A study helps answer a question many of us ask when deciding whether to buy organic food: does it really make a difference? by Kendra Klein and Anna Lappé, The Guardian When Andreina Febres, a mother of two living in Oakland, California, signed up for a study evaluating whether an organic diet could make a difference […]
Earlier this year, I had the pleasure of spending a few days with more than 200 leading researchers, advocates and farmer leaders talking about the connections between food and climate change and what we should do about it. I helped to capture some of the voices you can see in this short film. There was […]
Find the full Behind the Plate interview with Anna on Foodstand where she talks about the beginning of a lifelong passion for creating a more equitable food system, the absence of food issues in the current presidential campaign and the food inspirations she finds in and out of her home. Tell us about how you got your start as […]
by Anna Lappé for Al Jazeera America If you made National Geographic collages of the basic four food groups — meat, dairy, grains and fruits and vegetables — in elementary school as I did, you have the federal government’s dietary guidelines to thank. Every five years, the government reviews these recommendations and releases new advice to […]
By Anna Lappé for EARTH ISLAND JOURNAL On March 20, scientists from 11 countries convened by the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer released their unanimous conclusions about the world’s most used herbicide, glyphosate. In a paper that would be published in The Lancet Oncology, the experts concluded that the herbicide […]
by Anna Lappé for Al Jazeera America You know organic food has gone mainstream when Men’s Health waxes poetic about an organic diet in between shout-outs to a “hot new sex app” and pictures of actress Chelsea Peretti in stilettos. And you know the business of organic is moving out of the margins when CNBC’s […]
In the New York Times Opinion Pages To the Editor: Mark Lynas’s profile of one farmer in Bangladesh does not represent the facts on the ground about genetically engineered eggplant there. The trials of the new variety of eggplant have actually had very poor results: Genetic engineering did not protect plants from most pests and have […]
by Anna Lappé with the University of California for Slate California’s 90-mile-long Salinas Valley, with its mild climate and rich soil, is known for abundant agriculture. Often called the “salad bowl of the world,” this fertile valley two hours south of the San Francisco Bay Area produces 70 percent of the nation’s lettuce, along with bountiful strawberries, […]
Great reporting over at Civil Eats today on an important new study looking at pesticide residues in the diets of people consuming organic and non-organic foods. Its described as the “largest study to look at organophosphate exposure in humans.” The study found that people consuming diets of chemically grown produce had higher concentrations of chemicals […]
A few weeks ago, at an international summit of the global network for organic agriculture, delegates from Fiji were excited to share the news that one of the islands in the tiny archipelago nation had gone 100 percent organic. The community had kicked out all toxic pesticides and imported, synthetic fertilizer. The impetus for the decision […]