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A new public radio documentary from Humankind
Produced in association with GBH / Boston
Heard on NPR and PRX member stations
What was the carbon footprint of your dinner last night? Agriculture is a huge emitter of greenhouse gases associated with climate change. This is an important emerging topic as Americans grapple with record-breaking heatwaves, drenching rains, coastal flooding, prolonged droughts, sprawling wildfires and other weather extremes as “the face of global warming”. These conditions directly affect how – and whether – our food is grown.
Listeners to this sound-rich inquiry will learn that climate scientists increasingly focus on food production as a source of heat-trapping gases. We’ll discuss which major food groups have the lowest environmental footprint (fruits and vegetables) and which have the highest (red meat and dairy), and why. Interestingly medical experts recommend that our diets emphasize many of the same foods that scientists regard as most climate-friendly. That’s the remarkable connection between diet and climate.
Frances Moore Lappé
In this audio documentary, we hear an update from author Frances Moore Lappé, whose Diet for a Small Planet, written in her twenties, sold millions of copies and introduced this subject to a broad audience decades ago. An environmental health expert at Johns Hopkins, Roni Neff explains how factory farming – the source of much of our food in the US – is responsible for massive global warming pollution.
Veggie Galaxy restaurant
Genesis Butler
And we visit Veggie Galaxy, a popular diner-style Massachusetts restaurant, which draws mostly a young crowd of patrons concerned about personal health, climate change and animal welfare – and who love tasty meals! Physician Walter Willett, who served as the long-time Nutrition Dept. chair at Harvard, describes the benefits of eco-friendly eating to your health and to the environment. And you’ll meet Olivia Calkins, Liam Reardon and Genesis Butler, youth activists for a “thriving planet”.
This documentary explores how diet-climate concerns are playing out in higher education, at the campus of Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota (near Minneapolis-St.Paul). Students and administration there share a commitment to environmental responsibility. And the food service (staffed by an unusual provider known as, Bon Appetit) has adjusted menu offerings accordingly – and deliciously!
I learned a lot about how our food system operated, and how it related to the environment and to our personal health. And what a crisis we’re facing with climate change, and other environmental ills… And I was really upset about it.”
We try and stay away from some of the high carbon [foods]. We’ve got beef and cheese galore here in the off season, in our downtime in the winter. But we’re really trying to support as much vegetarian and veganism as possible…and it’s a tasty alternative, they don’t even know what they’re missing nine times out of ten.”
I’m not concerned about what [food] they access here, because I know that they eat healthy. Outside of school, it’s a different story.”
Once you get that awareness that there’s all this great food out there that isn’t in a box, that isn’t full of added sugar, or sodium, or all sorts of other stuff, I think there’s a lot more interest on the part of the kids.”
There has been a lot less discussion of meat than a lot of the other factors, in terms of what we can do as individuals to influence climate change… But we need to talk about diet, and if that’s where we can make our impact, then that’s what people need to know, and understand.”
There’s just tremendous waste built into our food system, and then of course the outcome: creating a people such as we are today whose food is really a health threat, that many of our top diseases are now food-related.”
If you look at the green split peas, lentils, black beans, these cost pennies… all of the beans are very, very high in protein. You’re not going to go wrong with beans.”
With just 2% of Americans now working on farms, many of us have only mythical images of how our food is produced. But a fascinating new movement brings together people in vibrant gardens and small urban farms, where they grow tasty, nourishing food, save money, get to know their neighbors and combat climate change. Our journey begins at the very productive White House vegetable garden, planted in 2009 by First Lady Michelle Obama; it feeds the president and his family, others at the White House and a local food pantry. We then visit Tonopah Community Garden, recently established in West Las Vegas in a community considered a “food desert” (very limited access to fresh vegetables and fruit); volunteers there discuss how growing food together yields delicious tasty meals and breaks down social barriers.
We have seeds from Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, that he actually used to plant, and grow, and eat himself, and that have been passed down from generation to generation. And it’s been just a great experience to grow these seeds that, you know, are so old. But you know what? They almost always do the best.”
One of the things people are learning is that they can actually do it. And it is just so incredible when you have someone that was [inexperienced] Rosalind Brooks like me initially, and they come in and they have no idea how to plant, and they buy a plot, and they plant some seeds, and they’re actually eating from it in three months. It is just incredible.”
We really view that the meal program is a foundation from which the students will become academically successful. And so by providing them fresh fruits and vegetables, it’s going to help them be ready to learn.”
The Diet-Climate Connection project is funded by the Henry P. Kendall Foundation, the Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment, the Lintilhac Foundation and a special grant from the Henry Luce Foundation. It is presented by Humankind public radio in partnership with Connie Goldman Productions.
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