Food Insider

A team of volunteers is airlifting food, water and basic necessities to B.C. communities cut off by last month's historic flooding.

Cover crops and other key practices in organic, regenerative, and agroecological farming also help farms weather the climate crisis. In addition to keeping soils stable during floods, they protect the ground from extreme heat, which can kill important microbial ecosystems, and help retain moisture during dry spells.  

Canada has one of the world's most wasteful economies when it comes to recycling and reusing commodities like plastic, metal, and energy, a new report commissioned by Environment and Climate Change Canada has found. 

Similar scenes have played out across southern B.C. in recent days as the province grapples with an unprecedented storm that flooded Merritt, Princeton, and much of the Fraser Valley under metres of frigid, dirty water.

When Penticton, B.C., resident Katya Irwin opened her computer Tuesday afternoon to place an order at her neighbourhood grocery store, the floods and landslides wreaking havoc in other parts of the province were far from her mind. Then she noticed that dozens of commonplace items like milk and vegetables were no longer in stock. 

Plastic production is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions and is growing rapidly as demand soars worldwide. If nothing is done, analysts predict it will account for about 13 per cent of the world's remaining carbon budget by 2050. 

Every day around noon, the smell of grilled beef and roasted venison wafts through the lines of delegates attending the COP26 climate conference as they queue for lunch. Yet even as hundreds flock to the burgers and venison pasties on offer, some attendees wonder if meat — a big emitter worldwide — should be on the menu. 

Countries gathered for the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow, Scotland, have for the first time agreed that the world must transition to more sustainable farming practices if we are to mitigate climate change and prevent millions of people from going hungry.

Food activist Rayan Kassem says action on climate change shouldn't be separated from issues like hunger which will only get worse in a warming world.

Forty-five governments led by the U.K. pledged Saturday to spend billions on transforming the world's farms, fisheries and forests in an effort to make our food more sustainable. 

With previous climate conferences coming under fire for serving unsustainable meals, the organizers of this year's United Nations meeting in Glasgow, Scotland, have highlighted efforts to serve climate-friendly meals. But critics say those measures — and the food itself — aren't enough to emphasize the urgent role food plays in saving the planet. 

When it comes to ending climate change, international climate negotiations have typically focused on ending the world's reliance on fossil fuels. Food — responsible for about a third of the world's emissions and vulnerable to a chaotic climate —has largely flown under the radar. 

Over 100 cities, towns, and other regional governments worldwide informally launched a pledge Wednesday to put food at the heart of their climate plans — even as their national counterparts have failed to do the same. 

On Tuesday, Canada backed a controversial initiative aimed at boosting countries' support for high-tech farming methods designed to reduce emissions and mitigate the impacts of climate change on farms and food. 

Last year, a restaurant in Singapore made headlines when it became the first place in the world to serve lab-grown meat. With meat and dairy responsible for roughly a sixth of global emissions, the U.S. company behind the pricey plates of artificial chicken nuggets, Eat Just, branded them "a revolutionary step towards solving climate change."