food
Food Deserts
A food desert is a geographic area – often an urban area – where affordable and nutritious food is difficult to obtain, particularly for those without access to an automobile. Food deserts disproportionately affect occupants of poor, low-income neighborhoods where there are often no groceries stores or farmer’s markets. These are places were food comes from convenience stores or fast-food chains. More than 20 million Americans are thought to live in food deserts.
Composting Pays
Many people compost their food scraps and yard waste because they think it is the right thing to do. In some places, like San Francisco and Seattle, there is curbside pickup available to have these organic materials composted.
Elephants On The Wing
For some, vampire bats conjure up thoughts of Dracula. But two recent studies highlight the intelligence of these misunderstood mammals, with noted animal behaviorist Brock Fenton comparing their social skills to elephants.
Climate Change And The Global Food System
One of the most troubling aspects of global climate change is its potential impact on the production, distribution and quality of food. A report issued at the 2015 Paris Climate Conference focused on identifying climate change impacts on global food security. Food security is the ability of people to obtain and use sufficient amounts of safe and nutritious food. Even without the impact of climate change, food security is a challenge because of increasing population, poverty, and changing eating habits.
[Read more…] about Climate Change And The Global Food System
Bromated Flour
Nothing evokes an image of wholesomeness like a loaf of crusty, fresh-baked bread. But the flour used in some baked goods may contain an additive that’s been linked to cancer.
Born On Frozen Lakes
The National Hockey League seems like an unlikely environmental ally. But a sport born on frozen lakes stands to lose a lot in a warming world. NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman is committed to keeping “the air clean and the ponds frozen for future generations.”
Biodiversity And Our Diet
We often talk about the importance of biodiversity in maintaining the health of ecosystems. One ecosystem we don’t often think about in those terms is the human diet.
Feast Before The Famine
New York’s Hudson Valley is experiencing a “mast year.” Mast refers to the seeds of woody plants that are eaten by wildlife. “Soft mast” has seeds surrounded by fleshy pulp, and includes berries and fruits. “Hard mast” has seeds protected by an outer coat, such as acorns and hickory nuts.
Local Food In A Global World
In the Northeast, many are enjoying the last of autumn’s bounty. When we grow fruits and vegetables, we can choose to forgo pesticides, GMOs, or industrial fertilizer. When we shop at farmer’s markets, we support family farms and help maintain open space that we all enjoy.
Reducing Food Waste
We have talked about food waste before. It is a big problem in this country: some 31% of our food supply is wasted, more than 130 billion pounds a year. Food waste makes up 21% of solid waste in municipal landfills, which means that it accounts for the bulk of landfill methane emissions. Methane is more than 20 times more effective as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, and landfills are a major source of it.
A New Labeling Initiative
Hydraulic fracturing – or fracking – is a well-stimulation technique in which rock is fractured by a pressurized liquid to free otherwise trapped natural gas or oil.
Obesity And Food Energy Supply
Obesity is a global health problem and is on the rise in many countries. There are many factors involved in the increasing prevalence of obesity such as increased urbanization, car dependence and sedentary occupations. Of course, the prime culprit is generally thought to be that we eat too much.
Too Warm For Seal Hunting
In the far north of Alaska, generations of hunters have traversed the broken sea ice of Kotzebue Sound every late June and early July hunting for bearded seals. A single seal can supply hundreds of pounds of meat, enough to feed a large family for an entire winter. Its meat and oil products are an important food source.
More About Food Waste
Yesterday we talked about the fact that Americans throw out nearly half of the food they buy. The worst thing about this is that one in seven Americans – over 46 million people – don’t know where their next meal is coming from.
Food Waste
We recently talked about the problem of food waste on this program, in particular, the 1.3 billion tons of food wasted around the world each year. This is a tragic situation given how many people around the world don’t have enough to eat.
It’s National Farmers Market Week!
