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Climate Food and Agriculture

The Counter
Amelia K. Bates / Grist
Special Series

Climate + Food and Agriculture

EDITOR’S NOTE

Grist has acquired the archive and brand assets of The Counter, a decorated nonprofit food and agriculture publication that we long admired, but that sadly ceased publishing in May of 2022.

The Counter had hit on a rich vein to report on, and we’re excited to not only ensure the work of the staffers and contractors of that publication is available for posterity, but to build on it. So we’re relaunching The Counter as a food and agriculture vertical within Grist, continuing their smart and provocative reporting on food systems, specifically where it intersects with climate and environmental issues. We’ve also hired two amazing new reporters to make our plan a reality.

Being back on the food and agriculture beat in a big way is critical to Grist’s mission to lead the conversation, highlight climate solutions, and uncover environmental injustices. What we eat and how it’s produced is one of the easiest entry points into the wider climate conversation. And from this point of view, climate change literally transforms into a kitchen table issue.

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Featured

Grist / Eva Marie Uzcategui / The Washington Post via Getty Images; Joe Raedle / Getty Images; Getty Images
Grist / Eva Marie Uzcategui / The Washington Post via Getty Images; Joe Raedle / Getty Images; Getty Images

The people who feed America are going hungry

Climate change is escalating a national crisis, leaving farmworkers with empty plates and mounting costs.

Ayurella Horn-Muller Staff Writer

Latest Articles

  • Ask Umbra on flatulence and climate change

    Send your question to Umbra! Q. Dear Umbra, The other day I was sitting on the couch after a day of eating an onion-rich diet and wondered … how much impact can a person have on climate change by avoiding flatulence-producing foods? Resourcefully yours,Rob D. Troubled by your bubbles?A. Dearest Rob, I appreciate your desire […]

    Ask Umbra® Agriculture

  • The Great Brain Robbery and the Seattle Pee Patch

    The neighborhood dogs use my daughter’s vegetable garden as a communal toilet. You can’t blame them really. The garden is right next to the sidewalk and they are just dogs. I suppose you could blame the dog owners holding the leash. But, are my dog-walking neighbors really that obtuse or are they victims of the […]

    Biodiversivist Food

  • Organic farming just as productive as conventional, and better at building soil, Rodale finds

    Organic agriculture is a fine luxury for the rich, but it could never feed the world as global population moves to 9 billion. That’s what a lot of powerful people — including the editors of The Economist — insist. But the truth could well be the opposite: It might be chemical-intensive agriculture that’s the frivolous […]

    Tom Philpott Agriculture

  • I raise pigs on annual pasture crops. Am I farming sustainably?

    Bob Comis with his porkers. Will they leave the land more productive than they found it? Photo: Zach Phillips The concept of sustainability isn’t very useful as a critique of industrial agriculture — all you have to do is create a friendly definition of “sustainable,” and the critique is turned on its head. However, sustainability […]

    Bob Comis Agriculture

  • Study: Organic chicken carries significantly lower salmonella risk

    Want it free of drug-resistant salmonella? Make it organic.Photo: sierravalleygirlThis study from the University of Georgia’s Center for Food Safety came out in November and has bounced around the internet, but for some reason I’m just now noticing it. It’s worth a look. The researchers looked at broilers — chickens raised for meat — from […]

    Tom Philpott Food

  • Journalists eat sugar substitutes so you don’t have to

    So maybe Tom Philpott convinced you to wean yourself off aspartame, or maybe you just think chemical-based sweeteners taste oogy. (Okay, ALL sweeteners are chemical-based, but you know what I mean.) Well, the folks at Salon have taken one for the team, eating a lot of gross cookies so you can know which sugar substitute […]

    Jess Zimmerman Food

  • How much should Japan worry about nuclear food?

    Japan has discovered potentially harmful levels of radiation in Tokyo tap water, and contamination levels in some foodstuffs have been high enough for the U.S. to halt imports.  Even if you live in Japan, you're unlikely to encounter these potentially dangerous eats — contaminated food is being kept out of grocery stores. But just in […]

    Jess Zimmerman Food

  • A well-fed world is a vegetarian world

    Samuel Fromartz doesn't like genetically modified food, but not for the reasons you think. We don't need more food, he argues in the Atlantic, but better access to food — there's actually plenty of food in the world for everyone to have enough, but most people can't get at it. GMOs don't do anything to […]

    Jess Zimmerman Agriculture

  • Introducing … the Vegan/Omnivore Alliance against Animal Factories

    Every day, Americans eat more than a half pound of meat per capita — one of the highest rates on the planet. The vast majority of it is produced with methods that abuse the environment, animals, workers, and public health as a matter of course. The handful of companies that dominate U.S. meat production suck […]

    Tom Philpott Agriculture

  • Can the United States feed China?

    China is worried — and rightfully so — that it might not be able to feed itself.Photo: Jerrold BennettIn 1994, I wrote an article in World Watch magazine entitled “Who Will Feed China?” that was later expanded into a book of the same title. When the article was published in late August, the press conference […]

    Lester Brown Agriculture