Climate Food and Agriculture
All Stories
-
Feed Your Head
Alice Waters leads 200-chef brigade to protect wild salmon Led by celebri-chef Alice Waters, some 200 chefs in 33 states are calling on Congress to protect river habitats and deprioritize hydroelectric dams that cramp Northwest salmon’s style. “Wild salmon is one of the unique, authentic heritage foods of the Pacific Northwest,” reads a letter that […]
-
Canada may raise pesticide levels to match U.S.
Every day there are roughly 1,347 stories I wish we could cover in Daily Grist. Here’s one that didn’t make the cut today, but that I can’t get out of my head: in an effort to bring its rules in line with the U.S., Canada is getting ready to raise allowable levels of pesticides on […]
-
One Bad Scrapple Spoils the Bunch
Regulators reveal new information on China-U.S. food links The tangled food relationship between China and the U.S. keeps getting tangledier. As new details emerge in the wake of the March wave of pet deaths, concerns about the possibility of tainted food reaching U.S. dinner tables are growing. U.S. regulators said yesterday that cyanuric acid, a […]
-
Senators call for a worldwide end to fishing subsidies
The only thing worse than overfishing our oceans and driving species to the brink of extinction is the government paying to do it. That's been the case for far too long, as upwards of $30 billion (that's billion, with a "b") worth of subsidies are handed over to the fishing industry every year. A whopping $20 billion of that is used for things like boat repairs, fishing equipment, and fuel -- expenses that allow for increased and intensified fishing practices.
-
Twice in one week!
Monsanto has barreled its way toward dominance over the global seed market with strong-arm tactics and friends in high places. As evidence of the former, the roguish company once threatened to sue me — then a neophyte blogger with 30 readers — on the most trivial grounds possible. As for the latter, software monopolist Bill […]
-
So far, small-scale, local-minded beekeepers have dodged hive collapse.
This post marks the launch of Fork it Over, in which I (attempt to) answer questions inspired by my Victual Reality column. Got a question about food and the politics that surround it? Fork it over, by emailing it to victuals(at)grist(dot)org. Reader Brooklynolmec writes in to inquire: are organically managed bees faring any better these […]
-
![]()
![]()
Savor your flavors with the slow-food movement
This is the fourth in a series of articles about connecting with people over food. Read others on setting up a dining co-op, celebrating Passover, and hosting an Earth Dinner. When I told a friend that I was writing an article about slow food, she said, “What’s that? The opposite of fast food?” In a […]
-
No more compromise
This is one issue where there can't be any compromise at this point: the demand for shark fin soup is decimating shark populations and marine ecosystems, and must stop. Whereas most forms of animal consumption put strains on ecosystems, this practice is extreme and environmentalists should continue to wage a "zero tolerance" campaign against it. It's not cultural imperialism or Big Brother, it's common sense and respect for life.
-
A guest blog from farmer’s rights legend Hope Shand
In the global fight to preserve what’s left of agricultural biodiversity from the ravages of the multinational chemical/seed giants and their government lackeys, no civil-society organization stands taller than the ETC Group. Among other projects, ETC documents the growing dominance over the global seed market by a handful of firms: Monsanto, Syngenta, and Dupont. The […]
-
How food processing got into the hands of a few giant companies
Two years ago, dairy giant Dean Foods shuttered a milk-processing facility in Wilkesboro, a town at the eastern edge of North Carolina’s Appalachian Mountains. Photo: iStockphoto Dean processes 35 percent of the fluid milk in the U.S. and Canada — roughly equal to the combined market share of its three biggest rivals combined. In my […]
