Miscellaneous
This bill could keep the U.S. government from plotting against vegan mayo again
There are few points of agreement between Democrats and Republicans these days, but it turns out maintaining a fair marketplace for vegan mayo is one of them. In a rare display of bipartisanship, Senator Cory Booker, a Democrat from New Jersey, and Senator Mike Lee, a Republican from Utah, Read More...
How microbes can save farming
Right under our feet. That's where David Perry believes the next agricultural revolution will come from — the millions of unseen microbes in soil that play a crucial but complicated role in the well-being of plants. Perry believes that he can repackage beneficial bacteria and fungi as Read More...
Solar Dogger sears your sausage with the sun
Who couldn't use a $60 portable solar hot dog cooker? Anyone who doesn't want to solarize their franks in about 10 minutes, that's who. GoSun's innovative solar cookers, which concentrate and harness the energy of the sun onto a vacuum tube with a 'thermal battery' that allows for quick heating and Read More...
This guy spends $2.75 a year on food and eats like a king
Over the last two years, William Reid has spent just $5.50 on food. Reid is a committed dumpster diver: He dredges unsold grub from supermarket dumpsters and collects food scraps wherever he finds them. And he feasts. A graduate student in film and electronic media at American University in Read More...
Denmark launches funding to fight food waste
Denmark has announced a subsidies scheme to combat food waste. The scheme was launched by the country’s minister for food and the environment, Esben Lunde Larsen. A subsidy pool worth more than DKK 5 million (almost $750,000) will be distributed to projects trying to tackle waste throughout Read More...
Biomimicry Institute announces winners of second food systems Challenge
The Biomimicry Global Design Challenge has announced the winners of its 2016 competition, the second challenge centered on food systems and how biomimicry can help improve them. The 10 winning teams will receive cash prizes and some will get the chance to bring their project to market and compete Read More...
Sub-Saharan Africa agriculture to rise 2.6% yearly through 2025
Sub-Saharan Africa’s agricultural output may rise 2.6 percent annually through 2025, boosted by productivity improvements. “Faster technology adoption associated with the emergence of medium-scale producers and integration of smallholder producers into the value chain” will raise Read More...
Growing Greens in the Spare Room as ‘Vertical Farm’ Start-Ups Flourish
They include City-Hydro, a farm built in a spare bedroom on the second floor of Larry and Zhanna Hountz’s three-story rowhouse in Baltimore. Mr. Hountz came to urban farming out of necessity. After a serious car accident, he was unable to leave his house for two years and had trouble Read More...
Want power? Fire up the tomatoes and potatoes
Summer is high season for composting food waste—and, at large scale operations, for generating power by burning the biogas it generates. But scientists around the globe are figuring out new ways to turn decomposing food into power beyond the trash heap, and they’re finding that some Read More...
Farmers have modified our food for at least 10,000 years, why does it matter all of a sudden?
In the past week you’ve probably eaten crops that wouldn’t exist in nature, or that have evolved extra genes to reach freakish sizes. You’ve probably eaten “cloned” food and you may have even eaten plants whose ancestors were once deliberately blasted with radiation. Read More...