Hardly a month has gone by in the past two years without a large food or agriculture corporate announcing a pledge to go carbon neutral by some future date. Given the food and agriculture industries contribute over a third of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, these commitments are certainly welcome. But as we increasingly learn about the industry’s potential to be a solution to reversing climate change through carbon sequestering farming practices, the question quickly became: is carbon neutrality enough? Shouldn’t these corporates have higher goals and be targeting carbon removal from the atmosphere?
Furthermore, is carbon even the right focus when you consider other important measures of sustainable and ecological farming?
To discuss this complex topic, we brought a diverse guest roster onto the podcast in another roundtable format episode, including: Ivo Degn, Climate Farmers CEO; Dani Nierenberg, president of Food Tank; Kathleen Merrigan, Executive Director for the Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems; Julie Kunen, Director of Sustainability for Oatly North America; and Debbie Reed, Executive Director for Ecosystem Service Market Consortium.
We discuss:
- Is carbon neutrality enough, or do we need to look beyond it?
- Is it detrimental to have such a strong focus on carbon neutrality? Does the focus detract from other important areas of regeneration and supporting all ecosystem services?
- Are carbon credits and overall certification of processes misleading and potentially damaging to the regenerative process?
- How corporations and startups might work better in the sector
- How are farmers and production workers affected by the carbon neutrality push?
- How might we design these systems to ensure farmers benefit
- How to ensure we don’t just end up “greenwishing” while searching for a solution
Show Notes
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Thank you to Foodshot Global & New Hope Network for sponsoring the series.
And a huge thank you to everyone who helped us bring this podcast to life:
Production: Cam Gray, Cofruition
Audio Editing: Tevin Sudi
Original Music: Rodrigo Barbera
Art: Lola Nankin
Project Management: Patrick Carter
New Food Order
New Food Order is a podcast exploring the business of tackling our climate and social crises through food and agriculture from AgFunder and Food+Tech Connect.
Through nuanced conversation and debate, its hosts Danielle Gould and Louisa Burwood-Taylor are embarking on a learning and unlearning journey to unearth how we might design business and finance to have maximum positive impact for people and our planet.
Join us as we speak with leading farmers, entrepreneurs, executives, investors, and other stewards on key topics like:
- Will plant-based, lab-grown meat, and regenerative agriculture save the world?
- Is carbon neutral enough?
- What are the most people and planet friendly business and finance models?
- How might we best honor and learn from indigenous communities?
- What are the unintended consequences of new innovation, and how might we avoid them?
Danielle Gould is an entrepreneur and activist. She is the Founder and CEO of Food Tech Connect, the first community for food innovation as well as the Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Alpha Food Labs, a consultancy where she works with some of the world’s largest companies to create products and innovation strategies that are better for people and our planet. She hopes that ultimately, her work helps unite and catalyze a movement of earth guardians.
A journalist and editor, Louisa is the head of media & research for AgFunder and chief editor of its news site AFN, focused on the foodtech and agtech industry. With 10 years of agriculture reporting behind her, Louisa started her career in other financial markets working for publications like the Financial Times, Euromoney and Private Equity International, where she launched the first-ever publication dedicated to agriculture investment.