Musings on sustainable food systems, agriculture vs. agroecology, and more!
As the year is picking up steam and the dreaded January hangovers are in full force (interestingly, that drop in energy after the first week of ‘I will redo my life!’ also appears in tropical climates), here’s a couple of quick but fascinating reads to keep you from doing what you should be doing. Enjoy! … Continue reading Recent reads
The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has been on a roll lately with important and inspired yearly foci. After last year’s Year of the Soils, 2016 highlights a much-neglected food group: Pulses. I would venture to guess that it is so neglected that many people don’t even know what it refers to – which … Continue reading Taking The Pulse on The Year of Pulses
“In the face of a rapidly overheating climate, collapsing fisheries, degraded soil, depleted water resources, vanishing species, and other challenges directly related to agriculture, we can no longer afford to pursue a flawed accounting system.” What is the real cost of food? Does the price we pay reflect the environmental impacts, the public health implications, … Continue reading TEEB AgFood: Calculating the Real Price of Food
One of the main activities of Mercator alumni is publishing a German-language magazine called adhoc international that treats global public policy challenges from a practitioner’s perspective. Of course, we couldn’t let the climate negotiations go unnoticed. Thus, the newest issue is all about changing climate and humanity (“Klima und Menschen im Wandel”; pdf), and I contributed … Continue reading Putting Meat on the Bones of a Climate Agreement
I am an unabashed New York Times enthusiast. It’s the only news source that I subscribe to, and its reporting is generally excellent. Thus, once a topic close to my heart is picked up by the NY Times, I rejoice because I look forward to a balanced, informed and insightful analysis. Alas, this is not … Continue reading Imagining A World Without Growth – But Seriously!
“I’ve often wondered how the media would respond when eco-apocalypse struck. I pictured the news programmes producing brief, sensational reports, while failing to explain why it was happening or how it might be stopped. Then they would ask their financial correspondents how the disaster affected share prices, before turning to the sport. As you can probably … Continue reading Indonesia’s Forest Fires: Is Ag To Blame?
As we are approaching our hottest year yet and historical climate talks, meat-free diets are still a political taboo. Even the official sustainable menu of COP21 has eschewed opening this Pandora’s box. Yet, animal agriculture is one of the greatest contributors to global warming and resource overuse. How long can we keep up the pretense? An … Continue reading Please Don’t Stop the Moo-sic: Is Less Meat Still No Option?
The Protests Smoke billows up between the sleek high-rises of the European Quarter in Brussels. The European milk farmers are angry, very angry. Many of them fear for their survival. After 31 years, the European Commission decided to end milk production quotas, to the dismay of many small and mid-scale producers. What with the Russian … Continue reading Quo Vadis, Quota? The EU Milk Protests
The coffee supply chain is famously shaped like an hourglass (or, if you will, a drip coffee machine): the broad demand at the top is connected to the millions of small producers at the bottom by a handful of powerful roasters. In 2013, the ten largest roasters controlled more than 40% of total world coffee … Continue reading Too Strong Coffee? Concentration at the Top and Anti-Trust Concerns
If human rights abuses take place where neither laws nor media exist, do they provoke an outcry? Thanks to some intrepid reporting by Ian Urbina for the New York Times, yes, they do. His piece “Sea Slaves: The Human Misery that Feeds Pets and Livestock“, part of his series “The Outlaw Ocean” on crime on the … Continue reading Fishing Slaves: Hidden Ordeals on the High Sea
