Living Democracy, Feeding Hope

By Frances Moore Lappé // October 29, 2021 Our food is increasingly implicated in such major killers as heart disease, diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, stroke, and certain cancers. (Photo: Flickr/cc/ Jens Hembach ) Originally Published on Common Dreams , October 29, 2021 My title is not hyperbole. I sure wish it were. In composing a new opening chapter for the 50th anniversary edition of Diet for a Small Planet, I dug into America's big dietary changes over the last half-century. Of course, I was delighted to take in the heightened attention to the many pluses of shifting from grain-fed, meat-centered diets toward plant-centered eating. I hope the new edition is a joyful (and tempting) celebration of this vital shift. Yet, I was also appalled by what I learned—that we've been moving in two directions, and the overwhelming trend is killing us. Our culture's shaming around body image personalizes our nation's nutrition crisis—laying blame on the consumer. It blinds us from seeing, much less challenging, the assault on our health by food corporations that put their profit over our very survival. Just check out these frightening facts: First, 60 percent of the calories Americans consume now come from processed food products providing loads of calories—along with huge profits for the few—but virtually no nutrition. Instead, we get much more salt and sugar than is healthy. On average, Americans each consume twice the recommended level of sugar, mostly invisible in processed products. That's equal to 17 teaspoons of added sugar daily, when not more than six teaspoons for women and nine for men are recommended. Thus, it should be no surprise that almost 90 percent of Americans fail to meet our government's nutritional guidelines. Our food is increasingly implicated in such major killers as heart disease, diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, stroke, and certain cancers . Here in the US, unhealthy diets are responsible for as much as nearly half of all deaths from heart disease and metabolic disorders. One such disorder is diabetes, which has become our seventh leading cause of death as well as the number one cause of kidney failure, lower-limb amputations, and adult blindness. Nearly half of American adults now are "pre- diabetic "—meaning we're on our way—or are suffering from full-blown diabetes. In the US, in just two decades the number of adults with diabetes has more than doubled . Over 90 percent of them suffer from " type 2" diabetes , in which the body is unable to keep blood sugar at normal levels. And what's the medical advice to prevent this disease? Doctors tell us it is up to us to behave: Lose extra weight, exercise, and eat less fat and sugar, while getting "plenty of whole grains, fruits, and vegetables. It's also a good idea to limit red meat, and avoid processed meats," says the U.S. National Library of Medicine . All positive suggestions. But why aren't our healthcare professionals also forcefully calling out the food industry itself for pushing unhealthy, ultra-processed food products and meat? Why aren't they—and all of us—uniting around deep economic reform, enabling all of us to afford more healthy, fresh, and whole foods? Such solutions also require policies ensuring that every single neighborhood in America is home to grocery stores offering such foods. This crisis of food as health hazard extends far beyond the U.S. I'll never forget driving through rural India and seeing huge Pepsi logos painted on trees along the road—impossible to miss. As global corporations push such hazardous products, they displace healthy, local fruit drinks that once helped both growers and consumers to thrive. Worldwide, poor diet is now the greatest contributor to early death —with red meat and sugary beverages among foods implicated in over a fifth of global mortality, reports the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. Yet, how many Americans have been warned, for example, that processed meat—sausage, bologna, hot dogs, etc.—was in 2015 deemed a carcinogen by the World Health Organization? A lot of Americans likely assume our Food and Drug Administration would surely be protecting them against a proven, cancer-causing agent. No. Processed meat still accounts for over a fifth of the meat Americans eat. And, in addition to far-reaching, needless suffering and early death, we pay financially: Each year, an estimated U.S. $ 50 billion in health care costs is linked to unhealthy diets, finds a peer-reviewed study. I am blown away. Why, to pick just one example, aren't we told that hot dogs can cause cancer? Afterall, once tobacco was proven carcinogenic, our public agencies—finally—stepped in to limit its advertising and sales. True, we've not yet gone far enough on tobacco; but we have been able to cut the rate of smoking by almost half in the last half-century. So, why not a comparable national campaign for making healthy eating available to all? The answer, as noted, is the insidious power that our highly concentrated food industry exerts over lawmakers and those in our public agencies, such as the Food and Drug Administration. For every single person you and I elect to represent us in Congress, there are more than 20 —mainly corporate—lobbyists working for the interests of their bosses. Among them, agribusiness lobbyists outnumber even those pushing oil and gas interests. Moreover, government officials and elected representatives often move from posts in government to work instead for the private interests of agribusinesses and other firms. During the Obama presidency, to pick just one example, Michael Taylor circled three times from the Monsanto corporation, pushing genetically engineered seeds linked to a dangerous herbicide, to government departments including the Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Agriculture and then, back again, to industry. Corporate influence in public agencies enables it to overpower the public good in an even more insidious way—using our own biology against us, reveals a breakthrough new book by Pulitzer-prize winner Michael Moss— Hooked: Food, Free Will and How Food Giants Exploit Our Additions . The industry has learned that some foods—especially sugars—can be even more addictive than drugs, tobacco, or alcohol, Moss finds. "Our bodies are hard-wired for sweets," he says, "so food manufacturers have deployed fifty-six types of sugar to add to their products, creating in us the expectation that everything should be cloying." The question is now clear. With our lives and those of our loved ones at stake, how can we tap our appropriate outrage to clean up Washington so we can clean up our diets? Choosing healthy food, if we can, has become a rebel act for life itself, and in a way I didn't foresee 50 years ago when writing Diet for a Small Planet. On the case is, among many others, is RealFoodMedia.org founded and co-directed by my daughter Anna Lappé. Fortunately, an historic movement is emerging to remove the power of private interests now corrupting our democracy and therefore our food system. It is a "movement of moments" for democracy reforms that puts the public interest first. Our organization, the Small Planet Institute, and a huge network of organizations—Democracy Initiative—have teamed up to make it easier for all of us to act. Check out our action hub— DemocracyMovement.US —to discover rewarding ways you and your friends can jump in now. We humans imagine ourselves to be the brightest species; but we are undoubtedly the first in which segments of our kind are turning their species' food supply into a major killer. Hmmm. Not so bright. Let's call it out. Let's turn it around, now.

By Frances Moore Lappe // October 28, 2021 Originally Published in Edible Communities, October 28 2021 When I wrote Diet for a Small Planet fifty years ago, questioning a meat-centered diet built on large-scale, chemically addicted agriculture meant you were naive “back to the lander.” Since then, we’ve seen a revolution in awareness: Transforming how we farm and eat is increasingly recognized as essential—both to personal and environmental health. It is also now understood as key in tackling the climate crisis. Why is transforming our food system so essential? Let’s dive in. Globally, food systems generate as much as 37 percent of greenhouse gas emissions . Of that, land use alone—farming, grazing, felling forests, and more—amounts to almost a quarter . So, get this: Even if the world immediately cut all fossil fuel emissions for energy, our food-system emissions alone would make it impossible to meet the targets for limiting climate change set in the 2015 Paris Agreement . From agriculture, carbon dioxide is released during deforestation and subsequent burning (mostly to grow feed) as well as from decaying plants. It is also emitted in the manufacturing and distribution of chemical fertilizers. Globally, the food system is a key source for methane and nitrous oxide, which are 34 and up to 300 times more potent as heat-trapping gases respectively. Ruminant livestock like cattle and sheep are a source of methane from their digestion process . Confined animal feeding operations are also a source of methane from animal waste; rice paddy cultivation is another. Nitrous oxide is released largely by manure and manufactured fertilizers . Producing nitrogen fertilizer itself is incredibly energy-intensive, requiring more than 25,000 BTU per pound to produce. In addition to these concerning greenhouse gas emissions, our food system—driven by pressure to bring the highest return to ever-larger farm operations, corporate suppliers, and food processors—disrupts nature’s regenerative capacities. The result is rapid depletion and destabilization of the complex systems that we need to grow food. Today’s dominant farming techniques have “disrupted the nitrogen cycle even more than the carbon cycle,” University of Virginia environmental sciences professor James Galloway, a leading authority, explained to me. In the United States, nitrogen runoff from agricultural fields seeps into streams and rivers and from there into the mighty Mississippi and then the Gulf of Mexico, where it has created a coastal “dead zone” almost the size of Massachusetts , killing marine life. Runoff, explains Professor Galloway, also worsens climate heating, smog, acid rain, loss of marine species and forests, well-water pollution, and the stratospheric ozone hole. Whoa. And meat production is key in all this harm. 58 percent of the biomass harvested globally enters the livestock system as feed or bedding for animals, while only 12 percent is used directly as human food. Cows alone pack such a punch that, if they were a nation, “cow country” would rank as the world’s sixth worst greenhouse gas emitter . If food waste were a country, it would rank higher still—as the third worst . If we achieve a societal shift toward plant-based diets, we can reduce greenhouse gas emissions from farming by as much as 70 percent by 2050—and by even more if we cut food loss and waste, predict the University of Oxford’s Marco Springmann and colleagues. Other encouraging measures of what this shift could achieve? Worldwide, if those eating meat-centered diets moved to popular low-meat or no-meat fare, emissions could be “reduced by an amount equal to the current greenhouse gas emissions of all cars, trucks, planes, trains, and ships,” calculate University of Minnesota’s David Tilman and Michael Clark. That’s huge. And note, the plant-based nutrient balance is hardly novel, as it’s what nourished humans throughout our evolution and still characterizes many Indigenous diets today. Plant-centered eating also reduces incentives to fell carbon-absorbing forests to graze livestock and grow feed. Our dietary shift away from meat could “prevent the destruction of an area of tropical forests and savannas as large as half of the United States,” Tilman and Clark also estimate . One reason that’s a good thing is that it reduces the risk of new pandemics: We know felling forests for farms and grazing brings humans into greater contact with wildlife that can transmit viruses . Our food system’s emissions can also be reduced by more localization and less processing, packaging, refrigeration, as well as better waste management. Some propose shifting to grass-fed beef as part of the climate cure, but such a shift would have to involve a massive reduction in consumption. In the United States, pastureland could only support just over a quarter of our current demand for beef, one study found. And experts are still debating the climate-harming emissions of grass-fed versus feedlot-fed beef . Something we know for sure is that growing food ecologically without chemicals offers climate pluses : It uses half the energy and generates only a third of the greenhouse gases per acre compared to corporate, chemical-dependent farming. Plus, while all plants take in atmospheric carbon and sequester it in the soil, soils farmed ecologically hold more carbon. In addition to these positives, ecological farming helps restore the species richness decimated by agricultural pesticides and is key in meeting our nitrogen-overload crisis. Instead of chemical fertilizers, it uses nitrogen that soil microorganisms generate, effectively recycling it. And here’s a not-so-radical nitrogen solution. How about we all consume only the protein we need to be healthy? For many countries, including ours, that’s about half our average intake. These findings show us what’s possible if we move toward what I call plant-and-planet-centered diets. Fifty years ago, I didn’t foresee the climate crisis that would make my book’s message even more urgent. Today, we know so much more about how our dietary choices—and the public policies that shape them—aid or upend the environment, our health, equity, and democracy itself. Let our food choices remind us daily of the power we each have to enhance our earth’s capacities to meet the climate crisis. Photo by Daria Shevtsova from Pexels . _________ This article features topics discussed in the 50th Anniversary Edition of my book, Diet for a Small Planet , released September 2021. This version features a brand-new opening chapter, simple rules for a healthy diet, and updated recipes by some of the country’s leading plant- and planet-centered chefs. We are so excited to share this with you; order your copy here now ! You can join in the Democracy Movement at www.democracymovement.us . Frances Moore Lappé has authored 20 books, including Diet for a Small Planet and in 2017 she coauthored with Adam Eichen, Daring Democracy: Igniting Power, Meaning, and Connection for the America We Want . Frances co-founded Small Planet Institute and is the recipient of 20 honorary degrees and the Right Livelihood Award, often called the “Alternative Nobel.”

By Frances Moore Lappé / October 8, 2021 Emerging people’s movements are producing healthy food as they create democracy and sustain the tapestry of life in the soil, water, and atmosphere. Originally Published in Earth Island Journa l, October 8, 2021 Writing Diet for a Small Planet 50 years ago, I was appalled. While the world obsessed over food scarcity, I saw the vast waste, destruction, and injustice built into “modern,” corporate, and chemical-driven agriculture then beginning to take hold. We were headed in the wrong direction, I felt certain, and today I take no pleasure in noting I was right. This historic turn towards large-scale, corporate-dominated agriculture continues the centuries-long displacement of Black farmers in the United States and Indigenous and peasant farmers across much of the world. It has poisoned those who work the land and spread an ultra-processed and meat-centric diet that is now implicated globally in our most deadly non-communicable diseases . I’ll never forget the doctor in rural India who, more than a decade ago, told me that his patients used to suffer from a lack of calories, but no longer. With corporations spreading ultra-processed products globally, now his patients’ leading ailments are heart disease and diabetes. My daughter Anna and I traveled India reporting for our book, Hope’s Edge . Before we heard his shocking words, we’d seen the evidence ourselves of the encroachment of sources of such diet-related illnesses. One sign? Driving along rural roadways in northern India, we saw groves of trees painted with large Pepsi logos right at eye level. As this power-and-profit-driven agricultural regime spreads — in tandem with in-country worsening economic inequality — hunger continues. Feed crops and cash crops for export have replaced many indigenous, seasonal food crops , and today, worldwide, have caused severe calorie deficiency for as many as 811 million of us . That’s almost two-and-one-half times the US population. By a broader measure, one in three people on Earth lack access to adequate food, reports the UN’s food policy arm. This suffering continues even as the world produces plenty of calories and a fifth more calories per person than when I first wrote Diet for a Small Planet. Despite this devastation, I write now with new hope — evidence-based hope. Today we have proof not only of courageous resistance to the failing food model but of ingenuity and cooperation creating life-serving pathways. Emerging people’s movements are producing healthy food as they diffuse power and sustain the tapestry of life in the soil, water, and atmosphere. In other words, they are creating democracy not defined simply as elected governance, but as a way of life — what my young self had imagined was indeed the pathway to ending hunger. However, I didn’t appreciate it then in its existing forms or foresee its current emergence. Along the way, I’ve been continuously stoked by the research of Professor Jules Pretty at the University of Essex in the UK. But his most recent findings excite me the most. Last year, Pretty and his team published a 50-year perspective on developments in farming, especially in low-income countries. They discovered that after decades of top-down, neoliberal approaches starting around 2000, a radically different way of being with the Earth was beginning to arise — this time from the ground up. Sprouting with remarkable speed across 55 countries, they write that bottom-up, collaborative groups began spreading sustainable farming and forestry. Their life-serving practices harken back to ways we humans cared for ourselves and the earth for eons — through “common rules and sanctions” derived from “shared values,” observes the Pretty team. They noted “relations of trust, reciprocity and mutual obligation” as key to their success. These self-governing groups are part of what I’ve come to call living democracy. The Pretty team’s astounding overall finding? Whereas in the year 2000 there were about half a million such groups, in the following two decades, eight million emerged. Eight million in twenty years — whoa! So, in all, 8.5 million self-organizing, community bodies aligning their farming and forestry with nature now exist — almost all in low-income countries. Together they’re reviving land nearly the size of India . These organizations have helped enact policy changes in many countries, like the recognition of the rights of nature in Ecuador in 2008. The brilliance of Pretty and his team, I believe, is that they scoured the earth and turned up lessons of self-empowerment, cooperation, and dogged persistence we can all use. Even I might have been skeptical if I had not had my own unforgettable tastes of this global emergence. One of the most memorable was when I had the opportunity in Hyderabad, India, to meet women in one of the 75 villages of the Deccan Development Society (DDS), a biodiverse farming initiative I’d admired from afar for years. Sitting encircled by smiling women wearing gorgeous saris, many eagerly shared their stories with me. Two decades earlier, hunger was their daily reality, and many described feeling powerless in their own households. But then a few women began meeting — and dreaming. More joined, and once a week they began gathering at night after their children were asleep. Their “sangham” (women’s group) devised common plans for transforming nearby abandoned, barren land into fertile farmland by growing organic, diverse food crops. A savings circle, with each member contributing modest amounts, made it possible for sangham members to offer each other revolving loans to purchase or lease small plots of this land. This group self-financing approach towards organization is hardly unique to DDS, as it has been arising in many parts of the world, as highlighted in the 2014 book, In Their Own Hands: How Savings Groups Are Revolutionizing Development . Today, there is “no hunger in our village,” the women declared, beaming as they guided me into their fields, each no more than an acre or so, to see for myself at least twenty crop varieties — millet, legumes, greens, and other vegetables — all thriving together. Deeply moved by all I’d learned, I expressed my thanks and began walking out of the village. But suddenly I heard voices. Turning, I saw women rushing toward me calling out: “We forgot to tell you the most important thing!” I stopped, and here’s what I heard: “Most of all, what we get from our sangham is courage.” Their courage has enabled DDS to change. For example, they influenced state policy to include their healthier grains in school lunches. Their beautiful message goes right to the heart of all I have learned over this half-century: Answers come as we build courage through connections of deep trust. These women embody the wider rebirth of Professor Pretty and his team’s findings: They estimate that almost 30 percent of farms worldwide are now using ecological practices, like agroforestry, sustaining healthy soil, water, and species diversity along with the families that depend on them. Contributing to this progress is Via Campesina . Formed in 1993, its 200 million peasant farmers form a network across 81 countries, linking 182 farmer organizations. Together they are creating “food sovereignty,” a powerful expression of living democracy grounded in self-determination, ecological principles, and justice. Hope has power, so let us all spread the word about what’s not only possible, but what such trailblazers are already creating. Together, let us find our own courage to demand policies that support family and cooperative farming protecting our soil, water, and our people. THIS ARTICLE FEATURES topics discussed in the 50th Anniversary Edition of my book, Diet for a Small Planet , released September 2021. This version features a brand-new opening chapter, simple rules for a healthy diet, and updated recipes by some of the country’s leading plant- and planet-centered chefs. We are so excited to share this with you; order your copy here now! You can join in the Democracy Movement at www.democracymovement.us .

By Erin Eberle and Anna Lappé / October 1, 2021 Shifting to a plant-based diet, particularly one centered on whole foods not ultra-processed products, could reduce food’s associated greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 73 percent. Today, plant-centered eating is no longer a fringe dietary choice. (Photo: Paige Green ) Originally Published on Common Dreams , October 1, 2021 If you tuned in to gawk at the creative costuming of this season’s Met Gala , you may have done so knowing every celebrity crossing the beige carpet was going on to dine on a meat-free meal. Download Buzzfeed’s Tasty recipe app and the first prompt will ask: “Quick question: Are you a vegetarian?” Pull up a chair at New York City’s three-Michelin-star restaurant Eleven Madison Park and your options will now extend across the vegetable kingdom—but not beyond. These are just some of the signals of a cultural shift away from meat and toward plant-centered cuisines, by default . But addressing the environmental and health impacts of the livestock industry will take more than just changing the menus of high-end restaurants and some app nudging. Thankfully, we’re seeing strategies that work to make this change at scale emerging around the world. A recent analysis on land use estimated that livestock production uses 83 percent of the world’s farmland yet provides only 18 percent of the world’s total calories. Fifty years ago, when Anna’s mother’s book Diet for a Small Planet made the ecological and political case for plant-centered eating, the text was considered radical for daring to suggest we could survive without meat at the heart of our plates. Today, plant-centered eating is no longer a fringe dietary choice. Five decades on, the health benefits of plant-centered diets are increasingly well understood. Since 2015 , the world’s foremost cancer research agency has warned of the cancer risk from processed meat—like hot dogs and sausages. And, this year researchers documented how replacing meat and poultry in diets with nuts, legumes, and whole grains can dramatically reduce risk of heart disease and overall mortality. The evidence of the environmental impacts of industrial meat production —not to mention the worker and animal welfare implications—are also increasingly well understood. Analysis has shown that meat, particularly beef, has a particularly hefty toll on the climate and land use. Shifting to a plant-based diet, particularly one centered on whole foods not ultra-processed products, could reduce food’s associated greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 73 percent, one study published in Science found. And a recent analysis on land use estimated that livestock production uses 83 percent of the world’s farmland, yet provides only 18 percent of the world’s total calories. In the United States, the meat industry—in large part because so much cropland is devoted to animal feed—is tied to the lion’s share of nitrogen leaching, creating a devastating dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico, predicted to be the largest on record this year. Despite this toll, global meat consumption is on the rise. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimated that unless consumption trends change livestock production could be up as much as 76 percent by mid-century . While we are seeing signs of the popularizing of planet-friendly foods, how do we move at speed and scale to address the health and environmental crises we face? One way is to change food environments so planet-aligned eating is easier. This is just what Bon Appétit Management Company (BAMCO) made possible in 2007 when, alarmed by the climate impacts of beef production, the company committed to reducing its beef purchases by 25 percent over five years at its cafés in cultural institutions and on college and corporate campuses around the country. By 2012, BAMCO had reduced beef from the 250 million meals it had been serving every year by 33 percent. “We did it without customers even noticing,” said Maisie Ganzler, BAMCO’s Chief Strategy and Brand Officer. Since then, the company has continued to explore ways to improve the health and environmental impact of its supply chain, focusing on “less meat, better meat,” as Ganzler put it, and looking for ways to make the healthier options the default. Campaigns like DefaultVeg, housed by Better Food Foundation, are encouraging more institutions to publicly commit to planet-friendly food policies . Another strategic pathway is tapping the power of procurement. Every year, the U.S. spends billions of dollars on food—from the National School Lunch and Breakfast Programs to purchases by the Department of Defense. Making changes to those procurement choices is a powerful lever to shift food supply. The Good Food Purchasing Program (GFPP) has been modeling what that kind of shift could look like at the city and county level. First adopted by the Los Angeles Unified School District in 2012, the GFPP is a purchasing policy that emphasizes food centered in the values of health, local economies, worker well-being, animal welfare, and the environment. When Oakland Unified School District, with approximately 50,000 students over 70% of whom qualify for free-reduced price meals, adopted the program in 2016, the District reduced animal products by nearly 30 percent and increased meat purchased from local sources raising livestock organically and more humanely. Friends of the Earth analyzed the results and found a 14 percent reduction in the Districts’ “carbon footprint” and a 6 percent reduction in its “water footprint.” What’s more, the District saved money and upped student satisfaction. We’re seeing this approach spreading around the world: Dine in any one of Berlin’s university cafeterias this fall and you’ll soon find ample plant-centered offerings thanks to student advocacy. Another key tactic will be increasingly pressuring governments to regulate pollution from industrial animal agriculture with the same sense of urgency as advocates for climate action are pushing for gas and oil industry regulations. The nonprofit advocacy group Public Justice , for instance, recently launched a campaign calling on the EPA to list and regulate industrial dairy and hog operations under the Clean Air Act. The group’s argument rests in part on the fact that these confined animal feeding operations account for 13 percent of the U.S. total emissions of methane, a greenhouse gas more than 80 times more powerful than carbon dioxide in the first 20 years after emission. It’s been fifty years since Diet for a Small Planet was first published. Today, eating from the book’s anniversary edition’s refreshed, planet-centered recipes will be a quotidian act; not the heretical proposition of 1971. While we celebrate the mainstreaming of the book’s message, without the massive systems change we and many others around the world are advocating for, the global meat industry threatens to blow our carbon budget . To avert this outcome, we can celebrate the culture shift toward planet- and plant-centered foods and, at the same time, fight for the policies and regulations we need so that in 50 years, we’ll look back on this moment as a critical juncture: This was the moment we collectively tipped the scales towards a more sustainable diet, by default. ___ ERIN EBERLE Erin Eberle is a creative strategist, activist, and writer working at the intersection of food and social justice. They can be found on Twitter: @ErinEberle ANNA LAPPÉ Anna Lappé is a national bestselling author, most recently of Diet for a Hot Planet: The Climate Crisis at the End of Your Fork and What You Can Do About It and a contributor to the 50th anniversary edition of her mother’s Diet for a Small Planet . She is a founder of Real Food Media and works with funders to support food system transformation around the world.

I wrote a book 50 years ago arguing that plant-based diets would be healthier and more just. Now they’re a necessity. By Frances Moore Lappé / September 17, 2021 Photo: Paige Green Originally Published in The Boston Globe on September 17, 2021 Fifty years ago, what stirred me to write “Diet for a Small Planet” was shock. In the late 1960s, Paul Ehrlich’s book “The Population Bomb” had just exploded, igniting a scarcity scare. I had to know. Was humanity really hitting the earth’s limits to feed us? Soon I discovered there was no scarcity. Rather, it was our inequitable economies that were ensuring hunger for hundreds of millions. So I set out to expose the vast waste and injustice built into our increasingly corporate-dominated and meat-centered food system. I hoped not only to empower people to choose plant-centered eating but to realize more broadly our power together to create a system that serves life. When “Diet for a Small Planet” came out in 1971, my message was heresy. Today is different. Very different. Back then I framed plant-centered eating as an important choice, but today it has become a no-contest necessity, as life on earth is now at stake. If I sound more than a bit melodramatic, stay with me. Half a century later, we are in the midst of a fierce storm: Years of attack on the integrity of our democracy, a pandemic, and a destructive climate crisis may finally open our eyes. It’s only when a mighty tree falls that we can see its roots. What are the food-related roots of crises that continue, worsen, or have arisen during the last 50 years? And how do we use what we discover to pull ourselves back from catastrophe and protect life itself? First, hunger amid plenty continues. Today, nearly a billion people “do not have enough to eat,” the UN World Food Program reports, while another UN agency estimates that many more, nearly of us, lack “access to adequate food.” And another heartbreaking and long-standing measure? One in five young children worldwide is stunted by malnutrition, bringing lifelong harms. Second, we’ve turned food and farming into a health hazard . About 58 percent of all calories Americans eat come from ultra-processed food, with little nutrition but loads of sugar, salt, and additives. Diet-related diseases have become leading causes of death. One hundred million adult Americans suffer from diabetes or pre-diabetes . That’s more than one in three. Some people hoped genetically modified seeds would reduce the use of herbicides, but instead we’ve seen substantial increases — killing insects that are, of course, key in sustaining countless plant and animal species. One recent study found that pesticides’ toxic impact on bees and other pollinators has doubled in just a decade. Pesticides poison farmworkers as well. Third, our food systems generate as much as 37 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. Just five meat and dairy corporations generate more greenhouse gas emissions than Exxon, Shell, or BP. Cows pack such a punch that if they were a nation, “cow country” would rank as the world’s sixth worst greenhouse gas emitter. And the greenhouse gas emissions from food waste are more than what all but two countries emit. Fourth, resources essential to growing food — healthy soil and groundwater — are fast disappearing. At the current pace, topsoil for farming worldwide could be gone in 60 years . In our key farming states, underground water is being mined for irrigation much faster than nature can replace it. Note that to produce a pound of beef takes 1,800 gallons of water — nearly 50 times more than a pound of vegetables. Fifth is a piece of the crisis that most of us have never even registered: Excess nitrogen is wreaking havoc on the environment . Chemical-dependent farming may have disrupted the nitrogen cycle even more than it has affected the carbon cycle. In the United States, meat is the single biggest food production avenue — via the runoff from fertilizing livestock feed crops and from manure — by which nitrogen moves into inland waterways and then into the Gulf of Mexico. There, it’s created a coastal “ dead zone ,” killing marine life — one of 415 such oceanic zones . Nitrogen runoff also worsens smog, haze, acid rain, forest loss, well-water pollution, climate heating, and the stratospheric “ozone hole.” Whoa. Sixth, here’s the clincher: Widespread, intensive livestock production threatens the web of life itself. By killing animals and destroying habitats, we’ve eliminated more than eight in 10 wild mammals on Earth, and 60 percent of the mammals remaining are livestock we’ve bred. Large-scale livestock production is a primary force causing forests and wildlife populations to shrink by two-thirds in the last half century. Plus, pesticides and mega-monocultures are primary drivers of the possible extinction of 40 percent of the world’s insect population in the next few decades. In all, one million species are threatened with extinction, and the pace of loss is quickening. Such massive loss is terrifying. So how did our bright species turn feeding itself into a threat to life? Through the undermining of decision-making that is accountable to us citizens: Ever more private corporate influence has translated into political power. One measure? Today, for every member of Congress we’ve elected to protect our interests, 21 lobbyists are instead pushing policies that serve their industries’ interests. Agribusiness has a much larger battalion of lobbyists than even the oil and gas industry. Now, to the good news. Worldwide, people across all walks of life are waking up. Awareness is growing that plant-centered eating is healthier. Not only are plant-centered diets associated with lower mortality rates , they also encourage soil-protective crop diversity and reduce the amount of land we need to grow food — reducing pressure on other species. Plant-based diets could cut in half the land that has to be used for food. A diet doesn’t have to be entirely vegan or vegetarian to be plant-centered. We’re also talking about diets that include small amounts of meat, as a complement to other ingredients. When I was growing up in Fort Worth, Texas, amid the smell of the stockyards, meat was the centerpiece of almost every meal. Today we know just how unsustainable that was. With this fast-spreading awareness, a global movement for healthy farming and eating is taking off. The necessary sharp turn toward life depends both on our everyday choices and on our courage. It requires determined citizens willing to challenge concentrated economic and political power to together achieve democratically set rules — rules that put our health and Earth first. Now is the moment. Tomorrow is too late. Frances Moore Lappé, cofounder of the Small Planet Institute in Cambridge, has written or co-authored 20 books about food, the environment, and democracy. The 50th anniversary edition of “Diet for a Small Planet,” with new recipes and other updates, will be released on Tuesday.

By Frances Moore Lappé/ September 24, 2021 In 1969, experts said the cause of hunger was world overpopulation. Frances Moore Lappé showed they were wrong. PHOTO BY PEOPLEIMAGES/GETTY IMAGES Originally Published in Yes! Magazine on September 24, 2021 When Frances Moore Lappé first published Diet for a Small Planet in 1971, she began a revolution that connects our personal food choices to the rest of the world. In this adapted excerpt from the book’s 50th updated anniversary edition, she reveals how it all began. Having made a D on my first college English paper, never did I imagine becoming a writer. No, never. But somewhere along the way I felt I had no choice. Twenty books later, here’s how it happened. As a child of the 1960s, I graduated from college not long after Kennedy’s assassination, and Martin Luther King’s March on Washington, and during intense conflict over the Vietnam War. At the same time, Lyndon Johnson’s civil rights legislation, as well as his Great Society and war on poverty , triggered new hope and big dreams for many. I was one of those many. In my first job I became a “covert agent” in Johnson’s war. Hired officially by the city of Philadelphia as a housing inspector, my real job assigned by radicals in the housing authority was to go door-to-door in a North Philadelphia neighborhood. My goal was to help single mothers trying to survive on meager welfare payments to connect with each other to realize their united power. My savvy bosses understood that their city program to transform renters—victimized by slumlords and racist redlining—into homeowners could succeed only as renters knew their rights and felt strength through their common bonds. Within months, the women had formed a chapter of the brand-new National Welfare Rights Organization to address the indignities and inadequacies of our welfare system. In the process, we all became close friends. I did have a favorite friend, though, Lilly. Despite her daily struggle to keep her young kids fed, clothed, and warm, her plucky spirit warmed and inspired me. Then one day the phone rang. “Lilly has died of a heart attack,” her dear friend told me. “Would you come to the funeral and wake?” Lilly’s death hit me hard, but I always knew what really killed my young friend: the stress of poverty and racism combined. This truth stayed with me the following year, as I moved across the country to begin a graduate program in social work at University of California, Berkeley. But soon came the moment—for me, the “Lilly’s truth moment.” My graduate program at the University of California involved working on fair housing in racially segregated Oakland, but one morning I woke up with this “ah ha”: I can’t actually help our troubled world until I understand how my action contributes to tackling the root causes of the injustices that killed my friend. But where do I start? I knew the roots of racism, poverty, and powerlessness lay deep in economic and political relationships; but how could I even begin to untangle all that? At the time, our culture was being hit with a scary message: Experts were predicting imminent famine, as we humans were overwhelming the Earth’s limits. Paul Ehrlich’s book, The Population Bomb , had just exploded, and another book with the ominous title Famine 1975! (including the exclamation point) had also hit the stands. Food! The first thing every species does is feed itself and its offspring. But we, the brightest species, are failing at this most basic task. What does that tell us? My hunch was that, if I could answer this question, I could untangle the mysteries of economics and politics—and find my path. In 1969, burrowing in at UC’s agricultural library—with the help of a great librarian leading me from source to source—I kept adding up the numbers. To my great surprise, I discovered the experts were wrong. There was enough food for all. Even more shocking, I learned that what we counted (and still count) as available food was what was left over after we devoted vast crop and grazing land to feeding livestock that return to us only a tiny fraction of what they eat. I found then that for every 21 protein calories going into cattle we got back only one calorie in the meat we eat. (Now, years later, an academic study confirms the estimate.) Wow, I thought. We cannot blame nature’s skimpiness. We are not bumping up against natural limits. We humans are creating the experience of hunger, and that means we can end it. What fabulous news. So, I circulated a one-pager proclaiming my discovery. Looking back now, I’ve come to appreciate the advantage of “fresh eyes,” as I had then— meaning that I arrived at my question without preformed assumptions limiting what I could see. Hmm, I thought, maybe it was precisely because I was untrained—and thus had no blinders—that I saw what “experts” had missed. Very soon after the release of Diet for a Small Planet in 1971, I began to summarize my message this way: Hunger is not caused by a scarcity of food but by a scarcity of democracy, as people are denied power even over life’s essentials. I wanted to focus my readers on power. I could see that Lilly’s early, needless death resulted from the economic and political assumptions and rules and racism that keep power tightly held—here in my own country as in all other countries experiencing hunger. So, over the decades I’ve worked to redefine democracy itself from “elections plus a market” to what I call “living democracy”—an ongoing journey to realize three conditions. They are: First, a culture of inclusive power in which we each have a voice. Second, transparency essential to accountability in public affairs; and third, mutual accountability. By that third point, I mean that because we’re all connected, we’re all implicated. As Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel puts it : “Some are guilty, but all are responsible.” Simply blaming is not enough to sustain democracy. We citizens must be solution-builders. Diet for a Small Planet launched me on a lifelong journey pursuing root-cause questions and enabled me to keep striving for a systemic vision in which bottom-up citizen engagement fosters transformative, democratic progress. I hope Diet for a Small Planet helps each of us to realize the power that is ours—to know we can make food choices based, not on what’s most advertised, but on what is best for our bodies, the Earth, and those who work to bring us food. And that taste of power can embolden us to work ever harder for democracy strong enough to transform public policies to guarantee all eaters real, nutritious choices. How liberating this learning has been in my life. Adapted from the book Diet for a Small Planet by Frances Moore Lappé. Copyright © 2021 by Frances Moore Lappé. Published by Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York. All rights reserved.

By Frances Moore Lappé / August 9, 2021 (Photo Credit: Shutterstock by Dmitry Demidovich ) Originally Published on Common Dreams , August 9, 2021 How can a democracy committed to freedom of speech protect itself against damaging lies? That’s a tough and urgent question with which our nation must now grapple. The Big Lie—still believed by one-half of Republicans—led to deaths on January 6th, and lies about Covid vaccines are “killing people,” affirmed Scientific American . Speed is part of their power. “Falsehoods are 70 percent more likely to be retweeted than the truth and reach their first 1,500 recipients six times faster,” find s MIT’s Media lab. So, what’s a democracy to do when lies fly while truth crawls? We can start by acknowledging that our First Amendment aimed not simply to protect an individual’s right to speak. It “was fashioned” also to serve a vital public function: “to assure unfettered interchange of ideas for the bringing about of political and social changes desired by the people,” as clarified in a 1957 Supreme Court ruling . But we fail in this public purpose if “freedom of speech” gets reduced a right to say whatever we please within a “marketplace of ideas”—a metaphor introduced more than a century ago by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. At great peril, we become blind to the fact that all markets have rules. Most of us appreciate rules protecting us against, say, the sale of unsafe drugs. Why wouldn’t we also see that democracy itself—our most cherished national value—requires rules to guard against the spread of dangerous lies? In the past, rules assuring “fair and balanced” news coverage served us well. In 1949, The Federal Communications Commission introduced the Fairness Doctrine requiring broadcasters to present issues of public importance and from a range of viewpoints. Twenty years later, in its defense, Justice Byron White argued that “the people” have an overriding First Amendment right to “an uninhibited marketplace of ideas in which truth will ultimately prevail.” But, in 1987 the Reagan administration killed the Fairness Doctrine on the grounds that increasingly diverse media assured access to opposing views. Quickly, though, one-sided, fact-free—but highly profitable—talk radio and television took off . Sinclair broadcasting—once dominated by Rush Limbaugh—now reaches about 40 percent of America’s households. Since 2005, its profits have soared almost ninefold . And TV? This year, among those leaning Red, 93 percent cite Fox as their political news source, and among those leaning Blue, 87 to 95 percent cite NPR, New York Times , and MSNBC. Eighty-six percent report getting their news from digital devices. Social media is the main source for almost a quarter; and half report its use “at least sometimes.” From these sources, Americans typically choose those aligned with their political orientation. Thus, the Court’s premise of an “unfettered interchange of ideas” no longer holds. Most do not hear opposing views from which truth can “ultimately prevail.” Contributing to decline in democratic dialogue, money speaks loudly in today’s media marketplace. Harvard Professor Lawrence Lessig notes that the “free speech we liberals romanticize has always had humans standing behind it.” But today, “free speech is driven…by machines that craft speech based upon the behavior that is desired. Most commonly, that behavior is simply commercial—clicking an ad.” Indeed, online advertising on over 20,000 websites poses disinformation risks while bringing $235 million in annual profits, finds a 2019 study by the Global Disinformation Index . So, how do we stay true to our nation’s purpose laid out in the constitution’s preamble: to “promote the general Welfare” as we assure freedom of expression while also protecting our wellbeing and democracy itself? For one, we can seek lessons from countries ranking higher than we do in political and civil liberties. They demonstrate that protecting truthful communication and assuring democratic freedoms are not at odds. Freedom House ranks New Zealand fourth in “ global freedom scores ,” while the U.S. falls behind sixty nations. Since 1989, New Zealand’s Broadcasting Standards Authority chaired by a judge has maintained radio and television standards. It responds to citizen complaints with full transparency online as to its reasoning, decisions (11 percent upheld), and appeal process. Germany ranks nineteenth, also well above the U.S. Its 2017 Network Enforcement Act was amended last month to better enable users to report hate speech and fake news and to achieve timely removal—while adding an appeals process. Five years ago the EU introduced a media code of conduct , especially geared to fast removal of terrorist content on online platforms and websites. While we have no comparable national strategy protecting us from lies, fourteen U.S. states have created media literacy curricula empowering students to detect misinformation. Plus, the Knight Foundation has invested almost $3 million in preparing journalists to identify misinformation and is creating a tool for “instant notifications of fact-checks during live events such as speeches and debates.” Available now to help sort fact from fiction is Factcheck.org from the Annenberg Public Policy Center. Worldwide, democracy is in decline , with two-thirds of the world’s people living in autocracies, including “electoral autocracies.” May this sad news along with inspiration from some democracies’ creative responses, ignite action here to protect robust, truthful communication. Our democracy itself is at stake.

By Frances Moore Lappé / June 11, 2021 People hold placards at a rally in front of the US Supreme Court to call on the Senate to pass the For the People Act, on June 9, 2021, in Washington DC. (Photo: Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images) Originally Published on Common Dreams , June 11, 2021 Laments over America’s political polarization mount. “Actions of the president and his party are pulling us further apart,” argued Senator Tim Scott (R-S.C.) responding to President Biden’s address in late April. “Polarization is the story of American politics today,” observes Fareed Zakaria of CNN. Such framing obscures the real threat—the attack underway on democracy itself. Merriam Webster defines democracy as “ government by the people, especially rule of the majority.” So defined, it is not merely Democrats that Republicans appear to be fighting as they pursue legislation undermining majority rule. Democracy itself is their target: “Overall, legislators have introduced at least 389 bills with restrictive provisions in 48 states,” reports the Brennan Center . They restrict voting and much more. Earlier this month a Statement of Concern from more than one hundred democracy scholars across the country decried that such legislation “could entrench extended minority rule.” So we should be alarmed but not surprised that in its 2021 annual ranking of countries by their political rights and civil liberties, Freedom House found the US dropping significantly, from 94 to 83, placing us between Morocco and Romania. Moreover, focusing on our divisions can blind us to the considerable evidence that the majority of Americans align on many key challenges we face today. Here are twelve big ones: Nearly eight in ten Americans favor limits on both raising and spending money in Congressional campaigns. Eighty-four percent of Americans agree that politicians have too much economic power, and 82 percent agree that the rich and big corporations have too much power. Six in ten of us believe that upper-income Americans do not pay enough in taxes, while 64 percent are bothered—either “some” or “a lot”—that corporations are not paying their fair tax share. Seventy-eight percent of Americans , including 80 percent of Republicans, oppose the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling unleashing even more money in politics. Eighty-four percent favor paid family leave, and two-thirds support a $15 federal minimum wage. Most Americans –including 70 percent of Republicans and 92 percent of Democrats–favor closing gun-sale loopholes by enforcing background checks for private gun sales and at gun shows. Seventy-seven percent of Americans now believe the US should prioritize the development of renewable energy over expanding fossil fuel production, and 68 percent favor increased federal spending on green and renewable energy. Seventy-one percent favor changing the healthcare system so that any American can buy into a government-run health care plan if they want to. Seventy-one percent think that most immigrants living in the United States illegally should be offered a chance to apply for legal status. Seventy-one percent are against overturning Roe v Wade. Seventy-seven percent agree that racism is a serious problem in the U.S. and 72 percent say racism is a serious problem in policing. Regarding For the People Act (H.R. 1 and S 1.)—with strong democracy-protecting measures addressing voting rights, money in politics, and gerrymandering— Data for Progress’s new survey revealed that two-thirds of likely voters are in favor. Here we see that in critical ways, the narrative of a divided nation is false. It’s taken hold in part perhaps because it taps into a human tendency to construct dichotomies—to adopt black-and-white thinking when faced with stress and uncertainty. But the framing harms us, as it undermines hope and stymies action. So, if you are surprised by these wide points of unity, consider a critical lesson. While often we hear that “seeing is believing,” for humans the opposite is true: “Believing is seeing.” We see what we expect to see. If we’re constantly told we live in a politically divided world, we risk seeing only evidence that confirms this frame. Let us free ourselves by embracing our wide areas of agreement. In so doing, we stoke hope and find courage to act. Now is the moment. Acting on our unity, we can heed the Brennan Center’s call : “Americans’ access to the vote is in unprecedented peril. But Congress can protect it. The For the People Act, passed by the House and now awaiting action in the Senate, would block many of the state-level restrictions that have been or may soon be enacted into law.” Inspired by our impressive unity, we each can sign the open letter to Senator Joe Manchin—sponsored by Equal Citizens—calling on him ensure passage of the For the People Act now. Manchin's claim that he needs bipartisanship to pass HR1 has already been met! Americans are not divided on democracy. We can make our voices heard. They are part of a beautiful harmony.

Almost half the growth of U.S. renewable energy from 2000 to 2019 can be linked to state Renewable Portfolio Standards — with more expected over the next decade. By Frances Moore Lappé / June 24, 2021 (Photo Credit: ipopba at iStock Getty Images) Originally published on Truthout , June 24, 2021 As we work to combat the climate crisis, it’s clear that electricity providers must shift toward using more renewable energy to generate power. Clearly, more regulations are needed. But depending on where you are in the country, the word “regulation” is met with heavy resistance. So, why not try a reframe? Some clever folks did just that. They came up with the label “Renewable Portfolio Standard,” also called “Renewable Energy Standards,” a policy approach that has spread rapidly with real impact. The Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) is a public mandate, typically initiated by a state legislature with the purpose of increasing energy from renewable sources — wind, solar, and other alternatives to fossil fuel and nuclear power. Another purpose has been to drive renewable innovation by signaling a predictable, growing market. The law sets renewable energy production targets for utilities — either in the amount of energy they produce or as a share of their energy output — along with consequences for not meeting them, usually a fine . Way back in 1983, Iowa became the first state to try this type of renewable energy mandate. The state’s Renewable Portfolio Standard mandated that Iowa’s two main utility companies own or secure by contract a total of 105 megawatts (MW) of renewables, or enough to power several hundred homes. Not a terribly impressive requirement … but a start. From this baby step came a big leap. By 2019, Iowa was the second largest wind power producer, after Texas. And by 2020, wind energy from more than 5,100 turbines powered 57 percent of Iowa's net electricity generation— a bigger share than any other state. As of early 2021 the state was generating around 11,500 megawatts of renewable-based energy, nearly 110 times the energy potential of Iowa’s original 105 megawatt renewables target. Iowa’s success has played a pivotal role in moving others to use the Renewable Portfolio Standard. Now, 30 states, plus Washington, D.C., and three territories have adopted the policy or a similar approach to mandate a shift in electricity generation. In 2004, as the most oil-dependent state in the nation, Hawaii changed its renewable portfolio "goal" to an enforceable standard. In a 2015 update to the standard, Hawaii became the first state to set a target of using 100 percent renewable energy by 2045. Gov. David Ige explained : "Hawaii spends roughly $5 billion a year on foreign oil to meet its energy needs. Making the transition to renewable, indigenous resources for power generation will allow us to keep more of that money at home, thereby improving our economy, environment, and energy security.” In 2018, California took the same step, setting a 100 percent renewable energy production goal by 2045. Understanding the urgency of this act, then-Gov. Jerry Brown declared to the press, “It will not be easy. It will not be immediate. But it must be done.” The results are impressive: Clearly, lack of federal leadership did not stop significant state action. If you thought Iowa’s use of renewable portfolio standards was unexpected, consider that even in Texas -- where we know ideas like “big government” and “regulations” sound unpopular -- lawmakers were willing to pass a renewable energy requirement when it was framed as a “Renewable Portfolio Standard.” In 2002, after much give-and-take, the Texas Legislature enacted Senate Bill 7 , amending the state’s utility code and allowing for competition in the state’s retail electricity market. The Lone Star State put in place a Renewable Portfolio Standard. It required that by 2009 electricity providers collectively supply consumers with 2,000 megawatts of renewable power , enough to power about a third of a million homes . When it became clear that this goal would be met three years early in Texas, the state legislature more than doubled the requirement to just over 5,000 megawatts by 2015. As before, wind development blew past forecasts. This achievement was possible because Texas had OK’d construction of transmission lines to route electricity from remote wind farms to large urban markets. As of May 2021, the state’s installed wind capacity had reached nearly 40,000 megawatts — more than six times the goal mandated just four years earlier. Now leading the nation in wind energy, Texas currently generates 20 percent of U.S. wind-powered electricity. Meanwhile, in less than a decade, Virginia has become a renewable-energy powerhouse. It’s on track to produce more than half of its electricity from renewables by 2035, and all of it a decade later. In March, the 2020 Virginia Clean Economy Act went into effect. It’s got real teeth: mandated benchmarks over 15 years for solar and wind investment and a Renewable Portfolio Standard requiring the state’s utilities to provide fully renewable electricity by 2045. If the entire US were to adopt similar policies to these state-wide initiatives and enact a national goal of a 50 percent renewable energy standard by 2035, potentially we could cut CO2 emissions in the nation’s power sector by over 45 percent and reduce national natural gas generation by 38 percent over the next 15 years. These reductions—although falling slightly short of national efforts by President Biden to halve our current CO2 emissions within the next decade—would put us on track to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. Almost half the growth of U.S. renewable energy from 2000 to 2019 can be linked to state Renewable Portfolio Standards — with more expected over the next decade. But that’s about the only blanket statement one can make about them. This reminds us of Justice Brandeis’s observation nearly 90 years ago, perhaps no more important than today: “It is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous state may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments ...” States have implemented differing approaches. Standards range from Washington, D.C.’s call for 100 percent renewable energy by 2032 to Iowa’s modest, but long-surpassed, 1983 renewables goal. Many states mandate that renewables comprise a minimum share of retail electric sales — generally between 10 and 45 percent, though 14 states require 50 percent or greater. Rather than mandating that a particular share of energy be renewable, two national leaders, Iowa and Texas, require specific amounts of renewable energy capacity. In creating investment certainty, states’ “standards” mandates have been astonishingly successful in driving the growth of renewable energy and advancing renewable energy technology, all the while driving down our reliance and generation of fossil fuel source production, which has been steadily declining in the past several years. In fact, the U.S. now generates more than double the total renewable energy that was called for in the 29 states’ standards all together. While this statistic is extremely impressive, we must also note that individual states can’t fight this national effort alone. These regional efforts constitute only a fraction, albeit a powerful one, of the necessary measures our nation must take in order to foster renewable energy systems that aren’t reliant on detrimental fossil fuels. Let us all support the efforts of organizations and leaders re-writing our nation’s energy story. The youth-led Sunrise Movement as well as 350.org are leading the charge for renewable energy, fossil-fuel emitter accountability, and just, equitable, and sustainable energy grids—all the while upgrading the most crucial element of American infrastructure, democracy itself. They, among others, deserve praise and support for advancing the Green New Deal and President Biden’s Plan for a Clean Energy Revolution and Environmental Justice . Renewable Portfolio Standards are just one tool in what must become a broad, transformative strategy to transform how we power our society—a strategy that, I’m thrilled to say, is already significantly underway. ………….. If you want to discover where your state stands on renewable energy mandates, here is a handy interactive site from the US Energy Information Administration: www.eia.gov/state/index.php . The author would like to thank Nina Larbi, Olivia Smith, and Rachel Madison for their assistance on earlier drafts.

It’s already happening across the globe. Photo: Groundswell International Originally Published on Medium , April 8, 2020. As COVID-19 spreads worldwide, we’ve become attuned to those on the front lines: Doctors and healthcare workers, yes, but also those who feed us. If we didn’t get it already, this global crisis is a wake-up call for how our collective fate is tied to the way we relate to nature, use the land, and treat farmers and workers who grow, process, and distribute our food. Unfortunately, in the last half-century, both public and private investments in industrial food systems that exploit people and undermine the natural systems on which food security depends have ramped up. Worldwide, industrial agriculture drives 80 percent of deforestation. On nearly every continent, land grabs by agribusiness have pushed small farmers onto increasingly marginal land and indigenous communities off ecosystems they’ve long stewarded. These dynamics have brought wild animal populations, natural hosts for pathogens, into closer contact with humans. Scientists have long warned it would only be a matter of time before those pathogens found new hosts — us. Indeed, damning evidence from evolutionary biologists and epidemiologists suggests that the industrial food system has helped create the structural conditions for this outbreak, and for others to follow in its wake. This crisis is a powerful reminder that our industrial food system puts us all at risk. But there is another way. As funders investing in food systems that promote biodiversity, farmer well-being, and health, we’ve witnessed incredible innovations in the past few decades that give us hope amid the crisis. Earlier this year, we helped convene innovators — scientists, farmers, policymakers, funders, and advocates from five continents — sharing strategies for food system resilience and the policies needed to defend it. We heard from indigenous Peruvian potato farmers, West African women rice farmers, and indigenous livestock breeders from Kyrgyzstan whose work is all rooted in what is known as “agroecology” — the science, on-farm practices, and social movements that support food systems working with nature instead of fighting against it with synthetic, external inputs. Guided by principles of diversity, regeneration, and localization, agroecology combines indigenous and traditional agriculture with modern science, boosting animal and crop health for maximum nutritional benefit and ecosystem restoration. At that gathering in southern India, we heard firsthand accounts of the impact of our industrial food system even before this current pandemic: Reliance on chemical inputs and fossil fuels — for pesticides, fertilizer, packaging, and transportation — destroys biodiversity, plunges farmers into debt, and contributes to the climate crisis. We heard about how a myopic focus on commodity crops has resulted in unhealthy diets responsible for the surge in diet-related illnesses worldwide and how industrial animal agriculture operations breed disease and drive massive water and air pollution. We also heard how such a dependence on commodities, bought and sold on a volatile global market, creates a shaky foundation for food security and breaks the connection between eaters and food producers. But we also heard solutions. In Kyrgyzstan, peacebuilding programs are working with herders and geneticists to revive the disappearing gene pool of two aboriginal livestock breeds — the Kyrgyz horse and the Buryat cow — to help restore Central Asia’s nomadic pastoralism and pasture ecosystems. By focusing on preserving this genetic diversity , these breeders ensure that native livestock thrives — livestock that is resilient to the region’s harsh climate. In contrast, animals bred exclusively for productivity crammed into factory farms increases the risk of illnesses and dangerous pathogens. In Burkina Faso, Groundswell International is working with farmers’ movements using agroforestry, mixed cropping, rainwater harvesting, and composting to gain incredible results despite the water scarcity near the encroaching Sahara desert. With these practices, they’ve reclaimed abandoned land for farming and obtained up to 130 percent yield increases of millet and sorghum, while regreening the landscape and adapting to climate change. In agroecological systems like these, the use of diverse and native species bridges wild and cultivated areas, helping to manage pests while also providing vital pollinators with continuous habitat. In southern India, grassroots farmer networks like the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha and village-level women’s self-help organizations have been advocating for years for a shift to natural farming practices to prevent dependency on chemical inputs, farmer debt, and spiraling farmer suicides. Policymakers listened. Today, the Andhra Pradesh state government supports more than half a million farmers to adopt agroecological practices in a massive public program called Community Managed Natural Farming. In Ecuador, the civil society-led Agroecology Collective collaborates with municipal governments in a campaign for healthy, safe, and locally grown food through a network of farmers markets and direct-to-consumer food programs, known as CSAs or community-supported agriculture. Shortening the supply chain between those producing food and those consuming it, as it’s being done in Ecuador, is essential to weather crises. From Malaysia to Mozambique to Mississippi, we heard about the myriad benefits of solutions grounded in those core principles of agroecology: diversity, regeneration, and localization. These benefits have inspired not just foundations like ours to invest in agroecology; they have inspired burgeoning public investments and acknowledgment of the value of these practices. In 2014, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization endorsed agroecology as a key pillar of the food and agriculture system we need. This year, the Convention on Biological Diversity will consider including agroecological solutions in its biodiversity framework. And ministries of environment and agriculture around the world are increasing investments in agroecology, many as pillars of post-Paris Agreement climate mitigation and adaptation action plans. COVID-19 has reminded us we cannot take our interrelation for granted — with each other or with nature. We must rethink an industrial food system that ruptures these vital relationships and step up our efforts to support practices that restore and sustain them. By ramping up private and public investment for agroecology now; we can feed the world and strengthen our resilience against this crisis — and the ones yet to come.

Despite lack of federal leadership and under-appreciated by most of us, key states and cities are not only getting it, they’re getting going—plowing ahead with solutions to the climate crisis grounded in social equity. People United for Sustainable Housing (PUSH) Buffalo is working to advance strong neighborhoods with quality & affordable housing, local hiring opportunities, and economic & environmental justice. (Photo courtesy of PUSH Buffalo ) Originally Published on Common Dreams , April 23, 2020 On the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, Covid19 shouts out a profound lesson: America can tackle this pandemic as well as meet our vastly bigger climate threat only as we move together toward solutions. Seem right? Obviously so. But solidarity for effective action demands we first take to heart that those most harmed by the virus—poor Americans, especially those of color—have also long suffered disproportionately from other harms, including fossil fuels’ hazards bringing on climate disruption. Equally true, in meeting the climate crisis, righting these wrongs can speed all Americans toward greater health and safety. And the great news? Despite lack of federal leadership and underappreciated by most of us, key states and cities are not only getting it, they’re getting going—plowing ahead with solutions to the climate crisis grounded in social equity. States home to more than half of all Americans—and responsible for 40 percent of our greenhouse gas emissions—have committed to the Paris Agreement’s climate goals dismissed by President Trump. Plus, eight states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico are going further —passing laws that put them the path to a 100 percent clean energy. Here’s a taste of how it’s possible to take strong action on climate while righting the wrongs of social exclusion. California Beginning in 2017, a statewide program requires the California Air Resources Board to focus its clean-air efforts on communities most exposed to air pollution. (Hmm. Seem like a no-brainer?) Plus, the Board must now specifically consult environmental justice groups, among others affected, in developing its air-quality strategy. Then, in 2018, in a move toward greater economic equity, the new governor Gavin Newsom committed $35 million annually to make sure new clean-energy jobs are “high quality”—commonly meaning well-paid, safe, and with benefits—and also include apprenticeships enabling “career ladders.” Since California’s economy is the world’s sixth the largest, ripples from these bold steps can travel far. New York In 2019, New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo also emerged as a leader, signing the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act . Its goal? To slash the state’s greenhouse gas emissions by 85 percent and reach net zero emissions by 2050. More than a third of the benefits target disadvantaged communities—via investments in housing, workforce development, reducing pollution, energy assistance and more. Welcoming community input, the Act creates a climate-justice working group , representing environmental justice groups, vulnerable industries, and disadvantaged communities. Its mandate is to ensure that actions target harms disproportionately hurting low-income New Yorkers and those of color. A second working group will advise on workforce training and job impacts. Plus, New York’s new offshore wind projects will provide enough electricity to power 1 million homes, doubling the state’s earlier goal. Plus, they will generate more than 1,600 jobs directly offering “well-paying careers, with annual salaries of roughly $100,000,” asserts the state agency. Not bad! Washington Looking west again, Washington took a big step in 2019: New legislation pledged the state to ensure all retail sales of electricity are greenhouse-gas neutral in just ten years and entirely carbon free by 2045; and it laid out how to make this huge shift happen. First, the state must identify communities most vulnerable to the health impacts of climate destabilization; and power utilities must fund a whole range of energy-assistance programs, including help for low-income families in weatherizing their homes. The law also offers a 50 percent cut all the way to total exemption from state sales and use taxes for cooperating businesses—those owned by women, minorities, or veterans, as well as those adhering to specific fair-labor practices and programs, including apprenticeships, preferred hiring of local residents, and more. Colorado In May, 2019, Governor Jared Polis signed 11 energy-and climate-related bills, including one to reduce pollution in disproportionately hard-hit communities. Another creates a new state Office of Just Transition. With the support of labor, the new transition office assists communities and workers—including struggling families of former miners as the state shifts away from coal-fired electricity. It provides funds to compensate cities and school districts for tax revenues lost due to coal plant closures. Cities Too! Plus, here is a taste of what municipalities are doing—simultaneously—for climate stabilization and equity. Did you know that almost 170 cities nationally have signed on to the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy, now representing 10,000 cities in 138 countries? Yes! In signing on, all pledge “to establish a goal of transitioning entirely to clean, renewable energy” and to measure greenhouse gas emissions, assess risk, set targets, develop an action plan, and make their progress transparent. Minneapolis In 2018, Minneapolis committed to “100 percent clean renewable energy by 2030,” becoming the largest Midwest city to sign on to the Covenant. To achieve its goals, the city is working with the Minneapolis Clean Energy Partnership to cut residential natural gas use and put city facilities on an energy-efficiency “performance path,” as it field tests energy-efficiency technology. And for its own fleet, the city is installing electric vehicle charging. City government has made clea r its determination to ensure “especially those who have been left out of the benefits of energy programs in the past, communities of color, low-income communities, renters, and communities that have borne the brunt of past environmental racism, receive equitable benefit from this transition.” One way Minneapolis is realizing that commitment is its targeted development of “community solar gardens”—a lovely term for a cluster of solar panels enabling nearby homes to reduce energy bills by as much 50 percent. In the process, the city aims for more equitable access to clean-energy jobs and financing. All this work has earned Minneapolis fourth place status in energy efficiency among US cities, ranked by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy. (Proud to say my adopted hometown of Boston places first!) Buffalo During Buffalo’s frigid winters, energy costs can rise to 30 percent above the nation’s average—an enormous burden for poor households. And deep resource disparities add to the challenge: The share of its African American residents living in poverty is three time greater than white. So PUSH— People United for Sustainable Housing Buffalo —has worked since 2005 to ensure all neighborhoods thrive even in America’s snow capital. As Sage Green, PUSH Buffalo Sustainability Specialist, puts it, “The people we work with… want long-term structural changes…a whole new system that works for people and the planet.” Adds PUSH Board President Maxine Murphy : Poor people are just like all people—they “want ways that their houses are using less energy. They want houses where their energy is not going out of windows and doors. But they have to fight for it harder....” After a decade, PUSH has a lot to show for its gutsy work. With its core strategy of actively listening and organizing, PUSH, for example , teamed up with a struggling neighborhood to turn an abandoned school building into 30 apartments for low-income seniors, replete with a roof-top solar array that keeps their electricity affordable. PUSH has also designated a Green Development Zone : A 25-square-block area, where 60 percent of the children live in poverty, with the goal of addressing vacant, run-down properties and high utility bills. There, PUSH has created green spaces, as well as purchased buildings and boosted their energy efficiency, while weatherizing existing homes. Energy savings accrue directly to the participants. Plus, PUSH’s work has brought living-wage jobs to neighborhood residents. A PUSH-organized campaign has compelled officials to step up, too. So in these dark times, let’s spread the word about states and cities in the lead—not just to inspire but to stoke determination. For they embody a clear truth: Creating a life-serving democracy demands widening inclusion at every step of the way—transforming today’s multiple crises into an opportunity to fix what’s been broken…for way too long.

By Anna Lappé (Photo Credit...Christie Hemm Klok for The New York Times) Originally Published in New York Times Opinion Letters, on May 4, 2021 To the Editor: I hate to be the dark cloud hovering over Farhad Manjoo’s solar array (“ The Wind and Solar Boom Is Already Here , ” column, April 30), but while those who care about climate stability should applaud the growth of renewable energy sources like wind and solar, fossil fuel industry expansion into worrisome markets should concern us all. As the Center for International Environmental Law has reported , for instance, the fossil fuel industry is moving rapidly into plastics, including investing heavily in expanding or building new petrochemical facilities to ramp up production. The industry is also eyeing pesticides and ammonia fertilizer, eager to exploit the emerging demand in soil carbon markets with fossil-fuel-dependent agricultural models. If we care about getting the climate crisis under control, we have to look at all the profitable but destructive outlets for the fossil fuel industry, including plastics, pesticides and fertilizers. Anna Lappé Berkeley, Calif. The writer is the author of “Diet for a Hot Planet.”