Food & Agriculture Stories
How do we feed a growing and more affluent population without the environmental collateral damage? The Anthropocene’s coverage of food and agriculture digs deep into innovations in farming, aquaculture, filling the global protein gap, reducing the carbon footprint of supply chains, and more.
Here’s one way to save farmland: synthesize starch from CO2
Researchers develop a method to make this crucial industrial ingredient 8.5 times faster than nature can — with potential consequences for food security and land savings
‘Ugly produce’ is having a marketing moment
In a surprising discovery, researchers found that shoppers were more likely to buy wonky produce labeled as 'ugly' than wonky produce left unlabeled or called ‘imperfect’
A wild grass gene endows wheat with the power to intercept fertilizer pollution
Applied to different cultivars, this discovery has the potential to not only slash nitrate pollution, but also agricultural greenhouse gases
Researchers calculate the value of bivalves’ appetite for pollution. It’s huge.
If coastal cities planted clam beds along the urban edge, they could save millions in nitrogen clean-up costs
Butter Is Toast
Margarine has a significantly lower environmental impact than butter in four important areas: global warming potential (i.e., carbon footprint), eutrophication potential, acidification potential, and land impact
Sometimes the birds and bees are about something more important than sex. Coffee.
In a ground-breaking study, scientists reveal how the combined power of biodiversity—in this case, pest control and pollination services—is greater than individual ecological services.
Insect farming byproducts are piling up. They could be fertilizer in a circular agricultural system.
Adding insect exoskeletons and “frass” to farm soils, researchers say, can nourish plants through a series of complex and fascinating interactions with microorganisms.
Putting a sustainable diet in context generates some surprises
A team of researchers meticulously designed a new personalized tool to compare what low-impact diets look like depending on country, season, sex, dietary supplements, and other details
Cocoa butter might be the secret ingredient for 3D-printed plant-based meat
The fatty material liquefies at higher temperatures and congeals when cold, helping the printed meat hold its shape
We’re running out of phosphorus for farming. Whales and other wildlife could build it back up
In an ambitious thought experiment, researchers show how restoring wildlife to pre-Industrial levels could achieve several billion dollars-worth of phosphorus production.
