By Matan Shelomi What is the life of a cricket worth? Insect farming is a rapidly growing industry, with hundreds of companies worldwide rearing insects at industrial scales. The global value of insect farming is expected to surpass $1.18 billion by 2023. Farmed insects, or “mini-livestock,” refers to insects such as crickets and mealworms raised […]
By Karen Perry Stillerman A few years back, the nation’s largest meat and poultry company used the slogan “Powered by Tyson” to sell its chicken, pork, and beef. Tyson Foods’ marketing language has since changed, but the notion of “power” is more apt than ever when it comes to the way this company operates. As […]
Extreme heat fueled by climate change is killing farmworkers, with compoundingly inequitable systemic effects, Bloomberg reports. Recent farmworker deaths in the U.S. from extreme heat have raised attention to the heightened vulnerability of people forced to work outside for fear of losing their income. People laboring in the fields “are being used as a human […]
By Gero Rueter Fabian Karthaus grew up with solar energy. “My father built the first photovoltaic system on the barn roof and you could see that it worked,” he says. Today, the farmer is 33 and owns two large solar power systems himself. Berries now grow underneath one of them. Five years ago, Karthaus took […]
By Julia Conley Americans’ grocery bills reflect only a third of a true cost of food, according to a new report, which evaluated factors including healthcare costs, spending associated with biodiversity loss, and the direct environmental impacts of farming and ranching to determine that the U.S. spends at least $3.2 trillion on food each year. […]
What Are GMOs? Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are organisms that have been modified in a laboratory in order to produce a specific result. For example, many types of food sources, especially corn and soybean crops, are genetically modified in order to withstand herbicides and insects. This method stems from the concept of selective breeding and […]
A new species of frog has been described by scientists for the first time, and it’s a real rockstar. The new frog, introduced to the world in the journal Neotropical Biodiversity on Sunday, hails from the Ecuadorian Andes and bears the name Pristimantis ledzeppelin, or Led Zeppelin’s Rain Frog. “The name honours Led Zeppelin and […]
For coffee drinkers, there’s really nothing more terrifying than the thought of waking up one morning and being all out of java. One way to ensure that never happens is to sign up for a coffee subscription service. This not only keeps you well-stocked, but it also gives you the opportunity to sample some high-quality […]
By Kenny Stancil A new report released Monday by a federal oversight agency revealed that before former President Donald Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency reapproved use of dicamba in 2018, high-ranking officials in the administration intentionally excluded scientific evidence of certain hazards related to the herbicide, including the risk of widespread drift damage. The Office of […]