 unique varieties of apples that don’t make the cut each year. Scapanski describes Triumph apples as, “pleasant, reliable, and sustainably good apples. They are well balanced with a solid texture that wouldn’t fracture like a Honeycrisp would.” At the University of Minnesota, an apple has a 1 in 10,000 chance of being released to the market, “I call it legalized gambling,” says Bedford. The Triumph apple beat the odds and consumers will start seeing them in grocery stores in a few years.

The University of Minnesota uses conventional breeding methods to produce roughly 15,000 new crosses each year. Conventional breeding allows researchers to select parents with desirable traits and create new varieties in the hopes that the child will possess those same traits. “With conventional breeding, we get possibilities that we didn’t even know were possible. Good and bad, but we find things and I think ‘wow, that is a different level of texture than I even knew was possible,’” says Bedford.

With each new release, Bedford says they continue trying to raise the bar. The criteria is getting more strict with improvements to taste, texture, and disease resistance. “The last thing we need to do is put another mediocre apple out there.”

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The most biodiverse region on the planet, Latin America is an agroindustrial superpower that exports fully one fourth of its total production. By contrast, another agricultural superpower, Asia, exports only 6 percent of its production. Still Latin America has never succeeded in tapping into its agricultural wealth to adequately feed its population. At the moment, at least six countries in the region are in the throes of a food crisis, with nearly 268 million Latin Americans currently feeling the effects of food insecurity, with many millions more sure to join their ranks in the coming months.

The countries in crisis—Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Haiti and Venezuela—find themselves in this situation as a result of economic recessions, natural or climate-related disasters, waves of violence or widespread delinquency. On top of that, the invasion of Ukraine and resulting spike in energy costs, as well as the lingering effects of the coronavirus pandemic and a series of climate shocks have sparked one more perfect storm that is plunging millions more Latin Americans into hunger.

Food insecurity spiked in many countries throughout Latin America and the Caribbean in recent years. In 2014, 24.6 percent of the region’s population was food insecure in 2014, compared with 40.6 percent in 2021, largely as a result of COVID-19 lockdowns and their economic fallout. Nevertheless, Latin America’s vulnerability to external crises is symptomatic of deeper problems in the region’s food systems and the wider development model adopted by most of its nations.

How is it that, given our wealth of agricultural resources, we always seem to find ourselves on hunger’s precipice? After all, of the world’s 12 so-called mega diverse countries, five of them—Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico and Peru—are in Latin America. The region also boasts three of the most important centers of origin and biodiversity. Mesoamerica is the birthplace of milpa—the trio of squash, beans, and corn, (itself among the most-consumed products on earth)—as well as avocados, or green gold. The potato, and a great variety of other tubers, originate in the Andes, as does quinoa, chiles, and the tomato. The Amazon basin is home to the pineapple, the cashew and cacao. In addition, Argentina’s vast pampas are ideal for cattle grazing, and the frigid waters off the coast of Peru are among the richest seas in the world. Nearly half the tropical forests and one third of the planet’s fresh water are in Latin America.

These factors make Latin America an ideal place to grow a wide variety of crops, helping turn it, in many respects, into a key breadbasket of the world. Agricultural exports have been a major source of both pride and export income and have garnered significant attention from our political class. Brazil and Argentina are among the world’s leading agricultural superpowers. Peru, Chile and Mexico—another agricultural heavyweight of global scale—have become leading exporters of fresh fruits and vegetables. Along with Ecuador, Costa Rica, and Colombia, they fill the world’s fruit bowl. And for decades, Peru has been among the top exporters of fish oil and fishmeal (much of it destined to feed farmed fish—an industry that’s been growing exponentially since the 1980s.)

Governments across the region gave these sectors a major boost, through wide-ranging structural reforms throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Part of these reforms resulted in an era of much-needed economic stability in many countries. But they also made deference to the biggest money makers all but automatic, much to the detriment of other, less cash-generating sectors and players. Export-oriented agriculture in Latin America was, therefore, awarded preferential treatment, with massive public investment in irrigation and infrastructure, as well as special tax breaks and trade deals aimed at opening new markets, in addition to other favorable measures.

Making export-oriented agriculture a political priority is nothing new in the region. Since the colonization, the Spanish favored producing export commodities, such as sugar, over basic staples aimed at feeding the local population. A similar logic applied to a string of other commodities, including bananas, coffee, and cacao, as well as grains and meat. More recently, Green Revolution-style agriculture has taken hold throughout much of the region, with large swaths of land given over to this fertilizer- and pesticide-heavy production. Argentina and Brazil have bet big on genetically modified soy and corn, which is exported to feed pigs and cattle in developed countries and China. Monocultures also predominate, such as sugar, which is used to produce ethanol, and palm oil, a key ingredient in ultra-processed foods.

And, just like in centuries past, Latin America’s prioritization of exports continues to take a terrible toll on small-scale producers—farmers and fishers—who not only make up a large percentage of the agricultural workforce, (estimates vary between 57-77 percent) but are also responsible for producing between 27-67, depending on the estimate, of all food consumed in the region. But despite their key role as guardians not only of our tables but also of our biodiversity, these small-scale producers are disproportionately poor and, in a cruel irony, suffer from food insecurity. Their already precarious situation has only been made worse by the lack of public investment in infrastructure and technical assistance. Trade deals have spelled disaster, leaving these small-scale producers vulnerable and unable to compete against subsidized agroindustrial imports from the United States and Europe.

Still, it comes as no surprise that the most unequal region in the world has failed to prioritize the economic inclusion of its small-scale producers. It is equally unsurprising that the environmental cost has gone largely ignored—industrial agriculture’s insatiable thirst for water and land, and the deforestation and biodiversity loss that have resulted from cattle rearing and intensive farming, not to mention the excessive use of pesticides and herbicides that contaminates waterways.

By the same token, it is far from shocking that the region’s reliance on imported staples, in particular, basic grains, has spiked, making us vulnerable to external crises. In the very same region where we are homogenizing our diets and squandering our rich biodiversity, two out of every five people suffer from food insecurity and we are also grappling with a host of other diet-related illnesses, such as anemia, vitamin deficiencies, and obesity. Healthy diets also tend to be so expensive that they are priced out for some 130 million people.

Despite all that, Latin America also gives us reasons for hope. It is the birthplace of major breakthroughs in the fight against ultra-processed foods, with Chile, Peru, Uruguay, Mexico, Argentina and Colombia adopting clear warning labels for these harmful products. Mexico has been working to prioritize and scale-up agroecology—an ecosystemic alternative model to industrial agriculture that is heralded as improving not only the lives of small-scale farmers and their families, but also having a positive effect on biodiversity, the environment and nutrition.

It is clear, however, that much more is needed. We must stop thinking of food production in a one-dimensional way, focusing exclusively on what it contributes to GDP, and take a systemic approach to food. We must consider not only food production’s effect on the bottom line—which is so crucial to reducing poverty and fostering social inclusion—but also take into account nutrition. In particular—we need to consider the most vulnerable among us and their access to healthy and affordable diets, as well as conservation and safeguarding biodiversity.

The challenge, in the most flagrantly unequal region on earth, is to invite to the table those who have long been forgotten. This means a greater representation of smallholder farmers and artisanal fishers, who have long been shut out of decision-making, and putting their needs above those of large-scale producers, who have been prioritized for centuries. Without these fundamental changes, the veins of Latin America will continue to be open and we will continue to feed the world with our riches, without feeding our own population.

* Marcela Cavassa contributed research.

The Spanish version of this article will be published by Nexos Magazine (México) in March 2023, in a special digital issue devoted to the food crisis in Mexico and Latin America.

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Do you want to live to be 100 years old? Or even 120?

Most people, says Dr. Mark Hyman, probably wouldn’t want to, for multiple reasons. The biggest, he says, is because their health might deteriorate and their quality of life might not be what it is now—but what if we could change that?

If you’ve been a Food Tanker for a while, you probably recognize Dr. Hyman’s name. As a physician and the founder of The UltraWellness Center, he’s one of the leading educators and advocates of Food is Medicine and functional medicine.

His latest book—Young Forever: The Secrets to Living Your Longest, Healthiest Life—just came out this week, and Food Tank members joined an exclusive members-only conversation with Dr. Hyman recently.

Food has a lot of power to help you thrive and live more healthfully at any age, Dr. Hyman says. Plants, nuts, seeds, and beans are all worth seeking out. Sugar, starches, dairy, and other foods contaminated with pesticides, antibiotics and hormones should be limited or avoided. He calls meat and animal products “condi-meats” to remind us that they don’t always need to be the center of our plates—something chefs like Dan Barber and others have been practicing in their restaurants for a long time.

And it’s important to remember the joy of food. We can celebrate the foods that truly act as medicine to our bodies, and celebrate our bodies’ innate knowledge to keep us healthy.

“We need to think about the root causes of why we get sick; we need to think about the underlying mechanisms,” he told our members. “And that’s what the science of longevity teaches us. We have to reframe our whole health care system from one focused on disease to one focused on creating health. Rather than just treating symptoms and diseases, we need to understand how to activate our body’s own innate healing system.”

I spend a lot of time thinking about my own and my family’s health as we all age. We’re all getting chronologically older, Dr. Hyman says, but that doesn’t always correlate with our biological age. Sometimes, we face health challenges at a younger age than we’d expect based on the number of years we’ve been alive. It can go the other way, too: Dr. Hyman, who’s 63, said his biological age is 43.

My feelings about this book are complex, I’ll admit. There’s so much emotion and social interconnectedness in the foods we eat and how healthy we are—and so many moral judgments, too. Even Dr. Hyman recognizes that there’s no silver-bullet foods. There is no single ingredient—just as there’s no single technology or diet plan or policy—that will address all problems.

And not everyone has equitable access to these kinds of foods, either, which we have to recognize and reckon with. Much of our diets depend on the foods we can afford and access, and food insecurity, hunger, poverty, and trauma translate directly to lower health outcomes, too. Individual actions are extraordinarily powerful, and at the same time, we know we can’t ‘personal responsibility’ our way out of a broken food system. We have to go deeper.

I appreciate that Dr. Hyman is also thinking about this with the Food Fix Campaign, which he helped launch to engage policymakers and government leaders to help transform the food system from a health-forward and planet-forward perspective. And like many of us, he believes the 2023 Farm Bill provides a huge opportunity to actually focus on good food policy.

This week’s members-exclusive conversation with Dr. Mark Hyman is just the latest in an ongoing series, where we’ve been able to have intimate conversations with journalist Chloe Sorvino, chef Alice Waters, and, soon, with farmer and food heroine Leah Penniman.

These are free for Food Tank members, and it’s been wonderful to see you all. If you’re not yet a Food Tank member, now’s absolutely the time to join HERE!

Tell me your thoughts on Dr. Hyman’s book and food as medicine by emailing me at danielle@foodtank.com—I look forward to hearing from you.

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The Movement for Community Led Development in Liberia (MCLD-Liberia) is helping farmers address challenges with home-grown solutions. Through these efforts, they are working to empower women and youth and to ensure that international development in their country is driven by communities.

In Liberia, the majority of the population depend on agriculture for their livelihoods, according to the International Trade Administration. But after the Liberian civil wars, which raged from 1989 to 2003, communities were fragmented and there were few farmers organizations left to advocate for fair incomes and political representation for smallholder farmers.

To restore community bonds and increase farmers’ collective power, MCLD-Liberia hosts convening sessions to bring together local farmers. There, they share knowledge about storing produce, accessing micro-finance, and getting better prices for their products.

These training sessions also act as forums for farmers to discuss and address problems in their communities. In two different instances, farmers recognized that there are systemic challenges for women and youth when it comes to owning farmland.

Farmers in Montserrado and Margibi counties decided to address these inequalities by donating some of their land, providing a communally managed plot for widows, women, and youth to work.

Empowering women is a principal goal for MCLD-Liberia, and for the global Movement more generally. “The Liberian legal system does not guarantee women’s rights, and even if it did, Liberian society’s perception about women hardly affords them the opportunity to enjoy their rights,” Jude Nwachukwu, founder of MCLD-Liberia, tells Food Tank.

According to the United Nations, women in Liberia own far less land than men and have less access to financial services. For women who are employed in agriculture, more than half (56.8 percent) are not paid for their work. As a result, 85 percent of female-headed households are in a state of moderate to severe food insecurity.

A lack of participatory democracy is partly to blame for gender inequity in Liberia, according to Freedom House. They report that adequate local governance is still being developed following the end of the civil wars. And customary law, like patrilineal land agreements which passes land ownership down along the male line, still reigns in rural areas.

The wars also resulted in a loss of community bonds. “Jude started with this recognition that in his community there was no farmers association, and that the MCLD looked like a framework to get one going,” John Coonrod, Co-Founder and Global Coordinator for MCLD, tells Food Tank.

Coonrod and a few others make up the secretariat for the MCLD, but there are no headquarters for the Movement. Rather, the MCLD is a global network of networks, made up of 1,500 community based organizations (CBOs), more than 70 international non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and 17 National Associations.

The Movement was publicly founded in 2015 at the signing of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). National Associations of the movement are formed by individuals and organizations that come together to make community development more effective and democratic in their country.

In 2020, Nwachukwu heard about a movement gaining traction worldwide which was redistributing power in international development away from donors and towards communities. So in 2021, he collaborated with NGOs around the country and founded MCLD-Liberia to make development projects in Liberia more sustainable and people-centered.

Since the end of the civil wars, World Bank data shows that multilateral institutions like the World Bank and bilateral donors like the U.S. have spent over US$12 billion in total official aid to Liberia. Still, Liberia is the 11th poorest nation in the world in terms of GDP and 7th from the bottom in terms of hunger, according to the 2021 Global Hunger Index.

Nwachukwu believes that many traditional aid and agricultural development projects fail because they are created and implemented by outsiders. “Our mission is to end hunger in Liberia. But we cannot end hunger, and we cannot have sustainable development, without the community leading the charge,” Nwachukwu tells Food Tank. “We need to allow community members to be the pilots in order for projects to be sustainable and effective.”

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Before she married at the age of 16, Jeet Kumari had received no formal education. As the years went by, it was difficult for her to survive off her small farm and send her four children to school. Unable to afford even basic health care, she lost her husband and one child to treatable illnesses. Still, she continued to farm, coaxing whatever food crops she could from the poor soil in her small corner of Nepal.

Smallholder farmers produce up to 80 percent of the food supply in Asian and sub-Saharan African countries, and women are crucial producers on those farms. They steward their animals and land with minimal resources, striving for sustainability, nutritious food, and financial security. It is an uphill battle, made worse by the combined impacts of climate change, conflict and a cost-of-living crisis that has plunged 828 million people across the world into chronic hunger.

That hunger crisis and rising rates of global poverty cannot be solved without the economic empowerment of women smallholder farmers—yet they are seldom the primary focus of development initiatives that aim to end poverty or improve food security.

In 2019-20, for example, 4 percent of Official Development Assistance from 31 of the world’s richest countries centered on gender equality and empowerment as its main objective—and only a fraction of that was dedicated to rural women. To be sure, a larger proportion (44 percent) went to programs that consider gender as part of a wider agenda. But such a general approach rarely addresses either the specific or systemic barriers confronting women smallholder farmers.

The barriers are high. Globally, women have equal economic rights to men in only 12 countries. Cultural and gender biases, discriminatory laws and regulations make it more difficult for women than men farmers to access secure land rights, technologies, financing and markets that could vastly improve their options and incomes.

In some cases, biases and disparities are widening. Studies have shown a growing acceptance of domestic violence since COVID-19 and an increased incidence of child marriage as families struggle to recover from devastating natural disasters. Indeed, by 2022, women had less food than men in every region in the world, with the gap expected to grow along with climate change.

It is simply not possible to achieve sustainable development without a primary focus on women; to achieve women’s economic empowerment without a focus on agriculture; or to end hunger and poverty without elevating women smallholder farmers.

Jeet is an example of the change that is possible. Today she is not only a respected farmer but has even donated land for use by her local women’s agricultural cooperative. Over the years, she received training in animal welfare, kitchen gardening, climate-smart agriculture, fodder and forage management, gender and group management.

Much of this training was offered through local partnerships catalyzed by Heifer International, a global development organization I lead that works to economically empower women smallholder farmers, their families, and their communities. Its programs promote an unshakable foundation of social capital—trust and mutual support built by the women through their collective farming enterprises.

Sustained by values of accountability, self-reliance and caring, women join together in self-help groups, receive training, access to capital and new market opportunities. As these groups grow and sophistication, they independently join together to form professional agricultural cooperatives with deeper market reach and livelihood-boosting resources for their members.

Heifer currently supports more than 250 cooperatives across 44 districts of Nepal, with more than 300,000 women actively engaged. They have also coalesced to form a national “apex” organization. It connects members to both markets and policymakers, advocating at the highest level of government for reforms that support farming as a business.

Using similar approaches in other parts of the world, women have gained greater agency over their farms, their finances and their futures.

In Nigeria, where 2.2 million women harvest shea nuts, collectives organized by the nonprofit Initiative for Gender Empowerment and Creativity have begun to eliminate the middlemen, engaging directly with buyers. A Climate Smart Shea Processing Facility enables the women to produce their own high-quality shea butter for global markets rather than selling the raw nuts for a minimal price.

In Burundi, the global nonprofit CARE found that investing in gender equality in agriculture brought a US$5 return for every US$1 invested, compared to a US$2 return for every US$1 invested in agriculture programs that ignored gender equality.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that, were women farmers in developing countries given access to the same resources as male counterparts, the women could raise their output by 20-30 percent. The benefits would continue from there, as women invest up to 10 times more of their earnings than men do in family well-being, including child health and education.

These approaches lay a roadmap for how the international community can support the economic empowerment of smallholder women farmers. But achieving this goal will require long-term commitments and integrated strategies to address the complex challenges at hand. Doing so is worth the time, effort, and resources—the economic empowerment of smallholder women farmers will change the world.

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Photo courtesy of Olivier Asselin/Heifer International

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As the first African-American woman elected to Congress from North Carolina, I served for 10 years in positions on the House Agriculture Committee and as the ranking member of the Operations Oversight, Nutrition, and Forestry Subcommittees. Combined with my subsequent tenure as the Assistant Director General of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN, I understand the critical need for investment in small and future farmers, and how connected their growth and ability to thrive is to healthy food, healthy people, and robust rural communities.

There is an old saying that “we are what we eat.” Health professionals recommend eating healthy food to prevent and control diseases like diabetes, hypertension, and heart conditions. Additionally, when food is sold locally, it is fresher. Some health professionals have recently promoted food as medicine. However, food insecurity is a fundamental problem in the United States, including North Carolina. Those of us living in rural America know that our health indicators, including food insecurity, are challenging and that our rural economy could be far improved. Food insecurity is both a health and economic condition. Access to healthy and nutritious food, a good environment, and healthy rural communities are tied to the survival and growth of small and future farmers. And investing in small and future farmers can benefit our rural economy.

While small farms contribute greatly to local food production and rural economies, they have historically received less resources, access to appropriate scaled information and technology, and investment from federal and state programs. This is disproportionately even greater among farmers of color. Our nation is rapidly losing farmland and farmers, who are getting older (average age greater than 58 years old) and going out of business. North Carolina is currently tied for first in farm loss in the US. Farm families are middle-sized or small ; the latter need help to make a profit or break even and must supplement the family income by working outside the farm. Black farmers have suffered the most significant number of lost farms due partly to proven discrimination. We should be attracting and investing in new farmers if we are to have a strong farming system going forward. To grow and sell healthier food locally, we must support and increase the number of small farms, especially minority and female farmers. We must redesign our food systems to be resilient and serve all people in our community, especially the most vulnerable. We can do this through establishing networks and infrastructure linking our public schools, childcare and senior care facilities, local farmers, extension services, hospitals and health professionals, community colleges, and food stores.

The Farm Bill allows for more fundamental changes, however there are improvements we can do now. We should take the following steps to expand existing programs and make them more effective:

• Increase federal and state government financial and technical support to small farmers to help them purchase land, buy equipment to grow healthy food, and sell locally. Fulfill legislative commitment to distress and minority farmers for debt relief under the Inflation Act of 2022.
• Expand the Farm to School programs to promote the value of nutritious, healthy and local food and create an interest in farming among our children. Provide incentives and assistance to school systems to develop these programs.
• Provide more money per meal for school lunches and include fresh vegetables and fruits and local food when possible. Consider modifying the Farm Bill to provide universal meals to all students as we provide books. Supplemental summer feeding programs need to be expanded that extend beyond the school year.
• Revisit, evaluate, and invest in the “Future Farmers of America.” Expand agricultural education programs, especially those focused on sustainability, with similar focus, coordination, imagination, and resources as the STEM program in schools.
• Provide needed support supply chain infrastructure, and farmer and business training needed to grow local food systems. While recent programs supporting local food procurement we must also focus on the infrastructure and training investments in food hubs, infrastructure and farmer support if these local food systems are to be resilient and sustainable.

I know we have the capacity to make these positive changes in our food system and there are many farmers, community leaders, university partners and rural communities working collectively to do this but they also need the policies and support to be invested.

We must continue to press forward in our rural communities to ensure equitable care and access to nutritious food. We launched the Rural Food Institute with a vision to share knowledge, resources and bring others to the table to ensure a healthier rural NC together.

One of the key takeaways from the recent Rural Food Forum held at Vance-Granville Community College sponsored by the Green Rural Redevelopment Organization and the Eva Clayton Rural Food Institute was how critical small farmers are to the goals of making healthy food accessible to rural communities.

We must ensure our small farmers are receiving adequate resources, have access to information and technology, and begin to seek significant investments from federal and state programs.

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U.S. efforts to bully Mexico over its announced restrictions on imports of genetically-modified (GM) corn intensified last week, as a U.S. Trade Representative official gave the Mexican government less than a week “to explain the science behind Mexico’s planned bans on genetically modified corn and glyphosate herbicide,” according to Reuters.

In response, Mexico’s Minister of the Economy, Raquel Buenrostro, announced that the government is indeed revising its original December 2020 presidential decree to clarify the nature and scope of the restrictions, originally announced to take effect in January 2024. Sure enough, her ministry released the revised decree February 13. The new edict addresses many U.S. concerns, most importantly clarifying that any ban on GM feed corn, which is the overwhelming majority of U.S. exports, would only be implemented gradually, pending a full review of the science and the availability of adequate supplies of non-GM corn.

Don’t expect any thank-you notes from U.S. officials. Indeed, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack was quick to snap the olive branch offered by Mexico. “USDA is disappointed in Mexico’s new decree regarding genetically modified corn.” Trade officials told Inside US Trade that USTR does not consider the decree a “formal response” to its questions on the science.

So fasten your seatbelts for another bumpy ride through the highly polarized debates over what constitutes “sound science” and over what levels of precaution governments should be allowed to take in the face of scientific uncertainty. To U.S. industry and government officials, precaution is a dirty word.

As a public service, I offer here some of the scientific evidence justifying Mexico’s restrictions on GM corn and glyphosate. It is a small sample from a large and still-growing literature.

GM Corn restrictions are intended to promote the health of people and the climate.

Mexico’s proposed GM corn restrictions are part of a larger effort by the government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, swept into power in a 2018 landslide, to better protect public health and the environment. The three-year phaseout of glyphosate, the herbicide in Bayer/Monsanto’s Roundup products, is just one of a range of toxic pesticides being banned as part of a sweeping public health law now making its way through the legislature. The glyphosate phaseout is reiterated in the new decree with a deadline of March 2024, and usage has declined steadily in the last two years. The government has also taken bold action to address Mexico’s alarming rise in obesity and non-communicable diet-related diseases, enacting a strong labeling requirement for foods high in salt, fats, and sugars.

Environmental initiatives include the promotion of agroforestry and agroecology and protection of Mexico’s unique diversity of corn varieties from cross-pollination by GM corn. The revised decree, which applies only to corn, not other GM crops does the following:

It reiterates the immediate ban on the cultivation of GM corn to prevent cross-pollination, in line with the court-ordered injunction in place since 2013.

The revisions clarify that there is no ban on the importation of U.S. GM white corn, but there is an immediate prohibition on the use of any GM corn in products for “direct human consumption,” clearly defined as the tortilla and corn flour supply chain. Enforcement will focus on producers of those products, and the decree calls for measures to ensure traceability, an important step.

The decree also reiterates that government agencies will cease all purchases of GM corn and glyphosate.

It eliminates the 2024 deadline for the phaseout of GM corn imports for animal feed and industrial uses, but it keeps in place the intention to substitute domestic non-GM corn over time, which aligns with government plans to increase food self-sufficiency.

It establishes Mexico’s Federal Commission for Protection Against Sanitary Risks (COFEPRIS, by its Spanish acronym) as the agency responsible for assessing risk and approving future import licenses requested by U.S. exporters. Implied in the decree is the right to enforce the government’s preference for non-GMO corn for future uses.

It calls for further study, in conjunction with North American partners, of the risks to human health and the environment from GM feed corn.

The decree commits to science-based decisions in compliance with the United States-Mexico-Canada (USMCA) trade agreement. In Buenrostro’s words, “If they prove that there is no harm to health, then it will be approved.” 

And the new decree makes clear that Mexico reserves the right to take precautionary measures it considers important to protect public health and the environment, including the genetic integrity of its rich diversity of native corn. 

Science evidence makes the case for precautionary measures.

U.S. industry representatives and government officials have repeatedly insisted that Mexico’s actions are not based on science. As always, U.S. leaders insist that they get to determine what constitutes “sound science,” despite the atrocious record of poor public health protections by U.S. regulations heavily influenced by industry. But Mexico does indeed have science on its side.

In fact, Mexico’s highest government science body has published a database on glyphosate and GM corn with 28 pages of citations. If fact it is so large that it is difficult to navigate. U.S. officials could examine that scientific evidence, which has been available since the 2020 decree. But to make it easier for them, let’s highlight some of the most important evidence.

In the U.S., which has allowed unlabeled GM corn to enter the food supply since the mid-1990s, the mantra is that no one has been harmed, regulators have adequately tested the new products, and there is a scientific consensus on the safety of eating GM foods. Many scientists beg to differ, as I wrote in an earlier Food Tank article, arguing that scientific uncertainty justifies precautionary restrictions because evidence of harm, mainly from animal studies, has not been taken seriously nor been followed up to assess the risks to human health. Below is some of the key evidence.

A 2015 statement signed by more than 300 scientists insisted that there is no scientific consensus on GMO safety: “the scarcity and contradictory nature of the scientific evidence published to date prevents conclusive claims of safety, or of lack of safety, of GMOs.”

My late Tufts University colleague, Sheldon Krimsky, conducted broad reviews of the academic literature in 2018 and reported “An Illusory Consensus Behind GMO Health Assessment. He found 26 studies that “reported adverse effects or uncertainties of GMOs fed to animals;” eight other literature reviews that showed anything but a consensus on safety; and no consensus among medical and scientific associations. All are listed in his extensive bibliography. (I summarize his findings in this earlier Food Tank article.)

A 2017 peer-reviewed study reported the “Pervasive Presence of Transgenes and Glyphosate in Maize-Derived Food in Mexico,” which raised alarms about the integrity of Mexico’s food supply even when GM corn was not being grown in the country.

Many scientists have also pointed out that evidence from the U.S. experience is of limited value because Mexico’s high levels of direct consumption of minimally processed corn products, such as tortillas, presents levels of risk that make U.S. exposures a poor guide to risk. As expert Charles Benbrook recently told me, “There is inadequate data to conduct an assessment of the impacts of Bt corn on the GI tracts of people consuming corn-based foods. The studies have still not been done.” This is known as “undone science” – investigations not carried out due to vested interests.

 While most of the current controversy has focused on concerns about human health, Mexico’s decree also cites the threat to the genetic integrity of the country’s megadiverse native corn due to uncontrolled cross-pollination from GM corn planted in nearby fields. Such risks were the basis for the successful challenge to permits issued by Mexico’s previous administrations for cultivation of GM corn, a citizen lawsuit I document in my excerpted book chapter, “Monsanto Invades Corn’s Garden of Eden in Mexico.”

I interviewed many scientists about the risks of “gene flow,” but we can look to NAFTA itself for the definitive science. NAFTA’s own Commission for Environmental Cooperation in 2003 conducted a trinational expert assessment of the risks to native corn biodiversity from GM corn. The scientific findings in “Maize and Biodiversity: The Effects of Transgenic Maize in Mexico” are still relevant today.

Open pollination can result in gene flow to nearby fields of native corn, and the pollen can travel much further than previously believed. (A later study showed transgenes present in native corn varieties in 14 Mexican states).

The contamination that prompted the study likely came from GM corn imported from the United States, unlabeled, distributed as food through a Mexican government agency, then unknowingly planted by a farmer. (That could easily happen again, which is why Mexico’s decree calls for traceability of imported GM corn).

Transgenes can spread further through subsequent pollination, threatening native corn diversity, which is invaluable culturally, environmentally, and also economically for future crop breeding.

Precautionary policies are warranted, including policies to restrict the importation of corn in kernel form from the U.S., which does not identify GM content through labeling.

U.S. trade officials have not directly challenged Mexico’s glyphosate phaseout, but there is no shortage of scientific evidence to justify the ban.

The World Health Organization (WHO) finds that Roundup herbicides are a “probable human carcinogen,” which I covered in an earlier Food Tank article. The WHO findings are summarized in an accessible two-page monograph and in The Lancet Oncology.

According to Forbes, Bayer/Monsanto has settled more than 100,000 lawsuits charging the company with misleading consumers about the safety of Roundup, and another 30,000 lawsuits are pending.

Damaging evidence keeps mounting. One recent study showed negative health impacts downstream from farms heavily using glyphosate, while the Guardian reported that 60 percent of urine samples in the U.S. showed traces of glyphosate and higher levels of “oxidative stress,” which is associated with cancer risk. 

As I have previously reported, there is nothing in the new Agricultural Biotechnology section of the USMCA that obligates any country to approve a GM crop approved in another country. Nor does it mandate that the three countries must accept other countries’ scientific assessments nor calculations of risk. It mandates transparency, consultation, and science-based decision-making. That seems to be exactly what the Mexican government is offering the U.S. with its revision of the 2020 presidential decree.

Mexico retains the right to take precautionary measures it deems necessary to protect public health and the environment. Precaution may be a dirty word for U.S. regulators, but not a U.S. public wary of industry lies about the dangers of its products – tobacco, fossil fuels, lead, asbestos, DDT, and PCBs, just to name a few. (See “Late Lessons from Early Warnings” for a longer list of such cases). Rather than challenge Mexico’s health and environmental policies, perhaps we can learn something from them.

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Consume Green Organic Future Foods is a women-led agricultural social enterprise working to rejuvenate traditional foodways in northern India. The health of both the planet and the community are equal priorities for the organization.

According to a British Council report, 28 percent of social enterprises in India are involved in agriculture, fisheries, or dairy sectors, representing a rapidly growing industry. Enterprises concerned with agriculture are especially pertinent to India, as the sector employs 49 percent of the working population. In addition, the report finds that 24 percent of social enterprises are led by women, which is a larger share than in mainstream businesses.

Consume Green Organic Future Foods, or C.Green was founded in the northern Indian state of Himanchal Pradesh, nestled in the western Himalayas. It is one of the least urbanized states in the country, with most of the population depending on agriculture, pastoralism, seasonal herding, horticulture, and forestry.

“The idea of C.Green was crafted to revive and preserve the traditional wisdom of food, keeping in mind the health of the people and the soil,” Himanshu Kapoor, Founder of Consume Green Organic Future Foods, tells Food Tank. The rise of convenience foods and industrial agriculture pushed aside traditional recipes and methods of processing over time, and Kapoor’s enterprise looks to revive the lost grains of the community.

C.Green is by procuring all raw produce from local, smallholder farmers. In particular, Kapoor explains that C.Green employs “the women folk of the local farmer communities.” The company encourages traditional agricultural practices by returning fair prices to farmers for their products.

The grains are hand processed in the traditional style, using solar roasting power and manual pounding methods. “By reviving the traditional lost recipes, packaging and putting them on the shelf for today’s youth, we are saving the lost grains, millet and the oil seeds,” Kapoor tells Food Tank.

C.Green’s work to revive traditional foodways and grains is also helping restore plant biodiversity of the region. Kapoor recognizes that the health of the environment goes hand in hand with that of communities. The health of the soil “in turn helps in the health of the people,” she says.

Kapoor finds that industrialization has created strong attachments to convenience foods and negative attitudes towards agricultural work. “Finding people to work for the philosophy of reviving and preserving honest food is difficult,” Kapoor says.

But she doesn’t let the conventional system discourage her. Kapoor envisions expanding C.Green’s efforts to multiple units, “like kitchens for the local farmers and the women of the community to add value to the local raw produce.”

Kapoor maintains a clear vision in the creation of “a sustainable system which satisfies the farmer, the local community and the consumer, keeping the health of the soil and the people as the priority.”

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A new historic Agriculture Bill in Wales is working its way through the Welsh Parliament. The Bill will pay farmers primarily through the Sustainable Farming Scheme to advance environmental, economic, and social and cultural goals.

The first draft of the new Bill, a work in progress since 2016, comes after Wales’ departure from the European Union (EU). “For the first time in our history this bill will give Wales the opportunity to implement its own food and farming policy, made in Wales for the people of Wales,” Policy Director at National Farmers’ Union (NFU) Cymru Dylan Morgan tells Food Tank.

The Bill’s Sustainable Land Management (SLM) legislative framework outlines several key goals: producing food sustainably, mitigating and adapting to climate change, promoting resilient ecosystems, and conserving and enhancing the Welsh countryside and culture.

In the past, the EU’s agricultural policy consisted of two pillars, including direct payments and separate environmental payments. But this new policy will create “one integrated scheme called the Sustainable Farming Scheme,” George Dunn, Chief Executive of the Tenant Farmers Association (TFA), tells Food Tank.

Under the proposed Sustainable Farming Scheme, the Welsh government will pay farmers through loans or grants for planting trees, restoring wildlife habitats, and other practices aimed at sustainability. Eligible farmers who join the Scheme will receive a baseline payment for universal actions and additional capital payments for optional and collaborative actions. The farmers will sign a contract establishing which actions are most suitable to his farm.

“Our farmers do great work as custodians of the land, protecting our heritage and landscapes so we can all enjoy them,” Minister for Rural Affairs and North Wales Lesley Griffiths tells Food Tank. “However, to address the loss of biodiversity and enable the landscape to become more resilient to the climate emergency, we need to support our farmers to make some land management changes.” 

Progress will be measured with specific indicators and targets currently being developed. Ensuring that there is a range of indicators and not just one metric of success, like carbon sequestration, to help make the Bill more effective, Dunn informs Food Tank.

The TFA also wants to see more support for “sustainable agriculture across all land occupation types,” he says. “Our biggest concern is that it doesn’t provide a sufficient framework for those of our Members who are occupying on newer style farm business tenancies.”

The organization promotes greater access to the Scheme for farmers operating on these restrictive short-term leases, in which environmental management may not be feasible under the terms of the agreement. One remedy to this issue includes offering legal recourse to individuals on Farm Business Tenancies (FBT) against a landlord’s unreasonable objections to joining the Scheme. 

NFU Cymru emphasizes the importance of including food production and security in the framework. “We support the introduction of a fifth SLM objective that reflects the importance of a vibrant, productive, economically active farming sector,” Morgan tells Food Tank. Alongside climate and environmental goals there should be “mechanisms to ensure levels of food production are assessed, maintained and enhanced.” 

The Bill and its associated Sustainable Farming Scheme are currently undergoing further scrutiny to ensure it reflects concerns about the economic viability of Welsh farms.

“We want this legislation to be a collaborative process which is why we have run consultations and co-design sessions on the Sustainable Farming Scheme,” she tells Food Tank. The government is working with producers and rural communities to sort out concerns, such as a 10 percent tree coverage on farms.

“It is an ambitious and transformational piece of legislation which reforms decades of EU farming policy,” Griffiths says. “It’s the right way to support our farmers to keep them producing high quality food while also addressing the climate and nature emergencies.”

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