As it stands, there is no common way to measure the sustainability of food and farming systems across the world. Not only does this make it hard for farmers and land managers to know the impact of their practices or how they can improve, but it allows the costs of food and farming systems to remain hidden and displaced, as those that pollute or have poor environmental practices are not held financially accountable for the damage caused.
With the United States moving swiftly to fund credits for farmers who store carbon in their soil, there’s growing concern that the program may pay for carbon storage that is already happening—and give fossil companies and other major emitters a free pass to keep polluting.
Summer in the U.S. begins with widespread drought already at historic levels across 11 states. Experts warn of worsening conditions once wildfires start.
Sarah Brunner opened the irrigation spigots on her farm in March, three months early. The rain should have still been falling in California. Now that summer is taking hold, she and her husband are considering shifting their meager water supplies into pastures so their animals will have enough to eat.
A first-of-its-kind study by SFU finds that Indigenous forest gardens filled with fruit and nut trees are still thriving, at least 150 years later
Along Canada’s northwest coast, ancient Indigenous forest gardens — untended for more than 150 years — continue to thrive. Ts’msyen and Coast Salish peoples once planted and cared for plots of native fruit and nut trees, shrubs, and medicinal plants and roots along the north and south Pacific coast, a new Simon Fraser University study finds.
There are many hard lessons learned from the pandemic. One is that our food system needs a serious reboot. Luckily, we need only look to nature’s cycles for clues on how to fix it.
In a circular food economy, food waste becomes valuable, affordable healthy food becomes accessible to everyone and innovation uses a regenerative approach to how food is produced, distributed and consumed.
A new study finds that if all parts of the food system are included, food production is responsible for as much as 40 percent of global emissions.
Emissions from food production, already considered one of the biggest contributors to climate change, have been underestimated for decades, potentially skewing the pledges that countries have made under the Paris climate agreement to cut their greenhouse gas emissions, according to new research.
Every year, much of North America and the world is drenched in the weedkiller glyphosate (the key ingredient in Roundup). Is this safe? Or are we living in a giant test tube?
Since 1974, in the U.S., 1.8 million tons have been sprayed on crops, forests, road sides, waterways, golf courses, lawns and school grounds. Worldwide, 9.4 millions tons have been applied (1). In British Columbia, hundreds of thousands of hectares of forests have been sprayed, with research showing that the residue can linger in some forest plants for up to 12 years (2).
Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US (and the EU) have a great part of the immense wealth of the richest countries in the world in 2021. This wealth is more than sufficient to provide for the needs for food, water, health, housing and education of the global population.
The urban food forest in Browns Mills, Atlanta, is one of more than 70 such initiatives scattered across the United States: all the work of volunteers determined to fight food insecurity through urban agriculture.
Farmers in parts of the Prairies are worrying about crop failures and water-deprived livestock, and communities are already facing local water restrictions and at least one forest fire, as the region enters a period of near-record dry conditions.
