Special Collections:
Food Security
The San Francisco Foundation and The Commonwealth Club of California hosted a discussion on Black communities' complex relationship with American land. This conversation explored systemic racism, "food apartheid," and the vital role of the Black farming movement in fostering environmental sustainability and worker cooperatives to ensure healthy, local food access for all.
Executive Director Doria Robinson (Urban Tilth) and Andrea Talley (Mandela Grocery Cooperative) shared insights on farming and food access for BIPOC communities. Noted author Natalie Baszile (*Queen Sugar*, *We Are Each Other's Harvest*) moderated. This program was supported by San Francisco Foundation's Bay Area Leads donors. Become a member: https://www.commonwealthclub.org/membership
COVID-19 has profoundly impacted our food system, causing outbreaks in food markets and plants, increasing food insecurity, and straining supply chains for farmers. Meanwhile, food banks have seen a surge in demand, highlighting critical vulnerabilities.
Explore these challenges and their implications for agriculture, food supply, and diets in a conversation with Lisa Held, senior reporter at Civil Eats, and Karen Ross, Secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture.
For more information or to support, visit www.commonwealthclub.org/covid19support. Subscribe for more videos here.
This webinar, originally held on April 29, 2020, explores whether sustainable protein can create a future-fit food system, as reviewed in our Future of Food report. It also examines how the pandemic is straining the current system and what the food industry can do to shape better long-term outcomes.
This recording is valuable for food industry professionals, particularly those in sustainability, nutrition, sourcing, innovation, or strategy. Watch to leverage Forum's futures and system change expertise in navigating today's rapidly evolving context.
Fourteen-year-old Asha O'Reilly encourages families to adopt meatless dinners as a positive collective climate action. She addresses Americans' strong association with meat, advocating for simple changes at the dinner table to combat the macro-level impacts of industrial meat production.
Asha, a 9th-grade expert on the meat industry, delivered a TEDx talk on this topic, empowering families to be part of the solution. Learn more about TEDx events: https://www.ted.com/tedx.
The World Bank Group supports a sustainable cattle ranching program in Colombia's Orinoquía region. This initiative uses silvopastoral methods, integrating trees, forage, and livestock, to help farmers adapt to climate change. As a leading source of funding and knowledge for low-income countries, the World Bank Group is dedicated to reducing poverty and promoting sustainable development.
For more information on this program and other development stories, visit the World Bank Group website, subscribe to our newsletter, or follow us on social media: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn.
Facing climate change, a global disaster, experts Arielle Crawford, Gene Baur, Jodi Monelle, and Liz Dee convened to inspire sustainable solutions. Moderated by Deepika Phakke, they shared insights on combating this urgent threat through everyday actions.
Arielle Crawford, founder of ARIELLE, champions sustainable apparel with regenerative materials. Gene Baur, hailed as the "conscience of the food movement," campaigns against factory farming and influenced animal welfare laws. Jodi Monelle's LIVEKINDLY empowers plant-based living for positive global change. Liz Dee, Co-President of Smarties and CEO of Baleine & Bjorn Capital, invests in solutions to outdated animal products and founded Vegan Ladyboss.
The global distribution of heavy wine bottles, primarily relying on diesel, significantly contributes to the wine industry's environmental footprint.
Napa winemaker Dan Petroski states that this process alone accounts for 40-45% of the sector's total greenhouse gas emissions.
Civil Eats author Twilight Greenaway highlights a profound irony: those who grow our food are among the most vulnerable to climate change's impacts.
Farm workers face significant threats, including extreme heat and soil-borne illnesses, underscoring the severe risks to this essential labor force.
John Wick and the Marin Carbon Project are pioneering carbon farming, a practice that sequesters atmospheric carbon in soil. This research-backed approach enhances soil fertility, increases crop yields, and makes farms more resilient to drought. Adopted globally, carbon farming offers a powerful solution to the climate crisis.
Learn more about carbon farming at Bioneers.
Aclima CEO and Co-founder Davida Herzl discusses the critical role of agriculture and food in feeding the global population and combating climate change.
Learn more about her insights on the Climate One Cool CleanTech event page.
Winemaker and sustainability advocate Paul Dolan discusses the wine industry's current efforts to address carbon and its environmental impact.
He believes the sector is "just working around the edges of being sustainable."
Denise Morrison, President and CEO of Campbell Soup Company, delivered a plenary address at the BSR Conference 2015 in San Francisco, CA.
This address was published on November 6, 2015. Learn more about Denise Morrison.
This powerful film explores the resurgence of urban farming in American cities. It showcases how diverse individuals are reclaiming lost skills and reconnecting people with their food, especially in Los Angeles.
Three LA residents exemplify this movement: Rishi, who traded a Silicon Valley career for backyard farming; Ron, who fought the city for his right to grow food on a public strip; and Adam and Jenna, a young couple cultivating their relationship through urban farming.
Urban farming is a growing global environmental movement, with unique significance in Los Angeles. This film was distributed by FilmBuff for Grist.
Chipotle presents an original series exploring the twisted world of industrial agriculture.
The series premieres February 17 on Hulu. This announcement was published on January 26, 2014.
Dow Chemical, known for products like Dursban, Napalm, and Agent Orange, is now entering the food business. The company seeks government approval for genetically engineered (GE) corn and soybeans designed to withstand repeated dousing with 2,4-D, a component of Agent Orange. This raises significant concerns about trusting Dow Chemical with our food supply.
For more information on Dow Chemical's history and how to oppose these new GE "Agent Orange" crops, visit www.dow-watch.org.
In May 2013, the United States Supreme Court ruled in favor of biotech giant Monsanto, concluding a patent case against Indiana farmer Vernon Bowman. The high court determined that 75-year-old Bowman violated Monsanto’s patent rights by planting seeds purchased from a grain elevator.
His story, told in his own words, was featured in a February 2013 interview covered by the Huffington Post.
TEDxManhattan 2013
Annemarie Colbin, Ph.D., is the Founder and CEO of the Natural Gourmet Institute for Health and Culinary Arts in New York City. Established in 1977, it is the oldest natural foods cooking school in the US.
A prolific writer, Dr. Colbin has authored four books and a bimonthly column for New York Spirit magazine since 1988. Her extensive bibliography also includes numerous magazine articles and anthology chapters.
Green City Growers Cooperative, an employee-owned Cleveland business, is set to harvest its first crops. This 3.25-acre hydroponic operation, located off East 55th Street in the city's Central neighborhood, is one of the largest urban greenhouses in the country.
Mary Donnell is the Chief Executive Officer of Green City Growers.
TED Fellow Marcin Jakubowski is open-sourcing blueprints for 50 farm machines, enabling anyone to build their own tractor or harvester. This initiative, launched in April 2011, is the first step in a larger project to create an instruction set for an entire self-sustaining village, with an estimated starting cost of $10,000.
For more details, visit the Open Source Ecology website. Additional information is available on TED.com.
ONE is a grassroots advocacy and campaigning organization, cofounded by Bono and other campaigners. With 3 million members, ONE fights extreme poverty and preventable disease, particularly in Africa, by raising public awareness and pressuring political leaders.
The organization supports smart, effective policies and programs that save lives, educate children, and improve futures. ONE is nonpartisan and collaborates closely with African activists and policymakers.
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The Thinking Game | Full documentary | Tribeca Film Festival official selection
“The Thinking Game” is the inside story of DeepMind's groundbreaking AI research, culminating in the Nobel Prize-winning AlphaFold breakthrough. Filmed over five years by the award-winning team behind "AlphaGo," this documentary explores co-founder Demis Hassabis's lifelong pursuit of artificial general intelligence and the rigorous scientific journey from mastering strategy games to solving the 50-year-old protein folding problem.
Following its world premiere at the Tribeca Festival, "The Thinking Game" is now available to watch for free. For those interested in hosting a screening for a classroom, community, or workplace, visit: rocofilms.com/films/the-thinking-game/.






















