Fiscal Cliff Drama Produces an Awful Farm Bill Extension
Remember the farm bill, that once-in-five-years legislation that sets the nation's agriculture and hunger policy? Due for reauthorization in 2012, it lurched through both the Senate and the House ag...
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Drought Lingers, Winter Wheat Crop Withers
Weather is a complex, multi-tiered phenomenon, and no event can be tied to a single cause. But we do know that climate change likely increases the incidence and severity of droughts. Last summer's...
View ArticleWhat Does Biofuel Have to Do With the Price of Tortillas in Guatemala?
I used to write about biofuels a lot. The idea of devoting large swaths of prime farmland and annual gushers of agrichemicals to grow "fuel" crops—not to be eaten but to be set aflame in automobile...
View ArticleOzone From Biofuel Farms Could Cause Thousands of Deaths a Year
Biofuels have a variety of drawbacks. They jack up the price of food, making life hell for the urban poor in the global south, while also pushing small-scale farmers off of land and into misery, as I...
View ArticleWhy the Government Should Pay Farmers to Plant Cover Crops
Globally, 2012 will likely rank as one of the ten hottest in recorded history, The New York Timesreports. If it does, "it will mean that the 10 warmest years on record all fell within the past 15...
View ArticleEnviro Crusader Turns Pro-GMO, Anti-Organic—And Anti-Logic
Earlier this month, Mark Lynas, a prominent UK environmentalist and author, delivered a blunt attack (text here; video below the fold) on critics of agricultural biotechnology at a farming conference...
View ArticleCoke: Wait, People Thought Vitaminwater Was Good for You?
In light of Coca-Cola's much-discussed attempt to place itself at the vanguard in the fight against obesity—see video above—it's worth taking look at its line of "enhanced waters," known as Glacéau...
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Tom's Kitchen: Wine-Braised Beef Short Ribs
Braising—cooking something, usually meat, at low temperature in a covered pot with a little liquid—is a fundamental technique. Demanding a little preparation and a lot of patience, braising...
View ArticleQuinoa: Good, Evil, or Just Really Complicated?
"Can vegans stomach the unpalatable truth about quinoa?," thunders the headline of a recent Guardian piece. Hard to say, but reality check: It isn't just vegans who enjoy quinoa. Like many occasional...
View ArticleGot the Blues? Eat More Kale
Humans have long turned to substances—from beer to Prozac—to improve their outlook on life. But there's another possible remedy to the rigors of existence that doesn't get nearly as much attention: the...
View ArticleSaving the Ocean, One McBite at a Time?
Last week, the Twitternets were abuzz with news that McDonald's is going to (as @HuffPostFood put it) "serve all sustainable seafood" at its 14,000 US stores. Actually, as Associated Press reports, the...
View ArticleThe Surprising Connection Between Food and Fracking
In a recent Nationpiece, the wonderful Elizabeth Royte teased out the direct links between hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, and the food supply. In short, extracting natural gas from rock formations...
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