Musings on sustainable food systems, agriculture vs. agroecology, and more!
In the last weeks, I’ve been wandering between two worlds, trying to bring sense and structure into what I’ve seen and what I am reading. We are currently working on collecting field data from coffee farmers in Honduras, and I was lucky enough to visit several regions of the country while adapting our questionnaire and data … Continue reading Dispatches from the Field: Honduras
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!
“To be honest, organic coffee could become a dying breed in Costa Rica.” Leland Westie and I stare at each other, neither of us quite sure how to continue the conversation. Westie seems startled by his own frankness. After a long pause, he qualifies his statement with an apologetic smile: “I mean, I hope it will … Continue reading Organic Coffee in Costa Rica: A Battle of David vs. Goliath?
Yesterday, as I stepped out of the DG AGRI building, head full of terminology and legislation non-sense, this bag caught my eye… what would that be about? In fact, a little stand had set up shop in the park adjacent to the European Commission’s main agriculture and rural development building and challenged all the bureaucrats … Continue reading Campesiños in the City
On Wednesday, as anticipated, the House of Representatives passed the Farm Bill after a 2 year impasse with 251 to 166 votes. The Democratic leadership of the Senate has already endorsed it, making it likely that it will pass the Senate floor as well in the coming week and be on President Obama’s desk soon. … Continue reading The USA Have A Farm Bill! Halle … Well … Yeah.
How are your holidays going, everybody? I hope you spent a wonderful Christmas season and are still in the delicious between-Christmas-and-New-Year limbo that doesn’t require you to do anything whatsoever but read and sip eggnog and mulled wine and relax. Have you started thinking about your New Year’s resolutions? I often think that resolutions are … Continue reading For A (Climate-) Healthy 2014
