Musings on sustainable food systems, agriculture vs. agroecology, and more!
Last week, I turned down the possibility to attend a training on “How to Deal with Lobbyists” (so glamorous) to instead learn about the sustainable food policy agenda in Europe – and I have to say, I have no regrets! The LiveWell for Life conference was really well organized, had interesting panellists and great speakers, … Continue reading Recap: LiveWell for Low-Impact Food In Europe conference!
First of all, ugh, I wasn’t planning to disappear for so long! The longer I am working, the more appreciation I have for the more professional bloggers that do it next to their day job – what a tough call! However, I really miss this little space whenever I quiet down for a while, so … Continue reading What Money Can Buy…
Philanthropy is an interesting concept. Here is one person, or a board of people, with more money to distribute than small nations have budgets. If they choose to concentrate on a topic, their impact can be immense and drive research, NGO actions and government policies in the direction of their liking because of the financial … Continue reading Who Gets The Money? On Helping Africa To Feed Itself – in the US.
Yesterday, as I was closing my computer for the end of the workday, I was convinced (CONVINCED) it was already Friday. Maybe it has something to do with the tradition of Thursday night happy hour in Brussels. Or all the pretty lights that guide you into the weekend… Nevertheless, the weekend is around the corner and … Continue reading Fun Links Friday V!
It happens that once you specialize in a topic, you get a little jaded about ‘broad overview’ talks. Whenever I go to one of those now, I notice myself mentally playing the ‘food security bingo’ game – what doesn’t the presenter mention? What is emphasized? The point scale in my head looks somewhat like this: Mentions … Continue reading The @WorldResources Institute On How To "Create A Sustainable Food Future"
We often hear about the fact that ‘just producing food is not enough’ if we want to confront the problems of global malnutrition – it also depends on what kind of food we grow and eat. That is the mission of the Global Panel on Agriculture and Food Systems for Nutrition. They’re a panel of experts … Continue reading How Does Nutrition Fit Into Food Policy? @Glo_PAN
The cool thing about being in Brussels? Showing up at a lunch meeting across the street from your office and have the chief statistician of the FAO and the director of the WFP Brussels office explain how they arrived at estimating the state of food insecurity in the world. I will talk more about the … Continue reading World Food Day: The Numbers #WFD2014
Español Sometimes, it´s easy to get caught up in the news of the day – Ukraine, Gaza, ISIS – that other news items go unnoticed. So, for example, that Central American agricultural producers are being hit extremely hard this year after a disease called coffee leaf rust destroyed many export crops. Now, on top of … Continue reading Drought in Central America – Sequía en Centroamérica
I wrote my bachelor’s thesis about Russia’s obsession with attaining food independence; i.e. that Russian demand should be able to be satisfied by Russian food production, and the non-rationality of such a policy goal in a world food market characterized by specialization and globalization. Turns out, Russia has good reason to pursue this goal after … Continue reading Russia's New Food Diplomacy
Man, sometimes you just have to catch yourself in moments of pure luck. Like today, after a morning spent in glorious summer weather hammering out the last formatting issues of my thesis, when I was able to attend a lunch seminar (who said there was no free lunch in economics?) with the inspiring Kate Raworth … Continue reading Review: Kate Raworth's 'Doughnut Economics'