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agriculture

Posted inEditor's Pick

The Sweet and Sticky History of the Date

by Seyward Darby November 9, 2022November 9, 2022

“Throughout the Middle East, the versatile fruit has been revered since antiquity. How will it fare in a changing world?”

Posted inEditor's Pick

The Ancient Potato of the Future

by Cheri Lucas Rowlands December 3, 2021October 19, 2022

“The Four Corners potato has sustained Indigenous people in the American Southwest for 11,000 years; USDA is now studying its 8-year shelf life, and its resistance to disease, heat, and drought. The future of this remarkable little potato remains unwritten.”

Posted inEditor's Pick

How Your Cup of Coffee Is Clearing the Jungle

by Cheri Lucas Rowlands August 13, 2021October 19, 2022

“However it happened, anywhere between 20,000 and 130,000 people — estimates range wildly — are farming illegally within Bukit Barisan Selatan.”

Posted inEditor's Pick

There Has Been Blood

by Cheri Lucas Rowlands August 10, 2021October 19, 2022

“For more than five decades, the Thai palm oil industry has been marred by rampant exploitation, violence, and corporate greed. Thailand is the world’s No. 3 producer of palm oil.”

Posted inEditor's Pick

The Farmer Trying to Save Italy’s Ancient Olive Trees

by Cheri Lucas Rowlands May 14, 2021October 19, 2022

“A fast-spreading bacteria could cause an olive-oil apocalypse.”

Posted inEditor's Pick

Inequality’s Deadly Toll

by Cheri Lucas Rowlands May 11, 2021October 19, 2022

“A century of research has demonstrated how poverty and discrimination drive disease. Can COVID push science to finally address the issue?”

Posted inQuotes

Pretty and Dumb? Tell It to the Avocado

by Carolyn Wells July 6, 2020October 17, 2022

New arrivals didn’t hand Natives the keys to the modern world — but took the tools that built its foundations.

Posted inNonfiction

What the World’s Most Controversial Herbicide Is Doing to Rural Argentina

by Longreads December 24, 2019December 30, 2022

After enormous lobbying efforts, Monsanto’s GMO soybeans, treated with Roundup, became the country’s largest export, as cancer rates and other health issues skyrocketed.

Posted inNonfiction

Betting the Farm on the Drought

by Longreads August 22, 2019February 3, 2023

Farmers like sixth-generation Illinois farmer Ethan Cox can’t wait for policymakers to protect them from climate change. To survive, they have to adapt their operations now, if they can.

Posted inEditor's Pick

Can the world quench China’s bottomless thirst for milk?

by Cheri Lucas Rowlands April 4, 2019October 19, 2022

In China, milk represents modernity and progress. But the radical plan to triple the nation’s consumption has serious environmental consequences.

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