Feed: a food systems podcast

113 Episodes

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Dire Straits: Hormuz, Fertilizers, and Food

2026-10-1429:02

The closure of the Strait of Hormuz has disrupted global flows of fossil fuels and fertilizers. But what does a shipping route in the Middle East have to do with the price of food? How are farmers coping? And what does this disruption tell us about our food system’s dependence on fossil fuels and synthetic fertilizers? Synthetic fertilizers tie food production to fossil fuels, leaving farmers exposed to price shocks and geopolitical disruption. In this episode, food systems experts unpa...

Plant protein without pretending

2026-09-2430:26

What if the future of plant-based food isn't about faking meat, but inventing something entirely new? We go inside a student hackathon at Wageningen University (WUR) and follow the winning concept from whiteboard sketch to test kitchen to campus cafeteria. Along the way, food scientists and student organizers weigh in on the potential for the food industry to not always try to imitate meat. This episode was produced in collaboration with Wageningen Alt Protein Project (WAPP). Want to share yo...

Bonus. The hidden costs of biosecurity

2026-07-2325:44

After the 2018 African Swine Fever outbreak led to the culling of over a hundred million pigs, China moved toward larger, more biosecure, high-rise hog farms. Human geographer Ray Chan takes us inside these operations. He argues that biosecurity isn't only about preventing disease. He calls it a form of governance, deciding whose risk gets prioritized and how both people and animals are expected to behave. For more info, transcript and resources, visit: https://tabledebates.org/podcast/ episo...

Bonus. The futures of China's countryside

2026-07-0941:55

China's countryside isn't heading toward one future. Sociologist Forrest Zhang walks us through four different scenarios: suburbanizing villages turned tourist destinations, industrial-scale grain belts managed by smart phones, intensive vegetable farms facing a looming labor crisis, and aging villagers returning to subsistence farming. We explore the shift from socialist to capitalist agriculture, and ask whether the next era may take a "sustainability turn,” a door opened by a shrinking pop...

Bonus. China's food future

2026-06-2544:21

China is currently the world's largest importer of agricultural products, buying 60% of globally traded soy. But a 2026 consultation paper by SystemIQ argues China may be approaching a turning point. In the coming decades, China could shift from being a net food importer to net food exporter of animal proteins. We dive into the analysis with the paper's authors to see how plausible that scenario might be, what it would take to get there including the role of alternative proteins in that futur...

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