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

  • Reinventing the supermarket: How New York’s Eataly falls short

    Eataly is nice, but there’s still plenty of room left to reinvent the supermarket.Photo: Samantha DeckerThe American supermarket experience hasn’t changed much in a half century. It’s basically a connect-the-dots problem each consumer solves differently: How do you get in, get the things on your list, avoid those annoying people with the slow-moving carts, and […]

    Wayne Curtis Food

  • Aspartame is not the only thing in diet cola that can kill you

    What evil lurks in that can of refreshment?Photo: Jeff GoldenTurns out, it’s not just the fake sweetener in Diet Pepsi and Diet Coke that might cause cancer; it’s also the coloring agent. The cans these beverages come in aren’t so healthy, either. Modern-day commercial colas (both diet and regular) get their characteristic dark hue from […]

    Tom Philpott Food

  • This is Flint, Michigan, in all its pain and all its glory

    Buick City parking lot, 2010.Photos: Wes Janz, except when notedCross-posted from Places [at] Design Observer, an online journal of architecture, landscape and urbanism, published in partnership with Design Observer. “Distressed are big chunks of Detroit, Flint, Gary, Chicago, East St. Louis, and Cincinnati.” This is what I wrote after completing the weeklong Midwess Distress Tour with […]

    Wes Janz Agriculture

  • Why raising the price of school lunch is a bad idea

    Scene from Dickens’ Oliver Twist. Drawing by George Cruikshank, circa 1837.At a time when many families are struggling with money — and racking up millions of dollars in debt at school cafeterias — school lunch is about to get more expensive. The hike is mandated by the recent Child Nutrition Reauthorization passed by Congress and […]

    Ed Bruske Food

  • Chicken, antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and regulatory independence

    In Meat Wagon, we round up the latest outrages from the meat and livestock industries. ——— Would you like that chicken tainted with salmonella with resistance to one, two, three, or four different antibiotics? We also have six and seven. Consumer choice! After my post Monday on aspartame’s wild and wacky path from pharmaceutical-company lab […]

    Tom Philpott Agriculture

  • Why playing with your food is serious business

    Sometimes, you just want to get your hands on some food and goof around. Don’t worry; it just means you’re human.  Sometimes, I cook when I’m hungry. Then there are those times I find myself heading into the kitchen with a strong drive for … well … nothing in particular. And I’m not even hungry. […]

    Carol Deppe Food

  • Killing a bison and eating it raw [VIDEO]

    My vegetarian girlfriend/camera operator refuses to watch this week’s video, so I won’t be insulted if you skip over it. I’ll be more impressed, though, if you watch. The slaughter is followed by a recipe for bison tartare. When you’ve seen the farm, and the butchering process, raw is a non-issue. For those of you […]

    Daniel Klein Food

  • Ask Umbra Book Club: The history of ‘adulterated’ food and gross-food urban legends

    Give us this day our daily bread, as long as we know what went into it.Photo: LaCheryl PorterDearest readers, Last week, we kicked off our discussion of Bill Bryson’s At Home: A Short History of Private Life. You can catch up here. Let’s move our conversation into what is perhaps the heart of a house: […]

    Ask Umbra® Agriculture

  • Why is Trader Joe’s short-changing farmworker justice?

    Hey Trader Joe’s: respect the people who harvest the food you sell. Photo: Scott RobertsonOver the past two decades, Trader Joe’s has grown rapidly as bargain-hunting foodies swarmed into its outlets. The chain now runs more than 350 stores with sales topping $8 billion in 2009. The secret to its dazzling success? Fortune magazine describes […]

    Sean Sellers Agriculture

  • Victims of tainted peanut butter outbreak demand criminal charges

    Peanut Corporation of America execs knowingly sent out tainted peanut butter — that eventually killed people. Will they pay the price? Last Friday, I spoke at the Government Accountability Project Food Integrity Campaign conference. During the lunch break, food safety attorney and advocate Bill Marler hosted a press event with 10 family members of victims […]

    Michele Simon Food