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food systems
Could High Fertilizer Prices Change the Face of Farming?
The development of agroecological and regenerative approaches would see a food system that is not only less vulnerable to the supply chain shocks being felt today, but would be better for the environment, human health, and animals.
May 17, 2026
The global disruptions caused by the war in Iran have brought renewed focus to the vulnerability of global fossil fuel supply chains. But what has received less attention is how the war also highlights the vulnerability of industrial agriculture supply chains reliant on massive amounts of chemical fertilizers and other inputs. Like oil and gas, these frequently travel long distances through turbulent waters.
A big advantage of renewable energy technologies like solar is that sunlight doesn’t have to pass through the Straits of Hormuz. The same can be said for many of the inputs required for agroecological and regenerative farming systems. The development of these approaches would see a food system that is not only less vulnerable to the supply chain shocks being felt today, but would be better for the environment, human health, and animals. It would be healthier, kinder, and more resilient.
A global economic recession and possible food shortages are looming as the war in Iran grinds on. While the devastating impact of the current conflict on people, their families, and communities must be foremost in our minds, the shock waves from the crisis are having system-wide impacts on energy supplies, cost of living, and food prices. As the seasons turn and farmers prepare to plant their crops, they are facing a new pressure: a sudden and critical rise in fertilizer and fuel costs.
As the price of petrol and diesel have skyrocketed since the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, so too have fertilizer costs due to shortages of urea and ammonia. A third of the world's key fertilizer chemicals pass through the Strait, and prices have risen steeply since the outbreak of war, with predictions that prices for nitrogen-based fertilizers like urea could roughly double if the war drags on. Alongside a rise in red diesel prices, agricultural profit margins are highly volatile.
The current war is heinous, but inadvertently it has created an inflexion point, a moment to rethink global distribution of goods, and our broken food system.
Farmers taking the financial hit will likely pass on the costs to the consumer, but this isn’t sustainable and undermines the financial, social, and environmental health of the global food system. What if we flip it? Could the Middle East War not only accelerate a shift to renewable energy but also reduce our dependency on fertilizer-hungry crops? Legumes such as beans and peas, which fix nitrogen in soils, root vegetables, soybeans, and hardy grains such as rye could be viable alternatives.
Since the Second World War, a burgeoning (and hugely profitable for a few) chemical industry has created food systems dependent on inputs such as fossil fuel-based fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides. While delivering greater crop surplus, industrial farming has brought new problems: algal blooms, less wildlife and pollinators, monocultures, local air pollution, global climate change, and the loss of small-scale farming and farmers.
We’ve reached a tipping point; we overproduce food, a third of which is wasted, and too many people are eating too much of the wrong types of food. Noncommunicable diseases such as cardiovascular disease and diabetes are becoming a much bigger health burden than infectious diseases. Meanwhile, entrenched inequalities mean that, despite a global food surplus, millions of people go hungry every day, and 2.6 billion people can’t afford a healthy diet. An insatiable demand for meat now means that there are over 76 billion farmed chicken, pigs, and cattle in production around the planet, driving a largely invisible burden of animal suffering.
The current war is heinous, but inadvertently it has created an inflexion point, a moment to rethink global distribution of goods, and our broken food system. Growing crops that don’t need so many fossil fuel-derived chemicals but still provide enough food to feed our populations, and sustainable farming for current and future generations, is where we should be heading. We need to transition away from industrial agriculture, to food systems built on fairness—to people, animals, and the planet—not one geared toward feeding animals to feed ourselves. It’s a stark reality that over one-third of land used to grow arable crops is used to grow crops for animal feed.
Animal farming industry groups have been calling for public money to weather supply shocks, which begs the question of how resilient are the industrial systems we currently rely on. The US government provided $1 billion in response to avian flu, for example, while the European Union directed €46.7 million to Italian farmers, plus another €15 million for weather and animal-disease-related impacts in parts of Europe, and Canada extended livestock tax relief linked to bovine TB and extreme weather. The Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO) is also calling for urgent action in the form of government funds to protect the countries heavily exposed to import disruptions.
It’s clear that the current industrial animal farming model is not resilient. It depends heavily on unstable supply chains exposed to geopolitical shocks, climate change, extreme weather events, and disease outbreaks, and is a deeply inefficient use of plant resources to feed the world. Yet public money keeps being used to stabilize food systems that are structurally fragile, rather than directed toward sustainable and humane agriculture.
The current crisis in the Middle East has once again spotlighted our dependence on fossil fuels for energy and for food production. The growing success of renewable energy technologies—wind, solar, electric vehicles, and heat pumps—provides a roadmap to achieving energy independence at local and national levels. This has been achieved through several decades of policy and fiscal support, such as feed-in tariffs, technological advances, and growing public support.
Changing how we produce food could advance rapidly on the coat tails of our energy revolution. Calls for a just transition in farming and food production are growing from independent, small-scale farmers to development organizations, from Indigenous people’s groups to animal welfare charities. This transition would pivot away from destructive, insecure industrial agriculture toward more equitable, humane, and sustainable forms of agriculture, such as agroecology.
Rethinking food is not a nice to have, it’s essential if we are to strengthen the resilience of farmers, consumers, and nations, reducing exposure to geopolitical tensions, supply-chain disruptions, and future global shocks.
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From 'Clean Eating' to Clean Rules: What Progressives Can Collaborate On With MAHA
The question isn’t whether the two groups share a few habits; it’s whether they can work together to build the political muscle needed to implement regulations that make everyone safer.
May 04, 2026
Eat real food. Buy organic. Filter your water.
Scroll through Instagram and you’ll find no shortage of such advice from the “MAHA girls,”—young women drawn to the Make America Healthy Again movement. If you have been accustomed to MAHA through its most famous champion—Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who helped popularize the slogan—#MAHA girls show a wider and growing allure of MAHA and their messages.
It’s tempting for progressives to either mock them or tune out, especially given their association with the current administration. But that would be a mistake. Not because MAHA has the right solutions—it often doesn’t—but because it names a real problem: Our modern lives are saturated with industrial contaminants from which individual consumer hacks can’t protect us.
As a sociologist who studies food systems, I recognize the mix of anxiety and practicality driving this trend. The MAHA movement’s concerns overlap with long-standing environmental and public health priorities championed by progressives. But the question isn’t whether these groups share a few “clean” habits; it’s whether they can work together to build the political muscle needed to implement regulations that make everyone safer.
Rather than rejecting MAHA’s sentiments, progressives need to listen carefully to the experiences that drive this movement, while being mindful of the limits of individual actions.
Consider glyphosate, the active ingredient in the herbicide Roundup. There has been ongoing debate over its potential consequences. Thousands of lawsuits have been filed against Monsanto and its parent company, Bayer. And on April 27, the US Supreme Court heard arguments in Monsanto v. Durnell. The MAHA movement is watching the case closely and held a protest outside the Supreme Court.
Environmental and public health advocates have warned about these chemicals for decades. On this point, MAHA advocates and progressive environmentalists are aligned: Both want glyphosate out of the food system.
Or take fermented foods. My book, Fermenting for the Future, traces the decline of fermentation practices in industrial societies and the resulting loss of gut microbial diversity. Our guts are often described as the “industrial microbiota”—but thanks to our modern food system, they are becoming a less diverse ecosystem linked to a rise in chronic conditions. That’s because industrial food systems don’t just add questionable additives; they also reshape “traditional” foods that are standardized, pasteurized, or only nominally fermented—optimized for cost and convenience.
Here, too, MAHA supporters often agree. They champion fermented foods such as kimchi and miso and emphasize gut health. These concerns have even entered mainstream policy, as seen in the 2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which highlighted gut health and fermented foods.
Usually, MAHA’s intellectual roots are traced simply to MAGA (Make America Great Again). But its intellectual roots run deeper: health freedom movements, environmentalism, and women’s health activism—many of which have progressive roots.
But there are key differences and they matter.
First, MAHA discourse is marked by a strong current of purism: the idea that we can purify our bodies, homes, and communities if we shop correctly and avoid the “bad” stuff. Purism often draws a moral boundary between the “pure” and the “impure.” Historically, such thinking can slide from labeling chemicals as “impure” to applying the same labels to people—feeding stigma, exclusion, and conspiracy thinking.
Purism also rests on an illusion. We live in a world saturated with contaminants—from microplastics to forever chemicals—such that we are, in a sense, born “pre-polluted.” To try to shield ourselves individually by careful shopping choices is impossible and creates a sense of false security.
Second, the movement is deeply shaped by healthism—an idea that puts most of the responsibility for health on personal behavior. If you feel unwell, the MAHA approach is to take personal steps: Monitor your glucose, eliminate processed foods, buy organic. Structural factors—regulation, labor conditions, environmental exposure—fade into the background.
This is a paradox. While MAHA advocates sometimes call for tighter regulation of certain substances, their overall mindset often distrusts government and scientists, which limits their willingness for necessary systemic reforms and support for experts.
Healthism also obscures inequality. The capacity to “choose health” is unevenly distributed. A single mother juggling multiple precarious jobs likely lacks both the time to research good supplements and the income to purchase organic foods. Without structural changes in how food is produced, regulated, and distributed, those with fewer resources will continue to bear higher burdens—and then be blamed for their circumstances.
Despite these differences, the underlying overlap to progressive causes offers a window of opportunity. Many of the MAHA girls on Instagram are responding to real personal experiences that speak to larger issues: chronic symptoms without clear diagnoses, medical visits that feel rushed or dismissive. Conditions such as allergies, eczema, irritable bowel syndrome, and diabetes have become prevalent, and the fear that today’s generation may fare worse than their parents cannot be waved away as mere hyperbole.
Rather than rejecting MAHA’s sentiments, progressives need to listen carefully to the experiences that drive this movement, while being mindful of the limits of individual actions. If we are serious about making Americans—and the environments we inhabit—healthier, we can’t rely on individual choices alone.
We should meet this moment with “clean rules,” not just clean eating. Tackling bad food requires sustained advocacy for better regulations that foremostly consider the existing and potential harms to the most socioeconomically marginalized, such as farm laborers, fenceline communities, and the poor. And better food governance requires more support for scientists and public agencies that help to build a solid knowledge base for regulations and for them to be fully enforced.
“Clean” also means addressing conflict of interests in appointment of officials, in scientific data gathering, and in the endorsement of “solutions” including commercial products. Those reforms would help everyone—including the people with the least time and money to manage risk on their own.
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Why Climate Action Must Start on Our Plates
Rebalancing industrial animal farming cuts emissions, limits disease risk, protects biodiversity, and strengthens food security, reminding us that human, animal, and planetary well-being are inseparable.
Nov 10, 2025
Every year, world leaders gather to tackle the climate crisis. They promise to cut emissions, restore forests, and invest in a greener future. Yet one of the most powerful tools for change often goes unmentioned: the food on our plates.
After more than a decade of working in, and with, the United Nations, I’ve learned something crucial: Food sits at the center of everything we are trying to protect—our climate, biodiversity, health, and livelihoods. This year, for the first time, food systems are formally part of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference of Parties (UNFCCC COP30) Action Agenda—a long-overdue recognition of their central role in solving the climate crisis. Still, too often, they remain the missing piece in global climate discussions.
The science is clear. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates that food systems—from how we grow and process food to how we transport and waste it—account for about a third of global greenhouse gas emissions.
The message is simple: We cannot fix the climate crisis while ignoring what we eat.
A Hopeful Solution Within Reach
This reality should give us hope. Food offers a solution that is immediate, inclusive, and within reach. Every meal is a chance to make things better.
Plant-rich eating is not a trend or a restriction. It is a climate solution, backed by science and rooted in fairness. Research in Nature shows plant-rich diets produce 75% less climate-heating emissions compared with high-meat diets, while using 75% less land and 54% less water. By eating this way, we can cut global food emissions by nearly one-third, improve public health, and ease the pressure on forests and ecosystems.
As negotiations unfold in Belém, COP30 offers a historic opportunity to embed food systems into the heart of climate policy.
But consumption is only part of the picture. World leaders must change how food is produced. Industrial farming, which relies heavily on deforestation and feed crop production, drives much of the problem. At COP30, hosted in Brazil, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has pledged bold action to protect forests, including a $1 billion commitment to the Tropical Forests Forever Fund. Reducing the expansion of soy and maize for feed—a major driver of deforestation—is essential not only for reducing emissions, but also for helping communities adapt, especially in vulnerable regions.
At Compassion in World Farming, we see this every day in our work with farmers, policymakers, and communities. Agroecological and regenerative practices, such as crop rotation, help restore soils and reduce the need for synthetic fertilizers. They also align with traditional and Indigenous knowledge that works with nature rather than against it.
Why This Matters to Me
As a father of a Gen Alpha child, I think about what kind of planet my daughter will inherit. We eat three times a day, every day, and we will do it for the rest of our lives. Our choices shape whether her world is sustainable or fragile.
I have been part of countless UN meetings and summits on climate, food systems, and sustainable development. In the past year, I have witnessed growing momentum across the UN system to integrate food into climate discussions, especially following the UN Food Systems Summit (UNFSS) and the COP28 Declaration on Food and Agriculture’s recommendations. This shift is encouraging and signals the world is ready to treat food systems as central to climate action.
When I look at my daughter’s future, I want to believe that we will have the courage to connect these dots: to see that what we grow and eat is not just personal preference but global policy.
What Leaders Must Do
At COP30 in Belém, governments have a chance to change course. To do so, they must:
- Integrate food into climate plans. Countries’ climate pledges, known as Nationally Determined Contributions, should include agriculture, livestock, strategies to eat more sustainably, and reducing food waste. They must move away from industrial farming and feed crop expansion toward regenerative agricultural practices that cut emissions and build resilience.
- Make plant-rich diets a climate priority. This is not about telling people what to eat but enabling sustainable, lower-emission choices that realistically align with the planet’s ecological boundaries. In practical terms, the recently launched EAT-Lancet 2.0 report, supported by leading scientists and policymakers, offers a clear and actionable framework for countries to adopt healthier, climate-friendly diets.
- Support farmers through a just transition. Those least responsible for climate change, who tend to be the most vulnerable populations, must be supported with finance, capacity building, and fair access to markets.
These shifts must fit local realities. In the Global South, diets, cultural traditions, and nutritional needs vary widely. Supporting plant-rich diets must go hand in hand with respecting local contexts and ensuring food sovereignty.
A New Kind of Climate Leadership
Reframing food as climate action must include the recognition that human, animal, and planetary health are deeply connected and dependent. Rebalancing industrial animal farming cuts emissions, limits disease risk, protects biodiversity, and strengthens food security, reminding us that human, animal, and planetary well-being are inseparable.
As negotiations unfold in Belém, COP30 offers a historic opportunity to embed food systems into the heart of climate policy—not just as a mitigation tool, but as a pathway for adaptation, resilience, and equity. Global action on food must reflect its true potential: to drive down emissions, regenerate ecosystems, and chart a more sustainable future for everyone.
This is the climate leadership we need: bold, inclusive, and rooted in the principle that climate action begins with what we eat.
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In the Year of Climate Finance, We Need to See Billions Flow Towards Transforming Our Food Systems
A growing coalition of philanthropic organizations, under the Global Alliance for the Future of Food, is committing to scale up funding for agroecological food systems to address intersecting challenges across climate, food and nature.
Jun 23, 2024
This year climate finance is all the talk. As the UN Climate Conference in Bonn wraps up and the stage is set for COP29 later this year, expectations are high for governments to agree on a new climate finance package that will tackle the worsening climate and ecological crises.
In many countries, food production is the climate frontline. Nearly 95% of nationally determined contributions (NDCs) include adaptation and mitigation actions in the agriculture sector yet fail to address the full food system.
It only takes one climate disaster—a drought, flood or heatwave—for entire villages to spiral into debt, poverty and hunger, impacting regional food systems and economies.
Responding to the climate and nature crises, will require a transformation of food systems backed by a rapid redirection of funds to flip agriculture from being part of the problem to offering solutions. Last year, 25 philanthropies—coordinated by the Global Alliance for the Future of Food—called for a tenfold increase in funding towards agroecological and regenerative approaches. Philanthropy, multilateral and bilateral organizations and governments must scale and align funding to catalyze a transition to 50% regenerative and agroecological systems by 2040 and to ensure all agriculture and food systems are transitioning by 2050. Read the full report.
Right now, industrialized food systems account for one-third of greenhouse gas emissions and at least 15% of fossil fuel use. This broken system—the ‘true cost’ of food production—comes at a staggering $12 trillion a year, according to the FAO last year. It manifests in hefty medical bills and the degradation of our soil, air, water, and biodiversity.
In this decisive decade, the way we grow, consume and package our food cannot be ignored or siloed in an all-hands-on-deck effort to meet our climate and biodiversity goals.
Moving away from a fossil-fuel based food system will not be cheap. It requires unlocking $250-430 billion per year, but this is in fact cheaper— than what is currently spent each year on harmful agricultural subsidies ($635 billion each year) and a fraction of the true cost of current food production.
Right now, investments into agroecology and regenerative approaches by the philanthropic, public, and the private sectors is estimated to be just $44 billion per year.
As representatives of leading philanthropy we are committed to scaling up funding into agroecological and regenerative approaches as a means to leverage existing policies that address the challenges of climate change and biodiversity loss. By embracing agroecology, communities have better control over the food they produce to future-proof their livelihoods and to make decisions to strengthen food sovereignty based on locally-tested solutions and knowledge.
There is a political appetite to make this transition and intergrate agroecological approaches into policy.
For example, the Tanzania government has worked with national civil society organizations to develop a National Ecological Organic Agriculture Strategy and implementation plan. Similar agroecology strategies are being developed in other Eastern African countries, like Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda. Priority actions include making agroecological and bio-inputs available, ensuring avenues for knowledge exchange and skills-sharing among farmers, expanding market access for food producers, mainstreaming village land use planning, fostering investments across the value chain, and supporting coordination, capacity building and governance at all levels.
And they’re not alone. In the Andes, smallholder farmers are stewarding thousands of varieties of native potatoes, preserving their cultural heritage, supporting their livelihoods and providing food for domestic consumption while also growing new markets in collaboration with researchers, civil society experts and other food system actors. Mountains are unique ecosystems, many of which are biodiversity hotspots and home to Indigenous Peoples. Mountain ecosystems are generally forgotten in national and international discussions, but are critical to biodiversity and resilience, especially in the face of climate change. The Andes are also not an island—they are critical for the existence of the Amazon and in turn the Amazon has a dramatic influence on the climate of the Andes, highlighting the interconnectedness that very often is broken by industrial agriculture. Support for Indigenous and agroecological approaches is vital to sustain the important contributions made by smallholder farmers in building thriving and sustainable local and regional food economies.
In this decisive decade, the way we grow, consume and package our food cannot be ignored or siloed in an all-hands-on-deck effort to meet our climate and biodiversity goals. It’s a race against time and we urgently need to see the money—in the tens of billions of dollars—move towards real solutions, particularly where policies are ready to be turned into action.
We are calling on governments, the private sector and other philanthropic partners to join us in this initiative and commit to scaling up their investments so communities, Indigenous Peoples and the health and the future of all living beings and the planet are at the center of our financial decisions.
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I Loved a Sheep and I Also Loved Lamb Chops. Until I Realized the Two Were Not Compatible
We can build a more peaceful and healthy world right now, so let’s start eating for the future we want today.
Jan 21, 2024
I have many friends who adore their pets and regularly post photos of them on social media. Sometimes these same friends also post photos of their barbecues, or rather barbecued animals. My hunter and fisher friends often post selfies with the animals they’ve killed. They hold a fish dangling from a hook and smile unselfconsciously as the fish suffocates. Or they crouch behind the not-yet-cold bear they’ve shot, beaming with pride, with their beloved companion hunting dog by their side.
Our relationship with animals is full of contradictions—contradictions I understand well. I grew up an animal lover in New York City, stopping on the street for every dog I saw, begging for a dog of my own as a child, sobbing during any movie where an animal suffered. In high school, I befriended a sheep at the children’s zoo in Central Park. I named him Wooly Baba and visited him every week. Whenever I’d arrive and call his name, he’d come running up to me and lift his head for a neck scratch. I loved that sheep.
I also loved lamb chops. In fact, lamb chops were my favorite food. But one day, I could no longer pretend that there was some essential difference between Wooly Baba and the lamb chop on my plate. I considered becoming a vegetarian, but the truth was I didn’t want to give up the foods I liked, so I told myself that because the animals on my plate were already dead, I might as well eat them. I didn’t yet understand the laws of supply and demand. I didn’t realize that our dollar is our vote that says: “Good job. Do it again.”
Eventually, I came to understand that my choices had consequences, and that when I allowed my desires to eclipse my values by eating animals, I was actively participating in the suffering of those I claimed to love. My transformation from omnivore to pescatarian to vegetarian to vegan spanned eight years. I was a slow learner. Or rather, I was slow to commit to living more deeply aligned with my values. It’s true that in the 1970s and 80s, there wasn’t a lot of information on the abuses that occurred in modern farming, and few people had heard the word "vegan." Back then, “substitutes” for meat, dairy, and eggs tasted pretty awful.
Eventually, I came to understand that my choices had consequences, and that when I allowed my desires to eclipse my values by eating animals, I was actively participating in the suffering of those I claimed to love.
How different it is now. Many, if not most, people know that there is rampant cruelty in animal agriculture. It takes little time to learn that soy milk has basically the same amount of protein as cow’s milk but without antibiotic residues, pus, and the toxins that get carried up the food chain, nor to discover the terrible abuse perpetrated on dairy cows in typical factory farms. Many have become aware that fisheries are collapsing one after another as we trawl the oceans and net everything in the path, including the dolphins and turtles we are more inclined to love. And whereas it was once challenging to be vegan, now it’s easy.
I’ve heard so many reasons for not choosing a vegan diet, among them:
“I could never give up cheese and ice cream.”
“You can’t get enough protein on a vegan diet.”
“I have the wrong blood type.”
“We are omnivores, and it’s natural to eat animals. Other animals do so, so why shouldn’t we?”
I understand. I’m a CrossFitter, well aware of the protein needs associated with weight-lifting and high-intensity exercise. But the reality is that It’s almost impossible to become protein-deficient on a healthy vegan diet that meets one’s caloric needs, even if one is an athlete.
I also love the taste of meat, cheese, and eggs and know first-hand that it can be hard to give up the foods one loves, even if many of the plant-based alternatives now taste identical to those foods.
I have the same blood type that a naturopath claimed necessitated meat in one’s diet, but because there is no scientific evidence to support this claim, I have happily continued with my vegan diet for nearly 35 years, along with tens of millions of other vegans, and together our health and longevity provide quite a lot of counter-evidence that the blood type claim is bunk.
And I, too, recognize that non-human omnivores eat animals and that my body can digest meat as well as plants. That doesn’t mean I need to cause unnecessary suffering and death to animals just to please my taste buds.
I believe that one day, the vast majority of us will not eat slaughtered animals or force animals to produce milk and eggs for us.
As a humane educator—someone who teaches about the interconnected issues of animal protection, human rights, and environmental sustainability—I know that most people resist dietary changes even after they’ve learned that their food choices cause immense suffering, not to mention environmental damage. Such resistance can fade when we pay attention to, and educate ourselves about, the consequences of our actions. When the inconsistencies between our values and actions become so stark; when the destruction animal agriculture is wreaking on the planet becomes so urgent; when delicious vegan options become so abundant; and when the desire to live more compassionately becomes so compelling, we can and do change.
I believe that one day, the vast majority of us will not eat slaughtered animals or force animals to produce milk and eggs for us. This day will come when enough people have shifted their diets, and food companies have shifted along with them, changing the food production system to meet the ever-growing demand for humane, sustainable, and equitably produced food. When this critical mass causes a systemic shift, the rest of the population will shift, too. We eat what we eat because that is what is served to us at our dinner tables as children, in school cafeterias, and in restaurants and convenience stores. If what’s served is different, we’ll naturally go along with our new and more humane diets.
How wonderful it would be to speed this change and not wait and look back regretfully wondering why we held on so tenaciously to cruel systems, petting our dog while feasting on bacon; filling our bird feeders while chowing down on chicken wings. We can build a more peaceful and healthy world right now, so let’s start eating for the future we want today. A more compassionate world is just a meal away.
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Global Food Justice Movement Warns Against Corporate Takeover of UN Food Summit
"Don't appoint the goat as gardener, a peasant proverb says," one advocate said of inviting agricultural companies to weigh in on issues of global food security.
Jul 19, 2023
World leaders will
gather in Rome next week for the United Nations Food Systems Summit +2 Stocktaking Moment, but local producers, Indigenous people, and the world's largest global food justice movements are sounding the alarm that the U.N. process favors the industrial agriculture status quo over true transformation.
The various groups, who claim to represent millions worldwide and gather under the banner of the People's Autonomous Response to the U.N. Food Systems Summit (UNFSS), say their primary concern is that large corporations and their proxies will unduly influence the U.N.'s new and contested approach to food security.
"Don't appoint the goat as gardener, a peasant proverb says," Patti Naylor of the National Family Farm Coalition said in a statement Monday. "The corporate ag, food, and data giants don't care about democratic governance in the U.N.—they just use it for their profits. Like the goat, corporations will eat the salad and the roses, if you don't stop them."
"The intention of the summit organizers is to sell us the corporate and industrial project as transformation."
The world's food system is in crisis. In 2022, acute food insecurity impacted around 258 million people, the People's Autonomous Response said in a declaration issued July 12. That was an increase from 193 million people in 2021 and 155 million people in 2020. A U.N. report published the same day found that a combination of the climate crisis, war, and the Covid-19 pandemic had forced an additional more than 100 million people into hunger since 2019.
The U.N. is therefore not on track to meet its sustainable development goal of ending hunger by 2030. The People's Autonomous Response believe they have a solution rooted in food sovereignty, centering frontline communities,, agroecology, encouraging biodiversity, territorial markets, and an economy based on solidarity.
"The evidence is overwhelming—the solutions devised by small-scale food producers and Indigenous peoples not only feed the world but also advance gender, social, economic justice, youth empowerment, workers' rights, and real resilience to crises," Shalmali Guttal of Focus on the Global South said in a statement. "Why are policymakers not listening to them and providing them with adequate support?"
One example of this lack of listening, the People's Autonomous Response says, was the UNFSS in September 2021. The summit raised alarms in part because it moved from a multilateral approach—with member states coming to an international agreement at the end of the talks—with a "multistakeholderism" approach that opponents argue allows private interests and large corporations a disproportionate influence on decision making. They worried at the time that the summit would muscle out the already existing Committee on World Food Security (CFS) that uses multilateral and human rights-based decision making.
During the summit, the voices of wealthy nations, companies, and large, corporate-linked nonprofits were raised over other member states, particularly from the Global South, the People's Autonomous Response said. At the same time, the summit failed to take into account some of the root causes of the global food crisis: Covid-19 pandemic, industrial agriculture, and the influence of large corporations on global food systems.
"The UNFSS has not only overlooked our rights and the structural causes of the crises…The intention of the summit organizers is to sell us the corporate and industrial project as transformation," said Saúl Vicente from the International Indian Treaty Council.
The original summit inspired a massive countermobilization, with more than 9,000 people speaking out against a pre-summit in July 2021 and more than 700 organizations and over 300 activists and academics endorsing a declaration to the summit in September.
"In these times of growing hunger and multiple crises, it is more urgent than ever that governments and the U.N. listen to us."
Despite all this, global food justice activists are concerned that the coming stocktaking moment, which will run from July 24 to 26, is "poised to repeat the failures of the FSS itself, further advancing industrial food systems, and opening the door of the U.N. to even greater influence by large private companies and their networks, without a corporate accountability framework in place."
In particular, they worry that member states will lend the process undeserved legitimacy by attending and sharing their plans for improving their food systems.
The People's Autonomous Response argues that world leaders should turn away from corporate-backed proposals for addressing food insecurity and heed the knowledge of people working on and in the ground.
"In these times of growing hunger and multiple crises, it is more urgent than ever that governments and the U.N. listen to us," Perla Álvarez from La Vía Campesina said in a statement. "We call on you: Change direction, and support our demands and efforts for a food sovereign future based on human rights and the principles of agroecology, care, justice, diversity, solidarity, and accountability."
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New Report Issues Dire Warning About Global Decline in Pollinators
'Their health is directly linked to our own well-being.'
Feb 26, 2016
Pollinators worldwide, from bees and butterflies to beetles and bats, face a grim state of affairs.
Climate change and land use changes drive many pollinator species toward extinction, including 16 percent of vertebrate pollinators. A new report shows that over 40 percent of invertebrate pollinators, like bees and butterflies, may be threatened locally.
This all adds up to very bad news for humans, the report details, as it poses risks to the global food supply.
The assessment released Friday is from the four-year-old Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), a UN-formed body similar to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). IPBES came to its first-ever analysis based on existing scientific studies.
"Pollinators are important contributors to world food production and nutritional security," said Vera Lucia Imperatriz-Fonseca, co-chair of the assessment and senior professor at the University of Sao Paulo. "Their health is directly linked to our well-being."
IPBES describes their critical role as three-quarters of the "leading types of global food crops" rely at least in part on pollination by some of the 20,000 species of wild bees or other pollinators. In terms of monetary impact, that translates to as much as $577 billion worth of annual global food production.
"Without pollinators, many of us would no longer be able to enjoy coffee, chocolate, and apples, among many other foods that are part of our daily lives," said Simon Potts, Ph.D., the other co-chair and professor of biodiversity and Ecosystem Services at the University of Reading in the UK.
In addition to climate change and changes in land use, the report cites the decline of practices based on indigenous and local knowledge and insecticides like neonicotinoids as contributing to the decline of pollinators.
Some strategies for protecting pollinators include promoting sustainable agriculture, reducing pesticide exposure, and increasing diversity in pollinator habitats.
As far as a real impact from the group's report, Dave Goulson, author, bumblebee expert, and professor of biology at the University of Sussex, is skeptical.
"I would question whether any practical on-the-ground action to help pollinators will happen due to this document. We are in the midst of the sixth global mass extinction event, and we sit around spending thousands of hours writing documents about biodiversity. Still, we do not take action to address the fundamental issues causing this ecological catastrophe," Nature reports him as saying.
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Food Sovereignty Honorees Show 'There is Another Way to Fight Hunger'
Both of the 2015 prizewinners are minority groups that 'have struggled for decades against oppression from their governments and large agricultural companies'
Oct 14, 2015
Underscoring how the struggles for racial, environmental, and economic justice are deeply intertwined, this year's Food Sovereignty Prize, honoring those who are taking back their food systems, will be bestowed Wednesday to the Georgia-based Federation of Southern Cooperatives and the Black Fraternal Organization of Honduras.
"On the heels of a visible resurgence of the struggle for black liberation made visible by a spate of police brutality against Black Americans, the two winners this year demonstrate a commitment to solidarity with Black people's struggles globally," wrote Alison Meares Cohen of the global hunger and poverty non-profit WhyHunger.
"Everything we're about is food sovereignty, the right of every individual on earth to wholesome food, clean water, clean air, clean land, and the self-determination of a local community to grow and do what they want. We just recognize the natural flow of life. It's what we've always done."
--Ben Burkett, Federation of Southern Cooperatives
Both of the 2015 honorees "have struggled for decades against oppression from their governments and large agricultural companies," said WhyHunger co-founder Bill Ayres in an op-ed last week. "They have pioneered excellent agricultural practices, fought for their rights, and produced nutritious food for people."
He concluded that in doing so, they have shown that "[t]here is another way to fight hunger. It is not through the latest tech solution or the latest chemical toxic concoction, but it does utilize science rooted in ecological principles, community participation, and democratic management."
The Federation of Southern Cooperatives, whose members are farmers in 16 Southern states—approximately 90 percent African-American, Native American, Latino, and White—grew out of the civil rights movement in the late 1960s. But its work "is today more important than ever," the prize committee writes, given that the number of African-American-owned farms in the U.S. has fallen from 14 percent to 1 percent in less than 100 years.
To counter that trend and keep farms Black and family-owned instead of corporate-owned, the Federation promotes land-based cooperatives and community development credit unions, provides training in sustainable agriculture and forestry, management, and marketing, and advocates in the courts and state and national legislatures.
"Our view is local production for local consumption," said Ben Burkett, co-founder of the Federation and a fourth-generation Mississippi farmer. "It's just supporting mankind as family farmers. Everything we're about is food sovereignty, the right of every individual on earth to wholesome food, clean water, clean air, clean land, and the self-determination of a local community to grow and do what they want. We just recognize the natural flow of life. It's what we've always done."
As Andrianna Natsoulas and Beverly Bell wrote in an op-ed this week, "The Federation's work to keep land in the hands of the small farmers is one of the foundations of food sovereignty, a framework of policies, principles, and practices through which food systems are controlled by, and serve the best interest of, people instead of corporations."
Meanwhile, the Black Fraternal Organization of Honduras (OFRANEH), was created in 1979 to protect the economic, social, and cultural rights of 46 Garifuna communities along the Atlantic coast of Honduras. In the face of Big Ag land grabs, tourist-driven development, and climate change, OFRANEH helps this historically oppressed minority, descending from Indigenous Caribbean and African groups, fight back through direct-action community organizing, legal action, leadership training, and movement-building. At the center of the organization's work is a focus on strengthening land security and sustainable, small-scale farming and fishing.
"Our liberation starts because we can plant what we eat," stated Miriam Miranda, coordinator of OFRANEH. "This is food sovereignty."
She continued: "We need to produce to bring autonomy and the sovereignty of our peoples. If we continue to consume [only], it doesn't matter how much we shout and protest. We need to become producers. It's about touching the pocketbook, the surest way to overcome our enemies. It's also about recovering and reaffirming our connections to the soil, to our communities, to our land."\
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Challenging Racism in the Food System
The Federation of Southern Cooperatives fights for Black lands, agriculture, and equal justice
Oct 14, 2015
The 2015 US Food Sovereignty Prize will be awarded on October 14 in Des Moines, Iowa. This year, one of the two winners is the Federation of Southern Cooperatives, a network of cooperatives comprising mostly Black family farmers across the deep South. The Federation upholds a vision of local production for local consumption and defense of their family land needed for that local production. The second winner, the Black Fraternal Organization of Honduras, has a similar mission and values.
Some Federation of Southern Cooperatives farmers continued working land that the US government had deeded to their ancestors after they were freed from slavery. Ben Burkett, president of the federation and a member of the Mississippi Association of Cooperatives, farms the 164 acres that his great-grandfather was given by the government in 1889. Burkett still has the land title signed by President Grover Cleveland.
Composed of 35 agricultural co-ops, representing 12,000 farm families in 13 states from Texas to North Carolina—primarily African-American but also some Latino, Native American, and white—the Federation employs organizing, political advocacy, and legal strategies to defend land. It also helps develop economically self-sufficient communities, assisting member co-ops in purchasing supplies and finding marketing outlets. Moreover, it offers financial and technical assistance.
The Federation's work to keep land in the hands of the small farmers is one of the foundations of food sovereignty, a framework of policies, principles and practices through which food systems are controlled by, and serve the best interest of, people instead of corporations.
Taking on the "Last Plantation"
In 1920, one in every seven farmers in the US was African-American. Together, they owned nearly 15 million acres. By 1982, however, African-American farmers numbered one in 67, owning only 3.1 million acres. 1 Racism, violence, and massive migration from the rural South to the industrialized North caused a steady decline in the number of Black farmers.
Even for those who have long held onto their family's land, maintaining it today is a constant struggle. Historical patterns of racism and economic pressures in an agribusiness-driven food system have pushed many Black farmers off their land.
Institutional racism in the agricultural policies of the United States Department of Agriculture - nicknamed "the last plantation" - is also to blame for the loss of Black land. Over the years, studies by the US Civil Rights Commission (CRC), as well as by the USDA itself, showed that the USDA actively discriminated against Black farmers. A 1964 CRC study showed that the agency unjustly denied African-American farmers loans, disaster aid, and representation on agricultural committees. 2
In response, in 1997-98, African-American farmers - organized through the Federation of Southern Cooperatives and other Black organizations - filed class-action lawsuits against the USDA for unjustly denying them loans. The lawsuits were consolidated into one case, Pigford v. Glickman, settled in 1999.
However, due to delays in filing claims, nearly 60,000 farmers and their heirs were left out of this settlement. In November 2010, the U.S. Congress passed the Claims Settlement Act, or Pigford II, to compensate Black farmers left out of the first settlement. President Obama signed the Claims Settlement Act a month later, making $1.25 billion available for claimants through cash payments and loan forgiveness. The final settlement allocated about $50,000 each to roughly 16,000 farmers nationwide.
"I never would have thought the government would pay anybody any money," Burkett said of the settlement. "Initially, I would say, 'You never get a dime.' But I was wrong."
"Not As Good As We Want It to Be"
Over the years, each generation of the Burkett family bought more land, so the original 164 acres has expanded to 296 acres. On them, under the name of B&B Farms, Burkett - with the help of his family - grows 15 different varieties of vegetables and timber. Burkett says he believes the co-op structure is the only way to survive as a farmer in the rural South.
Speaking of Pigford and Pigford II, Burkett says he would have preferred that the money had been pooled and put into a trust to borrow against or to help new farmers. He added that that would have provided future generations with some seed funding and current farmers a layer of security.
In an interview, Burkett explains the rationale of the Federation taking a lead in the Pigford v. Glickman lawsuit.
"The lawsuit was about discrimination in the county office of the USDA. I got a loan to buy my equipment, seeds, and fertilizers. I could not write any checks directly. I had to write a check, and somebody in the [USDA] office had to sign it. They were only treating black farmers like that, not white farmers. For example, if I wanted to buy $5,000 worth of soybean seed, I had to find the seed from the Forest County co-op and get an invoice. I then returned to the [USDA] office and got the check. They sign the check, and I sign it, and then I have to take it back to the store. I'm just one of them; they treated me like that.
"A lot of farmers go in and get their loan approved. This happened to me, too. My loan was approved in February or March, but I didn't get the money until July 15th. That's cutting time. Planting is over. It was several things like that that brought the suit about. A lot of black farmers went into the USDA offices and were denied. They wouldn't even give them the application for a loan. The USDA officers told them, 'You can't make any money farming, so. . .' In the lawsuit, [denial of your loan] had to happen to you between '81 and '96. It was happening before then, and it is happening now, after the lawsuit. That's just the price of doing business, I suppose.
"They can pass a rule in Washington, D.C., [in the] USDA or Congress. Then, it comes to the state of Mississippi. If the state says they don't want to, they don't have to. We have a [USDA] county committee comprising five farmers who do the hiring, the firing, and everything else. Those fellows in Washington, D.C., can talk but can't fire anybody. They cannot fire a soul in the state of Mississippi.
"As long as it's set up that way, it won't change. I believe that in my heart. There are all kinds of laws about discrimination [that say] 'regardless of race, religion, creed or color.' Discrimination, morals, people's ideologies... you can't make policy or legislate that away.
"But, it is much better. I remember the '60s, I remember segregation, and it is better now. Not as good as we want it to be, but not as bad as it was."
Because racism persists in the agricultural system, hurting the efforts of Burkett and other Black farmers, the Federation of Southern Cooperatives keeps fighting for equal justice through grassroots mobilizations, in the courts, and through state and national legislation.
Burkett said, "Racism is still here in the marketplace and credit, but we have learned to deal with it and not give up on changing the system. We struggle every day to bring about a change."
Footnotes
- Public Broadcasting System, "Challenging the USDA (1980s and 1990s)," Black Farming and Land Loss: A History.
- Public Broadcasting System, "The Civil Rights Years (1954-1968)," Black Farming and Land Loss: A History.
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Debt and Despair: How Small-Scale Farmers Feel the Impact of So-Called "Responsible Investment"
What is now happening in Tanzania should be an example of how not to behave if you want to help poor farmers make a living and feed their communities
Jun 17, 2015
Kilombero Plantations Ltd (KPL) is no ordinary rice farm. Based in Kilombero Valley, Tanzania, the company owns a 5,800 hectare plantation and buys rice from local farmers. Not only is it now the largest rice producer in East Africa, it's become a flagship for international backers hoping to prove that corporations can deliver economic development for communities.
"With farmers being displaced and livelihoods hanging in the balance, the evidence is demanding that governments take a whole new approach building better food systems in Africa."
A subsidiary of UK-based multinational Agrica, KPL is at the forefront of a series of initiatives backed by African and G8 governments, charged with attracting corporate investment in to Africa's food system. Bought by KPL in 2008, the plantation lies within the controversial Southern Agricultural Corridor of Tanzania (SAGC0T), a government initiative to help agribusiness access 350,000 hectares of prime farming land and establish industrial farming projects. KPL's project forms part of the Tanzania's deal with the G8's New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition, a multi-billion dollar initiative that is using aid and corporate investment to leverage policy reforms that will help big business access land, seeds, and markets in ten African countries. Farmer groups in Tanzania and beyond fear that SAGCOT and the New Alliance could be a death blow for small-scale farmers struggling to keep control of their livelihoods, and have branded the projects "a new wave of colonialism." Undeterred, the UK government have announced they will directly co-finance KPL with PS6.7 million. Global fertiliser and seed giants Yara and Syngenta are partners in the project.
Hailed as a "responsible investor"--and with backers keen to prove that what's good for corporate profit is good for poor communities--KPL is under pressure to deliver.
Yet a new report published by Global Justice Now, Oakland Institute and Greenpeace Africa today suggest all is not going so well for KPL. Not only do farmers displaced by the project complain of receiving inadequate compensation, KPL's outgrower scheme has left many in despair. KPL's outgrower farmers, who were required to buy seeds and fertilisers from the company and sell their produce back, reported falling in to dangerous levels of debt. This was made worse when KPL offered lower prices than expected. Locals reported low wages for casual labour with KPL, and that many of the promised jobs for farmers have not materialised. "Life now is very bad as compared to before," said one farmer. "Previously I was able to earn money from my own farm, but now I have to earn money by doing various small jobs for cash. Before, I was able to cultivate my own food. Now I need to buy the food with the small income I have."
With multinationals receiving negative publicity surrounding communities being displaced from land investments, many are now choosing to buy directly from farmers who own or lease their own land through 'outgrower' schemes. Such schemes are also becoming the preferred options for governments and backers in the development sector. Yet KPL's is one of a number of schemes on which farmers have reported getting a bad deal. In March, Action Aid reported that a similar outgrower scheme by Eco Energy in Tanzania, also backed by the New Alliance, saw farmers falling in to debt.
Since the G8's New Alliance was launched in 2012, governments and corporations are struggling to prove their positive impacts on communities. With farmers being displaced and livelihoods hanging in the balance, the evidence is demanding that governments take a whole new approach building better food systems in Africa. Across the continent, small-scale farmers are using their own solutions to sustainably increase yields and feed their communities, free from corporate control. With support from governments, these farmers could transform their food systems for the better.
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