For Food's Sake

Four grain trading giants - collectively known as the ABCDs - dominate international grain trade in our global food system. Knowing who they are and what they do is vital to understand the whys and hows of our modern food supply. 

A key branch of ABCD power and influence are their financial subsidiaries. Financialisation in the food system today has widespread and alarming implications. Local food movements, farmers and consumers must take heed of these global forces, or risk being crowded out by private interests pursuing profit over people and planet.

Dr. Jennifer Clapp joins us to discuss:

• Who the ABCDs are, where and how they operate, and why they dominate
• Recent ABCD mergers and acquisitions and the impact of Trump's trade war with China
• The merging of food & finance: the financialisation of futures markets
• How financial speculation helped fuel the 2008 food price crisis
• Why financial investors moved en masse to acquire farmland
• ABCD involvement in the financialisation of the food system
• How to regulate invisible giants and the financialisation of food

 

Dr. Clapp is a Canada Research Chair in Global Food Security and Sustianability and Professor in the School of Environment, Resources and Sustainability at the University of Waterloo, Canada. She has published widely on the global governance of problems that arise at the intersection of the global economy, the environment, and food security. Her current research focuses on the implications of financial markets and transnational corporations for food system sustainability. Her most recent books include Speculative Harvests: Financialization, Food, and Agriculture (with S. Ryan Isakson, Fernwood Press, 2018), Food, 2nd Edition (Polity, 2016), Hunger in the Balance: The New Politics of International Food Aid (Cornell University Press, 2012), and Corporate Power in Global Agrifood Governance (co-edited with Doris Fuchs, MIT Press, 2009).

Links:

• Speculative Harvests: Financialization, Food, and Agriculture (2018) – Jennifer Clapp & S. Ryan Isakson
• Food. 2nd Edition (2016) – Jennifer Clapp
• Hunger in the Balance: The New Politics of International Food Aid (2012) – Jennifer Clapp
• Corporate Power in Global Agrifood Governance– Jennifer Clapp & Doris Fuchs (Eds.) (2009)
• 'Cereal Secrets: The World's Largest Grain Traders and Global Agriculture' Oxfam (2012) – Jennifer Clapp, David Burch & Sophia Murphy

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The global fertiliser market is a $200 billion industry. But who does it serve?

Produced in large-scale, centralised facilities in developed countries, conventional fertilisers are neither cheap nor reliably accessible for rural smallholder farmers in emerging markets in Africa and India.

Safi Organics in Kenya has a vision to decentralise and downsize fertiliser production. Using recycled waste from local farms, carbon-negative organic biochar fertilisers empower farmers by making their farms more resilient with lower costs, higher yields and better soils.   

We talk to co-founder Samuel Rigu about:

• His childhood memories of growing up on a farm in Kenya
• The conventional model of fertiliser production and use
• The crippling costs and logistical challenges of fertiliser use in Kenya
• Decentralising fertiliser use
• Carbon-negative, organic biochar fertiliser
• The role of fertiliser in facing the reality of climate change
• A vision of empowering smallholder farmers for lasting food security

Links:

• Safi Organics Website, Twitter, Instagram
• "How Climate Change is fuelling innovation in Kenya" – Smithsonian
• "The EU finally provides legal framework for organic and recycled fertilisers"– EURACTIV
• Thought For Food website
• The Original Foodies: A Documentary Series

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• FFS 020 – Optimising the Food Economy with Blockchain
• FFS 017 – When Farming Goes Vertical
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When we stop treating dirt like dirt, when we accept it's neither 'dirt cheap' nor 'dirt poor', we will come to realise it is the most precious resource we have. Treat dirt, or soil, the way you want to be treated.

In this episode, David R. Montgomery joins us to talk about how soil has shaped the course of civilisations. From the Classical Greeks and the Romans to the Maya civilisation – the story of soil and its mistreatment has been central to explaining why civilisations collapse.

The plow – the tool that defines farming - is the number one culprit. Some argue it has been more destructive than the sword.

David is a Professor of Earth and Space Sciences at the University of Washington, he is a MacArthur Fellow, and author of King of Fish: The Thousand-year Run of Salmon; The Rocks Don't Lie: A Geologist Investigates Noah's Flood; Dirt: The Erosions of Civilizations; The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health (which he co-authored with Anne Biklé); and Growing a Revolution: Bringing Our Soil Back to Life.

We cover:

• A crash course on soil, soil formation, erosion and degradation
• The myth that ancient civilisations lived and farmed in harmony with nature
• The central role of soil in the fall of ancient Greece and Rome
• The plow: more destructive than the sword?
• Soil erosion and colonialism, slavery and empire
• Soil and climate change
• Soilutions: the promise of conservation agriculture  

 

Links:

• David Montgomery's Website and Twitter
• Dirt: The Erosion of Civilisation– David R. Montgomery
• The Rocks don't Lie: A Geologist investigates Noah's Flood  - David R. Montgomery
• The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health - David R. Montgomery & Anna Biklé
• Growing A Revolution: Bringing Our Soil Back to Life- David R. Montgomery 

 

You might also like: 

• FFS 034 – Wizards and Prophets
• FFS 024 – The Soilution: Saving our soils, saving ourselves
• FFS 011 – Transforming Agriculture to Feed the Future

The end of Capitalism is nigh. Or we should certainly hope so.

Raj Patel makes a convincing case for the urgent need to think beyond capitalism if we are to move towards a zero-carbon economy. "Let us recognise that the system itself is dooming us and that we need to think outside it rather than within it" – Raj Patel.

If this sounds revolutionary, that's precisely the point.

Raj and I discuss:

• Why we shouldn't call this era the "Anthropocene"
• What Capitalism actually is
• The frontiers of Capitalism and the search for the next best "cheap thing"
• The Chicken McNugget: the symbol of modern capitalism
• The Market Approach: Carbon pricing, Natural Capital, and voting with your fork
• Thinking beyond Capitalism: a Theory of Change to get us to a zero-carbon economy

Links:

• Raj Patel's Website and Twitter
• Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System– Raj Patel
• The Value of Nothing– Raj Patel
• A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature and the Future of the Planet– Raj Patel & Jason W. Moore
• The Secret Ingredient Podcast– Raj Patel, Tom Philpott, and Rebecca McInroy
• La Via Campesina Website
• Agrarian Dreams: The Paradox of Agrarian Farming in California– Julie Guthman
• The New Food Activism: Opposition, Creation and Collective Action– Alison Alkon & Julie Guthman
• A Foodie's Guide to Capitalism: Understanding the Political Economy of What We Eat– Eric Holt-Gimenez

 

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• A Landmark declaration supporting the battles that matter most in Food– Matteo De Vos
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Monsanto has been found guilty in the world's first-ever court case over claims its Roundup herbicide causes cancer. It faces thousands of similar lawsuits. Is this Monsanto's (Bayer AG) tobacco moment?

Veteran investigative journalist Carey Gillam walks us through, step-by-step, the Monsanto trial that shocked the world.

We cover:

• Who Dewayne "Lee" Johnson is and why he sued Monsanto
• What happened during the trial: the jury selection, the plaintiff and defendant's arguments, the jury's verdict
• What's next: the implications, the appeals, and other trials

 

Links:

• US Right To Know website
• Carey Gillam on Twitter
• Carey Gillam – 'One man's suffering exposed Monsanto's secrets to the world'– The Guardian
• 'A shock court verdict against Monsanto's Roundup' The Economist

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• FFS 026 – We Need To Talk About Monsanto
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Are you a Wizard or a Prophet? Two largely forgotten 20th century thinkers – Norman Borlaug and William Vogt – continue to shape our competing visions of the future of our planet.   In this episode, we talk to Charles C. Mann, award-winning author of The Wizard and the Prophet, about these remarkable scientists and their lasting influence.   Borlaug – the Wizard – is a Nobel-winning scientist who kickstarted the agricultural 'Green Revolution', while Vogt – the Prophet – laid the foundations for the modern environmental movement.   The path we choose to solve our environmental dilemmas hinges on how we understand and frame the problems we face. Is innovation and technology the solution that will push us beyond our predicaments to overcome earth's natural boundaries, or is the answer to scale back and respect the ecological limits of our planet?   Charles and I discuss:

• Who the Prophets and Wizards are, what they believe in and what they've achieved, and how they envision the future
• Who the contemporary Prophets and Wizards are that continue to shape public debate
• How these competing visions dictate debates in agriculture, water scarcity, energy, and climate change
• The politics and power dynamics behind the visions of Prophets and Wizards
• What's at stake if we choose one path over another
• A sobering (and rather terrifying) alternative third vision

  Links:

• Chalres C. Mann 'Can Planet Earth Feed 10 Billion People?' The Atlantic
• Charles C. Mann 'The Wizard and the Prophet'
• William Vogt 'The Road to Survival'
• Noel Vietmeyer 'Our Daily Bread; The Essential Norman Borlaug'

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• FFS 013 – How Plants Domesticated Humans
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What role can livestock play in a sustainable food system? In Meat: A Benign Extravagance, Simon Fairlie lays out a convincing case as to why eating meat and dairy is part of a holistic and sensible agricultural system.   In this episode, we discuss:

• Why widely quoted figures on livestock's impact on the environment are misleading: from feed conversion ratios to water use to greenhouse gas emissions.
• How a 'default livestock diet' makes ecological sense
• The uncertainties and potential shortcomings of veganic farming
• An (uncomfortable) reality: truly sustainable agriculture calls for the ruralising of society

  Links:

• Simon Fairlie's book Meat – A Benign Extravagance
• Simon Fairlie's recent articles on Resilience.org
• 'If you want to save the world, veganism isn't the answer' The Guardian

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• FFS 032 – The Last Acceptable Prejudice
• FFS 029 – Carbon Neutral Restaurants
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The urban-rural divide is more pronounced than ever. The 'last acceptable prejudice' - that against rural people and places - is not only real, it is destructive.

As in our politics, the debates around food and sustainability are increasingly polarised. Conventional agriculture is pitted against organic agriculture, vegans face-off against carnivores, urban city-dwellers clash with countrymen and women. How do we bridge these divides?

In this episode, we talk to Ash Bruxvoort about their story growing up as the daughter of a conventional farmer and a sustainable agriculture advocate.

Ash Bruxvoort is a writer and program coordinator at Women, Food and Agriculture Network. They grew up on a family farm outside of Des Moines, Iowa, where their father produces corn and soybeans. Their writing and work focuses on empowering women and gender non-conforming people to tell their stories about the urban-rural divide. 

We discuss:

• How the urban-rural divide shapes how we see politics and debates around sustainable agriculture
• Ash's take, as a daughter of a conventional farmer, on sustainable agriculture
• How we address 'the last acceptable prejudice' : the prejudice against rural places and people (Wendell Berry)

Links:

• Women, Food and Agriculture Network
• Wendell Berry: The Unsettling of America
• Letters to a Young Farmer – Stone Barns Cener for Food and Agriculture

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• FFS 025 – Breaking bread with Paleo
• FFS 021 – My Beef with Veganism
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In this episode, we talk to Patrick Holden about the hopes and fears of British farming after Brexit.

Patrick is a pioneer of the modern sustainable food movement. He is the Founding Director and current Chief Executive of the Sustainable Food Trust, an organization dedicated to accelerating the transition to more sustainable food and farming systems. Previously, he has been the founding chairman of British Organic Farmers in 1982, and the former Director of the Soil Association, where he played a key role in the development of organic standards and the market for organic foods for nearly 20 years. Patrick is also a farmer, and runs the longest established organic dairy farm in Wales, and wrote the world's first draft of the organic dairy standards in the 80s.

In this episode, Patrick and I discuss:

• The mood in British agriculture towards Brexit
• The UK government's Brexit plan for agriculture
• Brexit: an opportunity for a decisive shift towards sustainable agriculture?
• Brexit's impact on subsidies, trade deals, EU migrant farmworkers, animal welfare and abattoirs
• What Brexit can teach the EU about agriculture

Links:

• Sustainable Food Trust Website
• DEFRA Health and Harmony consultation paper
• Sustainable Food Trust Response to DEFRA paper
• The Guardian: 'UK has nearly 800 livestock mega farms, investigation reveals'

You may also like:

• FFS 028 - Money Well Spent? Farm Subsidies in the EU
• FFS 024 – The Soilution: saving our soil, saving ourselves
• FFS 011 – Transforming Agriculture to Feed the Future

Shifting mindsets at the grassroots level lies at the heart of The Art of Living's approach to sustainable agriculture.

An epidemic of farmer suicides has claimed over 300,000 lives in India since 1995. By investing in social capital, The Art of Living focuses on bringing back self-esteem and self-confidence in rural communities.

Farmers practice yoga, breathing exercises and meditation for stress-relief and personal development - investing in themselves to become productive and proactive advocates for change. Livelihoods are transformed by taking charge and ownership of the challenges faced.

This episode was recorded live at The Art of Living International Center in Bengaluru, India during the visit of students from HEC Paris. Himanshu Kelra, Director of Institutional Relations of the Center, explains The Art of Living's approach to building social capital. The talk covers:

• A brief history of international development aid models in India
• Boreholes crops, depleted aquifers and the tragedy of the commons
• The Art of Living's river rejuvenation projects
• How to build trust, engage and empower rural communities
• How to measure the impact of changing mindsets

Links:

• The Art of Living – Website
• The Art of Living – Projects in India
• The Art of Living – Water projects

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• FFS 026 - We Need To Talk About Monsanto
• FFS 024 - The Soilution: Saving our Soils, Saving Ourselves
• FFS 011 - Transforming Agriculture to Feed the Future