Policy 360

Kelly Brownell and Billy Pizer discuss the pros and cons of different policy approaches to climate change, from carbon taxes to cleaner automobiles and renewable energy. They also discuss the potential for these options to succeed given the polarized political landscape. From 2008 to 2011, Pizer was deputy assistant secretary for environment and energy in the U.S. Department of the Treasury, where he created and led a new office responsible for the department’s role in the domestic and international environment and energy agenda of the U.S. Pizer joined the faculty of the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University in the fall of 2011. The two discuss the pros and cons of different policy approaches to climate change.

North Carolina’s contentious political climate is making national headlines. But there's a new effort to get people with differing political viewpoints talking civilly to each other. 

Will Chile be the first country to end obesity? Health expert Barry Popkin of the Nutrition Transition Research Program at UNC Chapel Hill says yes. Another in series about the future of food policy.

Mexico taxed soda, and people drank less of them. Barry Popkin, director of the Nutrition Transition Research program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, talks about why the tax worked and what it means.

Finland used to have a diet with high saturated fat and sodium. No anymore. A conversation with Francesco Branca of the World Health Organization. Part of series on the future of food policy.

Another in our series of conversation with global food leaders. Francesco Branca, Director of the Department of Nutrition for Health and Development at the World Health Organization, says there's a need for change. "People have been talking about a food revolution," he says. "I think we should believe in it."

Series on food continues with Lisel Loy of the Bipartisan Policy Center. She proposes new training for doctors on obesity issues, and a change in the way doctors are paid.

"We can't keep on doing the thing we're doing right now with agriculture. It's like Saudi Arabia frittering away their oil." - Dr. Ricardo Salvador, Union of Concerned Scientists

The world faces problems in supplying food to its growing population. Savvy business leaders are trying to adapt. Conversation with Betsy Holden, former co-CEO of Kraft Foods and CEO of Kraft Foods North America. Holden is a consultant for McKinsey & Company. 

Are U.S. black women aging faster deep in their cells due to stress? Listen to an exploration of this novel theory. Duke Sanford Assistant Professor Jay Pearson talks with Kelly Brownell.