Michael Grunwald, a seasoned journalist known for his work on public policy and climate issues, discusses his latest book about the intertwined challenges of our food system and climate change. He reveals the role of agriculture in environmental degradation and critiques biofuels while advocating for sustainable practices. Grunwald also highlights the potential of alternative proteins to address unsustainable meat consumption and urges for innovative agricultural solutions as a means to combat the climate crisis.
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insights INSIGHT
Land Use's Hidden Climate Cost
Land use is central in assessing climate impact of agriculture and biofuels.
Ignoring land's cost leads to damaging effects like deforestation and biodiversity loss.
insights INSIGHT
More Food, Less Land, Less Emissions
Feeding the world requires producing more food using less land with fewer emissions.
Expanding agriculture leads to critical deforestation and environmental degradation.
insights INSIGHT
Yield Matters More Than Methods
Organic and regenerative farming often yield less food per acre, risking more land use.
Efficient mixed methods with higher yields can reduce environmental pressures better.
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The Race to Fix Our Food System and Save Our Climate
Michael Grunwald
In this book, Michael Grunwald delves into the critical issue of the global food system's impact on the environment and climate. He highlights how humanity's agricultural practices have led to significant land clearance, deforestation, and carbon emissions. Grunwald argues that despite the challenges, there are potential solutions such as adopting industrial farming methods, reducing food waste, and shifting towards more sustainable diets. The book chronicles the stories of scientists and entrepreneurs working on innovative solutions like genetically edited cattle and plant-based meat substitutes. It also emphasizes the need for better policy, technology, and behavioral changes to address the looming crisis of feeding a growing population without exacerbating climate change and biodiversity loss.
Michael Grunwald is a well renown journalist, who over the last thirty years has focused on public policy and national politics, with the last fifteen years having him zeroing in or climate-related issues. His current book, which he wrote this after six years of research. It was a passionate journey to understand, not to advocate for any position.
Because of his reporting for such publications as the Boston Globe, the Washington Post and Politico magazine, Michael won the George Polk Award for national reporting and the Worth Bingham Prize for investigative reporting, as well as being honored with many other journalism honors.
This is Michael’s third book, and like the previous two, his journalistic research and writing states the major challenges to the feeding the world’s population, but also provides a visionary path forward.
This book not only delves into agriculture practices and consumers’ choices about food, but the focus is on the immense climate impact from poor land land-use decisions.
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