Growing Corn in the Desert, No Irrigation Required
This story was originally published by Reasons to be Cheerful, and is reprinted with permission. When Michael Kotutwa Johnson goes out to the acreage behind his stone house to harvest his corn, his fields look vastly different from the endless rows of corn you see in much of rural North America. Bundled in groups of […]
Can Human Urine Fertilize Our Crops?
This story originally appeared at Ambrook Research. Twice a growing season, a big yellow truck with the license plate “P4FARMS” pulls into Jesse Kayan’s farm in Brattleboro, Vermont, loaded with a thousand gallons of pasteurized human urine sloshing around in IBC totes. For more than 10 years, Kayan has been applying human urine to his […]
The High Tech Farm
Farming has come a long way in the last few years. We know, from the last census of agriculture, that farm life is changing. The number of farms is dropping, while the size of the average farm is going up. That means fewer farmers are working more land. In order to be efficient, farmers have […]
Spotlight On the Students Growing Kalo in Hawai’i
On a Friday morning in late September, the students in Naʻau ʻŌiwi gathered in Māhukona on the North Kohala Coast of Hawai’i Island to build beehive boxes. The apiary they are building will produce honey for their secret recipe plans for the statewide Kalo Challenge, which is the culmination of their nine-month program that […]
The Night Shift
Every morning, for years, Josana Pinto da Costa would venture out onto the waterways lining Óbidos, Brazil, in a small fishing boat. She would glide over the murky, churning currents of the Amazon River Basin, her flat nets bringing in writhing hauls as the sun ascended into the cerulean skies above. Scorching temperatures in the […]
Top 12 Food Changemakers of the Year
Our food systems in North American can be complicated. While there is plenty of food, many people struggle with access to enough food, and farmers may have difficulties reaching local communities interested in their products. Over 2024, we covered many people working to address these systemic issues. This collection is a look back over the […]
Spotlight On One Texas School District Revolutionizing School Lunch
When Marissa Bell started working for the Lake Travis Independent School District in Austin, Texas in 2020, she didn’t know the food supply chain was about to be turned on its head. As the dietitian and marketing coordinator for Lake Travis ISD, Bell is responsible for ensuring students have medically and culturally appropriate foods to […]
Here’s Why School Lunches Matter
School lunch is more than just a meal for students to fuel them for the day. It’s an opportunity for students to discover new foods, learn about their community and take a personal role in their own health. As inflation and the scale-back of pandemic-era boosts to SNAP and other government food programs threaten access […]
Top 10 Conscious Consumption Stories of 2024
This year, we brought you many stories of people connecting with their food, and examining how they consume it. From looking at the true cost of eating meat, to reckoning with just how much plastic we use even in our home gardens, we explored how we consume and participate in our food system. Here, we’ve […]
Top 10 Food Equity Stories of 2024
Food can be a tricky thing. While we produce enough food for people globally, it doesn’t always get distributed equally. Food is also a powerful cultural connector, and can bring communities together. This year, we looked at many stories of food access and equity, and what food means to people. From exclusive avocados and exorbitantly […]