Tonight I sat down with Matt Adams to explore a question that sits right at the heart of everything we’re trying to do with food and farming: how do we actually recognise truly good food? Matt talked me through his work on measuring food quality through taste testing and Brix readings, and why he believes we need to shift our thinking from yield per acre to health per acre. We dug into his work with natural farming communities in Andhra Pradesh, India, where growers are moving away from chemical inputs at scale, and discussed the bigger opportunity this creates for farmers everywhere: proving quality in a way that could help them earn properly from producing healthier, better-tasting food. It was one of those conversations that really stops you in your tracks and makes you rethink where you start from — not labels, not dogma, but the end result on the plate.

We then widened the discussion to living soil, local supply chains and practical ways communities can rebuild a healthier food system from the ground up. Alexander joined us to share his long-standing work with Bokashi composting and Effective Microorganisms, explaining how households and communities can turn food waste back into living fertility instead of sending it to landfill. Paul brought in the farmer’s view from the ground, talking about direct selling, regenerative methods, animal health, biodiversity and why local, nutrient-dense food is already changing how younger families buy. Across the whole show, the message was clear: restore life in the soil, reconnect growers and eaters, and we give ourselves a real chance to rebuild health, resilience and value in farming.

• Food For Thought Radio: https://fftradio.com/
• Food Finders Hub: https://foodfindershub.com/
• Conscious Food Systems Alliance: https://consciousfoodsystems.org/
• United Nations Development Programme (UNDP): https://www.undp.org/
• Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO): https://www.fao.org/home/en/
• Andhra Pradesh Community Managed Natural Farming (APCNF): https://apcnf.in/
• NITI Aayog – Natural Farming initiative: https://naturalfarming.niti.gov.in/
• FreshRx Oklahoma: https://www.freshrxok.org/about
• Soil Association: https://www.soilassociation.org/who-we-are/
• Lady Eve Balfour (Soil Association history): https://www.soilassociation.org/who-we-are/our-history/lady-eve/
• EMRO USA – Effective Microorganisms / EM-1: https://www.emrousa.com/
• ATAGO hand-held refractometers (Brix tools): https://atago.net/en/products-master-top.php
• HOPE Sussex Community: https://hopesussex.co.uk/
• Weekend Truth Festival: https://weekendtruthfestival.co.uk/about-us
• Bhutan – Gross National Happiness overview: https://www.mfa.gov.bt/rbedelhi/bhutan-at-glance/gross-national-happiness/
• Big Green Gathering / Green Gathering history: https://www.greengathering.org.uk/past-future/
• International Conferences on Kyusei Nature Farming: https://www.infrc.or.jp/english/14559/