RANKING AND RESULTS BY 2050 #23 14.08 GIGATONS REDUCED CO2 $72.2 BILLION NET COST $1.34 TRILLION NET SAVINGS Around the world, farmers are walking away from lands that were once cultivated or grazed because those lands have been “farmed out.” Agricultural practices depleted fertility, eroded soil, caused compaction, drained groundwater, or created salinity by over-irrigation.... Continue Reading →

RANKING AND RESULTS BY 2050 #3 70.53 GIGATONS REDUCED CO2 GLOBAL COST AND SAVINGS DATA TOO VARIABLE TO BE DETERMINED. One of the great miracles of life on this planet is the creation of food. The alchemy human beings do with seed, sun, soil, and water produces figs and fava beans, pearl onions and okra.... Continue Reading →

RANKING AND RESULTS BY 2050 #9 31.19 GIGATONS REDUCED CO2 $41.6 BILLION NET COST $699.4 BILLION NET SAVINGS Cows and trees do not belong together—so says conventional wisdom. And why should it not be? In Brazil and elsewhere, headlines condemn ranching as a driver of mass deforestation and attendant climate change. But the practice of... Continue Reading →

RANKING AND RESULTS BY 2050 #24 (IMPROVED RICE CULTIVATION) 11.34 GIGATONS REDUCED CO2 NO ADDITIONAL COSTS REQUIRED $519.1 BILLION NET SAVINGS RANKING AND RESULTS BY 2050 #53 (SYSTEM OF RICE INTENSIFICATION) 3.13 GIGATONS REDUCED CO2 NO ADDITIONAL COSTS REQUIRED $677.8 BILLION NET SAVINGS Vietnamese poet Phan Van Tri writes of rice grains: “They leave rice... Continue Reading →

RANKING AND RESULTS BY 2050 #4 66.11 GIGATONS REDUCED CO2 GLOBAL COST AND SAVINGS DATA TOO VARIABLE TO BE DETERMINED. The Buddha, Confucius, and Pythagoras, Leonardo da Vinci and Leo Tolstoy. Gandhi and Guadi. Percy Bysshe Shelly and George Bernard Shaw. Plant-based diets have had no shortage of notable champions, long before omnivore Michael Pollan... Continue Reading →

RANKING AND RESULTS BY 2050 #21 15.81 GIGATONS REDUCED CO2 $72.2 BILLION NET COST $166.3 BILLION NET SAVINGS Preparing food is at the core of family, culture, and community. Experts debate how long humans have been cooking with fire, but it is likely hundreds of thousands of years. Cooking with heat has a host of... Continue Reading →

Think of the causes of global warming, and fossil fuel energy probably comes to mind. Less conspicuous are the consequences of breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The food system is elaborate and complex; its requirements and impacts are extraordinary. Fossil fuels power tractors, fishing vessels, transport, processing, chemicals, packaging materials, refrigeration, supermarkets, and kitchens. Chemical fertilizers... Continue Reading →

RANKING AND RESULTS BY 2050 #3 70.53 GIGATONS REDUCED CO2 GLOBAL COST AND SAVINGS DATA TOO VARIABLE TO BE DETERMINED. One of the great miracles of life on this planet is the creation of food. The alchemy human beings do with seed, sun, soil, and water produces figs and fava beans, pearl onions and okra.... Continue Reading →