In his book Global Problems and the Culture of Capitalism, Richard Robbins weighs the environmental costs of a staple of the US diet: beef. In mathematical number of calories, beef is an inefficient food that requires huge food input. Cattle feed accounts for 80% of US grain production and about half of US water consumption. This inefficiency is magnified as… Read more »
Each component of the global food system depends on a healthy planet. What is a healthy planet? It is not just the absence of air pollution, global warming, landfills, deforestation, oil spills, etc. A healthy planet, and therefore a healthy global food ecology (socially, politically, environmentally) also boils down to healthy dirt, nutrient-rich soil and water, microbial symbiosis… all sorts… Read more »
Agriculture, value added (% of GDP). (n.d.). Retrieved August 19, 2017, from http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NV.AGR.TOTL.ZS?end=2016&locations=KE&start=1960&view=chart For me the greatest insight from my research is how developing countries can fight back against SAP’s. My research focused on Kenya where the agriculture had been successful for two decades after independence. However, since Kenya was one of the first countries to agree to SAP’s… Read more »
Water is the new oil…meaning that moving forward conflicts over resources will concern water. The finite amount of water, growing world population and continued climate change will force us to make some tough decisions in the near future. One of these tough decisions involves poppy farmers in Afghanistan. It is easy and not necessarily wrong to conclude that growing poppy… Read more »
Fossil fuels are at the epicenter of the political ecology of the world food system. The direct correlation that fossil fuels have on various feedback loops are a fundamental concept to understand. The economical aspects of utilizing fossil fuels are enormous and were the reason for rapid growth coming into the 21st century. The results of such growth have led… Read more »