Climate Food and Agriculture
All Stories
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Critical List: Tornado hits Massachusetts; wild lands policy dies an early death
At least four people died after a tornado touched down in Massachusetts. That E. coli strain that's killing people in Europe? Yeah, it's a terrifying, never-been-seen-before mutant. Can the world stop pretending it's in a Robin Cook thriller now, please? The World Bank is going to help cities around the world finance projects that reduce […]
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Down with healthy school lunches, says House GOP
You want me to eat what?Having already moved to gut USDA programs promoting agricultural conservation and renewable energy and strip the USDA of its authority to enact the first meaningful reform of the irredeemably monopolistic livestock industry, House Republicans have now turned their attention to that other great threat to American freedom: USDA nutrition guidelines. […]
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Why wasting food wastes nature, too
Waste not, want not: In order to meet global food demand, we should decrease food waste instead of expanding agriculture.Photo: Christoph LupprichCross-posted from Cool Green Science. A new report by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations finds that globally, roughly one-third of all food produced for human consumption is wasted. But […]
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Mom-and-pop vs. big-box stores in the food desert
A locally owned grocery in Pleasantville, Iowa. Photo: Ashton B Crew, wikimedia commonsA few weeks ago, when the Obama administration released its Food Desert Locator, many of us realized that a once-good idea has spoiled like a bag of old bread. If you go online and find that your family lives in a food desert, […]
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Spice up your sustainable pantry: Look for fair trade seasonings
Your award-winning chili recipe calls for grass-fed beef, organic tomatoes, and locally grown carrots. But what about the cumin? The salt? The chili powder? We greens have been well trained by now to look for fair trade everything, but sustainable spices have received less attention than other make-your-life-better products like chocolate and coffee. But many […]
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‘Ag-gag’ bills face tough row to hoe
As you were saying?Big Ag is having trouble installing its Iron Curtain. I am referring, of course, to the various “ag-gag” laws proposed in Florida, Minnesota, and Iowa that would make it illegal to produce (and, in some cases, possess) undercover videos from within factory livestock farms. The latest state legislature to pursue this dubious […]
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Mark Zuckerberg kills his meat with his bare hands
You wouldn’t know it to look at him, but Mark Zuckerberg is gunning to be the new Ted Nugent. The Facebook founder/Übernerd/kabillionaire is now only eating meat he slaughters himself. At least, that’s what he claims his status update reading “I just killed a pig and a goat” means, and issues or no, he doesn't […]
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Change in season: Why salt doesn’t deserve its bad rap
A good pinch of this won’t do you any harm.For something that’s so often mixed with anti-caking agents, salt takes a lot of lumps in the American imagination. Like fat, people tend to think of it as an unnecessary additive — something to be avoided by seeking out processed foods that are “free” of it. […]
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The $200 backyard barbecue
This is what's going to convince Americans to invest in local food and alternative energy: the demise of the backyard barbecue. High gas prices are finally trickling down into U.S. food markets, and the red-meat-loving New York Post has calculated that an outlay of burgers, hot dogs, trimmings, potato salad, and ice cream will cost […]
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Now that the FDA itself has found BPA in canned foods, will it regulate the poison?
Oh, yes we can: It’s time for the FDA to act on its own information regarding canned foods and BPA.The next time an FDA panel convenes to discuss whether to ban BPA, the endocrine-disrupting industrial chemical used in can liners, it will have new data to consider — a study by the agency’s own scientists. […]
