1 00:00:00,400 --> 00:00:05,120 Speaker 1: Welcome to zero. I'm Akshatrati this week, microbial protein, the 2 00:00:05,240 --> 00:00:15,560 Speaker 1: end of farming, and really stinky cheeses. Every year, our 3 00:00:15,560 --> 00:00:19,320 Speaker 1: food system does something amazing. We produce enough food for 4 00:00:19,400 --> 00:00:22,840 Speaker 1: eight billion people and then some, and although millions still 5 00:00:22,840 --> 00:00:25,200 Speaker 1: go under fed, the level of hunger in the world 6 00:00:25,280 --> 00:00:28,600 Speaker 1: is much lower than in all of human history. It's 7 00:00:28,640 --> 00:00:32,559 Speaker 1: a remarkable feat when put in its historical context. Meanwhile, 8 00:00:32,680 --> 00:00:37,320 Speaker 1: India's board problems continue to create widespread concern a countryside 9 00:00:37,320 --> 00:00:40,800 Speaker 1: on the very edge of starvation. Back in the nineteen sixties, 10 00:00:40,960 --> 00:00:44,800 Speaker 1: widespread famine was averted by the Green Revolution, a transfer 11 00:00:44,800 --> 00:00:49,360 Speaker 1: of agricultural technology to developing countries that massively increased farming 12 00:00:49,400 --> 00:00:53,000 Speaker 1: yields across Asia and South America and lifted hundreds of 13 00:00:53,040 --> 00:00:56,560 Speaker 1: millions out of hunger and poverty. The population in the 14 00:00:56,680 --> 00:01:01,480 Speaker 1: nineteen sixties was just three billion, now at eight billion people, 15 00:01:01,640 --> 00:01:04,520 Speaker 1: and still our food system has managed to keep up. 16 00:01:05,200 --> 00:01:10,160 Speaker 1: In twenty nineteen, the production of primary crops things like cereals, fruits, vegetables, 17 00:01:10,520 --> 00:01:14,800 Speaker 1: reached nine point four billion tons globally. That's fifty percent 18 00:01:14,880 --> 00:01:18,720 Speaker 1: more than in the year two thousand. But all that 19 00:01:18,800 --> 00:01:22,920 Speaker 1: food production comes at an enormous cost. Agriculture is a 20 00:01:22,959 --> 00:01:26,360 Speaker 1: major driver of global greenhouse gas emissions, and almost forty 21 00:01:26,400 --> 00:01:30,319 Speaker 1: percent of the Earth's surface is used for farming. That's 22 00:01:30,319 --> 00:01:34,560 Speaker 1: something that my guest today, environmental journalists and campaigner George Monbio, 23 00:01:34,840 --> 00:01:39,600 Speaker 1: argues is a disaster for our planet. The crucial environmental 24 00:01:39,640 --> 00:01:42,680 Speaker 1: commodity which we should be paying more attention to than 25 00:01:42,800 --> 00:01:47,440 Speaker 1: any other environmental metric is land, because every hectare of 26 00:01:47,520 --> 00:01:50,760 Speaker 1: land we use for an extractive industry is a hectare 27 00:01:50,920 --> 00:01:55,880 Speaker 1: not being used for wild ecosystems. In his new book, ReGenesis, 28 00:01:55,920 --> 00:01:59,720 Speaker 1: George argues that the global food system needs a radical rethink. 29 00:02:00,320 --> 00:02:03,639 Speaker 1: That system can sound abstract, but picture it as every 30 00:02:03,680 --> 00:02:07,160 Speaker 1: business and relationship that exists to bring Ukrainian wheat to 31 00:02:07,200 --> 00:02:11,840 Speaker 1: Pakistan or Brazilian beef to a butcher in Paris. This 32 00:02:11,880 --> 00:02:15,600 Speaker 1: conversation is about the difficulties facing that system, but it 33 00:02:15,760 --> 00:02:19,320 Speaker 1: is also about solutions, the technologies that George hopes can 34 00:02:19,360 --> 00:02:22,280 Speaker 1: fix a system in crisis and lead us to another 35 00:02:22,600 --> 00:02:27,120 Speaker 1: greener revolution. We join George surrounded by birds and bees 36 00:02:27,320 --> 00:02:30,560 Speaker 1: in his community orchard in Oxford, where his book and 37 00:02:30,720 --> 00:02:39,560 Speaker 1: his examination of the global food system begins. George, welcome 38 00:02:39,560 --> 00:02:42,160 Speaker 1: to the show. Thank you very much. You open your 39 00:02:42,160 --> 00:02:46,960 Speaker 1: book sitting in this orchard, pulling out a spit of soil, 40 00:02:47,320 --> 00:02:50,799 Speaker 1: and then you examine the food system through the exploration 41 00:02:50,840 --> 00:02:53,600 Speaker 1: of what's in the soil. You write about these systems 42 00:02:53,639 --> 00:02:57,160 Speaker 1: being in crisis, and you'll then explore solutions to some 43 00:02:57,240 --> 00:03:00,840 Speaker 1: of the crisis. Let's start with the crisis. Where does 44 00:03:00,880 --> 00:03:03,880 Speaker 1: the crisis and the food system really begin. It begins 45 00:03:03,960 --> 00:03:06,480 Speaker 1: with the world food system. In fact, the biggest problem 46 00:03:06,560 --> 00:03:10,160 Speaker 1: the world food system faces is the world food system, 47 00:03:10,200 --> 00:03:13,440 Speaker 1: and it's beginning to look rather like the financial system 48 00:03:13,520 --> 00:03:15,920 Speaker 1: in the approach to two thousand and eight, which is 49 00:03:15,960 --> 00:03:18,959 Speaker 1: not a good place to be. There are a number 50 00:03:19,000 --> 00:03:23,320 Speaker 1: of huge, superdominant companies which have become too big to fail. 51 00:03:23,880 --> 00:03:27,800 Speaker 1: So on one estimate, four companies control ninety percent of 52 00:03:27,919 --> 00:03:33,160 Speaker 1: global grain trade. And as their operations have become more 53 00:03:33,160 --> 00:03:38,000 Speaker 1: efficient and streamlined, which might be good for each individual business, 54 00:03:38,600 --> 00:03:42,360 Speaker 1: it makes the system as a whole less resilient. And 55 00:03:42,720 --> 00:03:46,600 Speaker 1: to understand this you really have to grasp systems theory 56 00:03:46,920 --> 00:03:49,480 Speaker 1: and a complex system, which is what the global food 57 00:03:49,480 --> 00:03:52,320 Speaker 1: system is, and indeed what most of the important things 58 00:03:52,360 --> 00:03:56,160 Speaker 1: on earth are is a system composed of nodes like 59 00:03:56,200 --> 00:03:58,840 Speaker 1: the knots in an old fashioned fishing net, and the 60 00:03:59,080 --> 00:04:02,920 Speaker 1: links between them. And if those nodes become too big 61 00:04:03,000 --> 00:04:07,000 Speaker 1: and too strongly connected to each other, you lose the 62 00:04:07,120 --> 00:04:11,680 Speaker 1: four elements of systemic resilience. One of those is redundancy 63 00:04:12,000 --> 00:04:15,160 Speaker 1: spare capacity that's been more or less stripped out of 64 00:04:15,200 --> 00:04:18,520 Speaker 1: the food system. Everything has become super efficient, just in 65 00:04:18,560 --> 00:04:23,080 Speaker 1: time delivery. Another one is what's called modularity, the degree 66 00:04:23,120 --> 00:04:26,440 Speaker 1: to which the system is compartmentalized. Well, that's all been 67 00:04:26,480 --> 00:04:29,279 Speaker 1: stripped out as well, as we've switched towards a global 68 00:04:29,320 --> 00:04:33,839 Speaker 1: standard farm supplying a global standard diet, using the same seeds, 69 00:04:33,839 --> 00:04:39,040 Speaker 1: the same chemicals, the same machinery everywhere. Then there's circuit breakers, 70 00:04:39,040 --> 00:04:43,360 Speaker 1: where are the points at which shocks which pass through 71 00:04:43,400 --> 00:04:46,880 Speaker 1: that system can stop being transmitted. Well, those have all 72 00:04:46,920 --> 00:04:49,520 Speaker 1: gone as well. And then there's the backup systems. Where 73 00:04:49,520 --> 00:04:53,200 Speaker 1: are the entirely different systems which you could switch into 74 00:04:53,360 --> 00:04:57,240 Speaker 1: if you encounter a crisis. They're virtually non existent now. 75 00:04:57,520 --> 00:05:01,720 Speaker 1: And so, through this global homogenization, which seems to make 76 00:05:01,800 --> 00:05:06,200 Speaker 1: sense every individual step towards it makes sense, we see 77 00:05:06,200 --> 00:05:11,040 Speaker 1: a system that has become systemically fragile. Now, complex systems 78 00:05:11,680 --> 00:05:14,520 Speaker 1: they don't respond to change in linear ways. Right, they're 79 00:05:14,560 --> 00:05:19,000 Speaker 1: not complicated. I mean it's not complicated more than complicated exactly. 80 00:05:19,120 --> 00:05:21,599 Speaker 1: So an engine is a complicated system. It's got lots 81 00:05:21,600 --> 00:05:25,480 Speaker 1: of moving parts, but they behave in predictable and linear ways. 82 00:05:26,040 --> 00:05:29,560 Speaker 1: Whereas a complex system is composed of billions of decision 83 00:05:29,640 --> 00:05:34,680 Speaker 1: points randomly stochastically interacting with each other, but has this 84 00:05:34,920 --> 00:05:38,640 Speaker 1: weird property of being self regulating within a certain range 85 00:05:38,640 --> 00:05:41,080 Speaker 1: of stress. But then if you push it beyond that 86 00:05:41,160 --> 00:05:45,760 Speaker 1: stress range, those self regulating circuits within the system becomes 87 00:05:45,800 --> 00:05:47,920 Speaker 1: self amplifying. And this is the same you know, whether 88 00:05:47,920 --> 00:05:52,160 Speaker 1: you're looking at the global food system, global financial system, ecosystems, 89 00:05:52,240 --> 00:05:55,440 Speaker 1: the atmosphere, the oceans, the human brain, the human body. 90 00:05:55,800 --> 00:05:59,479 Speaker 1: This is how complex systems consistently behave. And so they'll 91 00:05:59,480 --> 00:06:03,440 Speaker 1: absorbs and self regulate and maintain an equilibrium state up 92 00:06:03,480 --> 00:06:07,279 Speaker 1: to a certain critical threshold. And you describe that threshold 93 00:06:07,279 --> 00:06:11,360 Speaker 1: to be flickering that you will start to see signs 94 00:06:11,480 --> 00:06:15,400 Speaker 1: of it breaking down. And are there signs you're seeing 95 00:06:15,400 --> 00:06:18,440 Speaker 1: in the food system that respond to this sort of 96 00:06:18,440 --> 00:06:21,000 Speaker 1: flickering in a complex system, Yes, you're quite right, So 97 00:06:21,200 --> 00:06:24,080 Speaker 1: as a system approaches a tipping point, it's outputs begin 98 00:06:24,120 --> 00:06:26,480 Speaker 1: to flicker and we see things which don't seem to 99 00:06:26,560 --> 00:06:29,120 Speaker 1: make any sense. Just like in the approach of two 100 00:06:29,160 --> 00:06:32,120 Speaker 1: thousand and eight, we saw these wild surges and fallbacks 101 00:06:32,120 --> 00:06:34,760 Speaker 1: in equity values, and so what's going on here? And 102 00:06:34,800 --> 00:06:37,680 Speaker 1: then suddenly the whole system was on the verge of 103 00:06:37,760 --> 00:06:40,080 Speaker 1: going down because of the subprime crisis in the US, 104 00:06:40,160 --> 00:06:43,480 Speaker 1: which wasn't a big deal in terms of global financial flows, 105 00:06:43,880 --> 00:06:46,279 Speaker 1: but it was the butterfly's wing which nearly tipped the 106 00:06:46,320 --> 00:06:50,000 Speaker 1: whole system. Well, in this case, we're seeing those wild 107 00:06:50,200 --> 00:06:53,400 Speaker 1: fluctuations in output values. Now, it should give us a 108 00:06:53,400 --> 00:06:57,719 Speaker 1: few examples. So in twenty fifteen, something very weird happened. 109 00:06:58,120 --> 00:07:01,240 Speaker 1: Between the nineteen six and twenty fourteen, we saw a 110 00:07:01,279 --> 00:07:05,279 Speaker 1: steady decline in chronic global hunger, fewer and fewer people 111 00:07:05,320 --> 00:07:08,880 Speaker 1: going hungry. And then suddenly in twenty fifteen we saw 112 00:07:09,040 --> 00:07:12,680 Speaker 1: that trend turn and we started seeing the number of 113 00:07:12,760 --> 00:07:15,680 Speaker 1: chronically hungry people rising and that's continued ever sight. I mean, 114 00:07:15,680 --> 00:07:18,120 Speaker 1: there's the pandemic that's made it worse, but the start 115 00:07:18,560 --> 00:07:21,960 Speaker 1: forces long before. And the really weird thing about this 116 00:07:22,640 --> 00:07:27,480 Speaker 1: is that between twenty fourteen and twenty fifteen, food prices 117 00:07:27,680 --> 00:07:30,760 Speaker 1: fell dramatically. The global food price index in twenty fourteen 118 00:07:30,880 --> 00:07:33,400 Speaker 1: was one hundred and fifteen. In twenty fifteen it was 119 00:07:33,480 --> 00:07:36,400 Speaker 1: ninety three, and it stayed below a hundred right up 120 00:07:36,440 --> 00:07:40,200 Speaker 1: until halfway through twenty three. Certainly there's more poverty and 121 00:07:40,200 --> 00:07:42,320 Speaker 1: people kind of afforded. That's why there's hungry. Yeah, it's 122 00:07:42,320 --> 00:07:44,120 Speaker 1: the opposite to what you would expect. You know, you'd 123 00:07:44,160 --> 00:07:47,320 Speaker 1: expect food prices full, hunger fulls, right, but it rose. 124 00:07:47,640 --> 00:07:50,320 Speaker 1: And what has been happening here is that as the 125 00:07:50,400 --> 00:07:54,000 Speaker 1: system has lost its resilience, shocks are more easily transmitted 126 00:07:54,040 --> 00:07:56,960 Speaker 1: through it. So even something relatively small like a speculative 127 00:07:57,000 --> 00:08:02,040 Speaker 1: surgeon one commodity, like an export restrict by one exporting nation, 128 00:08:02,680 --> 00:08:06,239 Speaker 1: those shocks, instead of being damped down by a healthy system, 129 00:08:06,640 --> 00:08:10,160 Speaker 1: get amplified by a system which is becoming fragile. We 130 00:08:10,280 --> 00:08:12,680 Speaker 1: in the rich nations hardly notice that, because we've got 131 00:08:12,680 --> 00:08:15,400 Speaker 1: the buying power, we've got the hard currencies. It's a 132 00:08:15,480 --> 00:08:19,000 Speaker 1: poor nations which are food insecure, which are buying food 133 00:08:19,040 --> 00:08:21,800 Speaker 1: with soft currencies in a hard currency market, or at 134 00:08:21,800 --> 00:08:24,280 Speaker 1: the end of that chain, and as the shock gets 135 00:08:24,280 --> 00:08:27,800 Speaker 1: amplified through the chain, it lands on them. And so 136 00:08:27,840 --> 00:08:30,920 Speaker 1: what you see is these sudden disruptions of supply in 137 00:08:30,960 --> 00:08:34,520 Speaker 1: the poor nations which cause local price spikes. So even 138 00:08:34,600 --> 00:08:37,840 Speaker 1: while the global price is low, the national price spikes, 139 00:08:37,840 --> 00:08:40,160 Speaker 1: and that's what seems to have been driving chronic hunger. 140 00:08:40,559 --> 00:08:43,160 Speaker 1: So we have the pandemic and people say, oh, there's 141 00:08:43,160 --> 00:08:45,120 Speaker 1: an issue with food supply here, and then we have 142 00:08:45,280 --> 00:08:48,079 Speaker 1: Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Ah, there's an even bigger issue 143 00:08:48,080 --> 00:08:51,640 Speaker 1: with food supply, and people assume that that's what caused it. 144 00:08:51,720 --> 00:08:55,360 Speaker 1: But actually those problems, which are real problems and have 145 00:08:55,440 --> 00:09:00,520 Speaker 1: definitely exacerbated it, have revealed the systemic fragility. They haven't 146 00:09:00,559 --> 00:09:04,120 Speaker 1: caused the systemic fragility. And in fifteen, of course, the 147 00:09:04,120 --> 00:09:07,160 Speaker 1: Paris Climate Agreement was signed. Yes it was. The world 148 00:09:07,280 --> 00:09:10,120 Speaker 1: was point nine degrees salsius warmer than pre industrial times. 149 00:09:10,200 --> 00:09:13,800 Speaker 1: We're at one point two almost now. Yes, and climate 150 00:09:13,880 --> 00:09:16,960 Speaker 1: change is contributing to some of these problems. Well, a 151 00:09:17,000 --> 00:09:21,040 Speaker 1: classic example was this year, after the invasion of Ukraine, 152 00:09:21,200 --> 00:09:23,840 Speaker 1: India stepped forward and said, don't worry, we can fill 153 00:09:23,880 --> 00:09:26,559 Speaker 1: the gap because we've got a bumper wheat harvest coming 154 00:09:26,600 --> 00:09:28,839 Speaker 1: and there's going to be this massive shortfall of wheat 155 00:09:28,880 --> 00:09:32,600 Speaker 1: exports from Ukraine. We'll make up that shortfall. We'll become 156 00:09:32,600 --> 00:09:36,480 Speaker 1: a super exporter this year. Literally just four weeks later, 157 00:09:36,920 --> 00:09:41,439 Speaker 1: the Indian government came forward again and said about those exports, 158 00:09:42,040 --> 00:09:45,880 Speaker 1: we're imposing a total export ban because we were hit 159 00:09:45,920 --> 00:09:49,160 Speaker 1: by this massive heat wave which has shriveled the grain 160 00:09:49,360 --> 00:09:51,920 Speaker 1: on the plants, and our weak harvest is going to 161 00:09:51,920 --> 00:09:53,839 Speaker 1: be much much lower than we thought. And so what 162 00:09:53,880 --> 00:09:58,160 Speaker 1: we saw there was a climate crisis coinciding with a 163 00:09:58,240 --> 00:10:01,960 Speaker 1: geopolitical crisis, and we're going to see more and more 164 00:10:02,000 --> 00:10:05,720 Speaker 1: of that. And some of the predictions for how environmental 165 00:10:05,800 --> 00:10:08,800 Speaker 1: change is going to affect the global food supply are 166 00:10:09,120 --> 00:10:14,439 Speaker 1: really terrifying. Absolutely is staying awake at night sweating terrifying. 167 00:10:15,080 --> 00:10:18,120 Speaker 1: But we have to acknowledge and sit in this sort 168 00:10:18,120 --> 00:10:24,120 Speaker 1: of discomfort that this food system than we've created has 169 00:10:24,200 --> 00:10:28,920 Speaker 1: been able to supply food for the ever growing population. 170 00:10:29,000 --> 00:10:30,839 Speaker 1: We had about two billion people at the start of the 171 00:10:30,800 --> 00:10:33,640 Speaker 1: the twentieth century who were fed, and yes there was 172 00:10:33,720 --> 00:10:38,200 Speaker 1: more hunger proportionally then, and now we have eight billion people. 173 00:10:38,480 --> 00:10:41,120 Speaker 1: This year we crossed that threshold and we are still 174 00:10:41,160 --> 00:10:42,960 Speaker 1: being able to feed them. Yes, hunger is going up, 175 00:10:43,000 --> 00:10:45,560 Speaker 1: but it's still relative to where we were at a 176 00:10:45,640 --> 00:10:48,760 Speaker 1: much lower level. So the system that's allowed us to 177 00:10:48,800 --> 00:10:51,600 Speaker 1: get here does have problems. But how do we sit 178 00:10:51,640 --> 00:10:54,320 Speaker 1: with that discomfort? Yes, so it's kind of like the 179 00:10:54,360 --> 00:10:56,080 Speaker 1: man falling out of the window and the top of 180 00:10:56,080 --> 00:11:00,280 Speaker 1: the skyscraper saying, so far, so good. It has served 181 00:11:00,320 --> 00:11:03,520 Speaker 1: as well so far, and we have been very fortunate. 182 00:11:03,600 --> 00:11:07,360 Speaker 1: You know, we've seen this great surge in food production 183 00:11:07,360 --> 00:11:11,480 Speaker 1: which is outstripped population growth such that we now produce 184 00:11:11,640 --> 00:11:15,640 Speaker 1: roughly twice as many calories as humans need to survive on. Now, 185 00:11:15,720 --> 00:11:18,000 Speaker 1: a huge amount of that is wasted by being channeled 186 00:11:18,000 --> 00:11:21,320 Speaker 1: through live start, by being used for biofuels. Some of 187 00:11:21,360 --> 00:11:24,440 Speaker 1: it disappears in food waste as well, but we can 188 00:11:24,600 --> 00:11:29,720 Speaker 1: turn out enormous volumes of food. Unfortunately, this system is 189 00:11:29,760 --> 00:11:33,720 Speaker 1: now being hit by all these causes of fragility which 190 00:11:33,720 --> 00:11:36,760 Speaker 1: we're just not attending to, and governments just don't seem interested, 191 00:11:36,800 --> 00:11:40,200 Speaker 1: They don't even seem to understand what's happening here. And 192 00:11:40,280 --> 00:11:43,000 Speaker 1: it is like the financial system before two thousand and eight, 193 00:11:43,000 --> 00:11:45,080 Speaker 1: where it looked great, it looked really healthy. You know, 194 00:11:45,120 --> 00:11:49,080 Speaker 1: equity values are really high, the bank shares were soaring. 195 00:11:49,160 --> 00:11:52,720 Speaker 1: It was all looking great and then suddenly boon and 196 00:11:53,120 --> 00:11:57,920 Speaker 1: it required this massive bailout. Now, the thing is that 197 00:11:57,960 --> 00:12:02,040 Speaker 1: you could bail out the financial sector before it completely 198 00:12:02,080 --> 00:12:05,800 Speaker 1: collapsed by drawing on future money. You can't bail out 199 00:12:05,800 --> 00:12:10,199 Speaker 1: the food sector by drawing on future food. What is 200 00:12:10,240 --> 00:12:12,520 Speaker 1: it that got us to this point? There are you know, 201 00:12:12,880 --> 00:12:15,200 Speaker 1: the ability for us to be able to make food 202 00:12:15,280 --> 00:12:18,480 Speaker 1: for eight billion people? What were the steps that led 203 00:12:18,559 --> 00:12:21,160 Speaker 1: us to this point? And then where in those steps 204 00:12:21,200 --> 00:12:23,800 Speaker 1: did we go wrong? Sure, the answer is the same 205 00:12:23,840 --> 00:12:26,880 Speaker 1: to both questions. That's a curious and paradoxical thing here. 206 00:12:26,920 --> 00:12:30,600 Speaker 1: The answer really is a green revolution which moved towards 207 00:12:30,640 --> 00:12:35,720 Speaker 1: these very high yielding, very successful new varieties which respond 208 00:12:35,920 --> 00:12:39,000 Speaker 1: very well to a particular formula of treatment. You know, 209 00:12:39,000 --> 00:12:42,200 Speaker 1: it's the same seeds, it's the same fertilizers, it's the 210 00:12:42,280 --> 00:12:46,400 Speaker 1: same machinery. You'd roll it out worldwide and you're producing 211 00:12:46,400 --> 00:12:48,800 Speaker 1: a huge amount of food. And as somebody who grew 212 00:12:48,840 --> 00:12:52,800 Speaker 1: up in India, that was tremendously valuable because we were 213 00:12:52,840 --> 00:12:56,440 Speaker 1: on the verge of facing hunger in levels that we'd 214 00:12:56,520 --> 00:13:00,080 Speaker 1: never seen before. No question, no question at all. In 215 00:13:00,160 --> 00:13:03,360 Speaker 1: all the predictions were we were going to see unbelievable 216 00:13:03,360 --> 00:13:07,280 Speaker 1: and horrendous famines, and that system saved the lives of 217 00:13:07,480 --> 00:13:11,920 Speaker 1: huge numbers of people. But it has these inherent instabilities 218 00:13:12,120 --> 00:13:15,680 Speaker 1: for all those reasons that I mentioned, And and it's 219 00:13:15,679 --> 00:13:18,839 Speaker 1: apparent health today, like the apparent health of the financial 220 00:13:18,880 --> 00:13:23,760 Speaker 1: system becomes ever more illusory as time goes on because 221 00:13:23,960 --> 00:13:27,239 Speaker 1: of the problem of systemic fragility. And so there's concentrated 222 00:13:27,280 --> 00:13:30,480 Speaker 1: agricultural system that's feeding the world right now, how exactly 223 00:13:30,600 --> 00:13:34,040 Speaker 1: is it contributing to climate change? Well, food production as 224 00:13:34,040 --> 00:13:37,600 Speaker 1: a whole is responsible for roughly one third of all 225 00:13:37,640 --> 00:13:41,199 Speaker 1: our carbon emissions or greenhouse gas emissions. Even if we 226 00:13:41,280 --> 00:13:45,080 Speaker 1: eliminated all other sources of greenhouse gas emissions, if we 227 00:13:45,120 --> 00:13:48,280 Speaker 1: don't tackle that, by the end of the century, it 228 00:13:48,320 --> 00:13:52,280 Speaker 1: will exceed by between two and three times the amount 229 00:13:52,320 --> 00:13:55,520 Speaker 1: of greenhouse gases we can safely produce just the food 230 00:13:55,559 --> 00:14:00,400 Speaker 1: system alone. But there's an even bigger issue, which is 231 00:14:00,480 --> 00:14:04,000 Speaker 1: the carbon opportunity costs. So those greenhouse gas emissions I'm 232 00:14:04,040 --> 00:14:06,560 Speaker 1: talking about, you could think of those as a current account, 233 00:14:07,040 --> 00:14:12,560 Speaker 1: current climate account, but the capital climate account is the 234 00:14:12,640 --> 00:14:15,520 Speaker 1: carbon opportunity costs, which means what you could be doing 235 00:14:15,600 --> 00:14:20,080 Speaker 1: otherwise if you weren't doing this particular thing. So, for instance, 236 00:14:20,160 --> 00:14:22,680 Speaker 1: if those emissions that are generated are coming from the 237 00:14:22,760 --> 00:14:27,480 Speaker 1: fertilizer production, from changing the land use, or you're deforesting, 238 00:14:27,560 --> 00:14:30,560 Speaker 1: and from the manure that's coming from livestock, and all 239 00:14:30,560 --> 00:14:33,960 Speaker 1: those things produce greens. So the livestock themselves produce methane, 240 00:14:34,040 --> 00:14:37,120 Speaker 1: the manure produces nitrous oxide. These are both very powerful 241 00:14:37,120 --> 00:14:41,000 Speaker 1: greenhouse gases. But the biggest question of all is is 242 00:14:41,080 --> 00:14:45,240 Speaker 1: capital account that land might otherwise be harboring, for instance, 243 00:14:45,280 --> 00:14:49,680 Speaker 1: forests or wetlands, both of which are very high carbon habitats, 244 00:14:50,000 --> 00:14:52,320 Speaker 1: And if the forests and wetlands are allowed to come back, 245 00:14:52,800 --> 00:14:55,720 Speaker 1: they will draw down a great deal of the carbon 246 00:14:55,760 --> 00:14:58,800 Speaker 1: dioxide we've released into the atmosphere. In fact, we now 247 00:14:58,880 --> 00:15:03,800 Speaker 1: know that decarbonizing our economies is no longer enough. Clearly, 248 00:15:03,800 --> 00:15:06,720 Speaker 1: we have to decarbonize them as quickly and as effectively 249 00:15:06,720 --> 00:15:09,640 Speaker 1: as we possibly can. But even if we did that, 250 00:15:09,720 --> 00:15:13,080 Speaker 1: we would almost certainly exceed two degrees of global heating. 251 00:15:13,120 --> 00:15:15,080 Speaker 1: We need to draw down some of the carbon diots 252 00:15:15,120 --> 00:15:18,600 Speaker 1: that we've already produced. If we bring back forests and 253 00:15:18,600 --> 00:15:22,400 Speaker 1: wetlands in particular, they turn CO two into C into 254 00:15:22,440 --> 00:15:26,880 Speaker 1: solid carbon, and in doing so they could determine whether 255 00:15:27,000 --> 00:15:29,920 Speaker 1: or not we get through this century. Yes. Yeah, In fact, 256 00:15:30,000 --> 00:15:32,960 Speaker 1: it's very hard to see how we're going to sustain 257 00:15:33,080 --> 00:15:35,960 Speaker 1: our life support systems and less as a mass restoration 258 00:15:36,640 --> 00:15:40,280 Speaker 1: of wild ecosystems like forests and wetlands, and the biggest 259 00:15:40,280 --> 00:15:43,920 Speaker 1: impediment to that is livestock keeping. In your book, you 260 00:15:43,960 --> 00:15:46,920 Speaker 1: mentioned this statistic which is stunning, which is that we 261 00:15:47,040 --> 00:15:52,560 Speaker 1: produce twice as many calories as humans consume. But of 262 00:15:52,560 --> 00:15:57,000 Speaker 1: course that's because last majority of those calories are not 263 00:15:57,080 --> 00:16:00,040 Speaker 1: being fed to humans, they're being fed to livestock, and 264 00:16:00,120 --> 00:16:04,120 Speaker 1: that creates us a set of problems. Yes, indeed, so 265 00:16:04,200 --> 00:16:07,360 Speaker 1: we have this grossly inefficient system that we've created of 266 00:16:07,520 --> 00:16:11,000 Speaker 1: eating animals, and it divides into two categories. There's the 267 00:16:11,120 --> 00:16:16,720 Speaker 1: intensive animal production, which involves these gigantic factories with tens 268 00:16:16,720 --> 00:16:19,840 Speaker 1: of thousands of chickens or thousands of pigs, all these 269 00:16:19,880 --> 00:16:23,560 Speaker 1: giant feed lots with loads and loads of cattle kept 270 00:16:23,600 --> 00:16:28,200 Speaker 1: in horrendous conditions, massive animal cruelty, being fed on grain 271 00:16:28,320 --> 00:16:31,040 Speaker 1: often shipped from the other side of the world. Particularly 272 00:16:31,120 --> 00:16:35,200 Speaker 1: sawyer growing in the Sahardu and the Amazon in South America, 273 00:16:35,320 --> 00:16:41,200 Speaker 1: with devastating ecological consequences. And then when they've eaten those 274 00:16:41,360 --> 00:16:43,880 Speaker 1: that food, there's a huge amount of nutrients comes out 275 00:16:43,920 --> 00:16:46,240 Speaker 1: the back end of those animals, and there's nowhere for 276 00:16:46,240 --> 00:16:49,280 Speaker 1: those nutrients to go. They can't easily be transported because 277 00:16:49,280 --> 00:16:52,200 Speaker 1: they're very low value and high volume, so farmers spread 278 00:16:52,200 --> 00:16:54,760 Speaker 1: them on the surrounding fields of fields can't absorb them. 279 00:16:54,760 --> 00:16:57,960 Speaker 1: All the surplus washes off into the rivers and the 280 00:16:58,040 --> 00:17:00,880 Speaker 1: rivers die, and all over the world now we're seeing 281 00:17:00,920 --> 00:17:05,159 Speaker 1: the global standard river being created by intensive livestock farming, 282 00:17:05,200 --> 00:17:09,199 Speaker 1: which is overfertilized, which means you get these blooms of 283 00:17:09,359 --> 00:17:12,919 Speaker 1: micro algae which when they respire at night, suckle the 284 00:17:12,960 --> 00:17:15,280 Speaker 1: oxygen out of the water and kill everything else, and 285 00:17:15,640 --> 00:17:19,159 Speaker 1: so they're turning into sewers, effectively are beautiful rivers. And 286 00:17:19,200 --> 00:17:21,680 Speaker 1: this is happening all over the world. So that's the 287 00:17:21,920 --> 00:17:24,960 Speaker 1: intensive livestock farming. And everyone says, oh, we hate that, 288 00:17:25,080 --> 00:17:28,280 Speaker 1: and they say so, the answer then must be extensive 289 00:17:28,280 --> 00:17:32,080 Speaker 1: livestock farming. In other words, crazy, exactly happy farming. And 290 00:17:32,080 --> 00:17:34,359 Speaker 1: we see all the images and We've got this long 291 00:17:34,960 --> 00:17:39,720 Speaker 1: Bucolic pastoral tradition of the shepherd with their flocks or 292 00:17:39,760 --> 00:17:43,760 Speaker 1: the cowboy with the cows, and we think that's the answer. 293 00:17:44,119 --> 00:17:47,600 Speaker 1: But if there's one thing worse than intensive livestock farming, 294 00:17:47,680 --> 00:17:52,080 Speaker 1: it's extensive livestock farming. And the reason for that is that, 295 00:17:52,280 --> 00:17:57,040 Speaker 1: by definition, extensive farming means using more land to produce 296 00:17:57,080 --> 00:17:59,840 Speaker 1: the same amount of food. That's the definitional quality of 297 00:17:59,840 --> 00:18:04,760 Speaker 1: it and the crucial environmental commodity which we should be 298 00:18:04,800 --> 00:18:09,399 Speaker 1: paying more attention to than any other environmental metric is land. 299 00:18:10,119 --> 00:18:13,320 Speaker 1: And the amount of land you use is the key 300 00:18:13,400 --> 00:18:16,840 Speaker 1: determinant of whether our life support systems survive or not. 301 00:18:17,280 --> 00:18:20,359 Speaker 1: Because every hectare of land we use for an extractive 302 00:18:20,440 --> 00:18:24,199 Speaker 1: industry like cattle ranching, for example, is a hectare not 303 00:18:24,280 --> 00:18:29,160 Speaker 1: being used for wild ecosystems such as forests or wetlands 304 00:18:29,320 --> 00:18:34,200 Speaker 1: or savannahs or natural grasslands. And so we're seeing this 305 00:18:34,280 --> 00:18:37,239 Speaker 1: is the biggest driver of all of habitat destruction. I mean, 306 00:18:37,280 --> 00:18:40,280 Speaker 1: agriculture is the worst thing we've ever done to the planet, right, 307 00:18:41,000 --> 00:18:44,359 Speaker 1: big oil? Oh yeah, well yes, because of the full 308 00:18:44,400 --> 00:18:47,560 Speaker 1: spectrum assault on the planet. I mean it causes a 309 00:18:47,640 --> 00:18:50,920 Speaker 1: massive amount of climate breakdown, more than global transport does, 310 00:18:50,960 --> 00:18:55,160 Speaker 1: for example, considerably more. But it also is the greatest 311 00:18:55,160 --> 00:18:57,959 Speaker 1: cause of habitat destruction by a very long way, the 312 00:18:58,000 --> 00:19:01,000 Speaker 1: greatest cause of wildlife loss, the greatest cause of extinction 313 00:19:01,160 --> 00:19:04,359 Speaker 1: again by a very long way, greatest cause of soil degradation, 314 00:19:04,480 --> 00:19:07,760 Speaker 1: greatest source of cause of fresh water use, one of 315 00:19:07,800 --> 00:19:11,880 Speaker 1: the greatest causes of water pollution, of air pollution, and 316 00:19:12,080 --> 00:19:15,840 Speaker 1: of climate breakdown as well. And the lion's share of 317 00:19:15,880 --> 00:19:19,600 Speaker 1: a cow's share of that is caused by livestock farming. 318 00:19:19,880 --> 00:19:23,200 Speaker 1: And the more extensive that livestock farming is, the more 319 00:19:23,359 --> 00:19:26,399 Speaker 1: damaging it is because of the sheer amount of land 320 00:19:26,520 --> 00:19:29,000 Speaker 1: it requires to support it. There was a study in 321 00:19:29,000 --> 00:19:31,639 Speaker 1: the United States saying, what if we did what all 322 00:19:31,680 --> 00:19:35,399 Speaker 1: the food is and chefs and some environmentalists say we 323 00:19:35,400 --> 00:19:38,040 Speaker 1: should do, which is the switch from grain fed cattle 324 00:19:38,240 --> 00:19:41,560 Speaker 1: production to pasture fed cattle. And it looked at it. 325 00:19:41,600 --> 00:19:43,159 Speaker 1: In fact, oh, yes, we would have to raise the 326 00:19:43,200 --> 00:19:46,159 Speaker 1: amount of land used to keep cattle by two hundred 327 00:19:46,200 --> 00:19:50,360 Speaker 1: and seventy percent. That would mean more than the entire 328 00:19:50,400 --> 00:19:53,800 Speaker 1: surface area the United States. You'd have to demolish the cities. 329 00:19:54,160 --> 00:19:56,280 Speaker 1: You'd have to cut down all the forests, you'd have 330 00:19:56,320 --> 00:19:59,080 Speaker 1: to water the deserts, you'd have to digizette. The National 331 00:19:59,200 --> 00:20:01,560 Speaker 1: parks called all the golf course, they get all the 332 00:20:01,560 --> 00:20:04,320 Speaker 1: golf courses, Yes, the worst of all. And you would 333 00:20:04,359 --> 00:20:07,840 Speaker 1: turn the whole US surface into a cattle ranch. And 334 00:20:07,880 --> 00:20:09,840 Speaker 1: then you can still need to be importing loads of 335 00:20:09,880 --> 00:20:12,600 Speaker 1: your beef from the Amazon, which incidentally they're already doing 336 00:20:12,640 --> 00:20:18,160 Speaker 1: and calling it pasture fed. It's an absolute environmental catastrophe. 337 00:20:18,359 --> 00:20:21,960 Speaker 1: The most damaging of all the farm products is organic 338 00:20:22,320 --> 00:20:26,160 Speaker 1: pasture fed beef. And the reason for the organic bit 339 00:20:26,200 --> 00:20:28,520 Speaker 1: of that is that organic needs even more land and 340 00:20:28,600 --> 00:20:32,840 Speaker 1: produces even more greenhouse gas emissions. There's a stunning start 341 00:20:32,880 --> 00:20:36,680 Speaker 1: in the book which said we use twenty eight percent 342 00:20:37,720 --> 00:20:42,520 Speaker 1: of the land on the planet to create one percent 343 00:20:42,680 --> 00:20:46,280 Speaker 1: of protein that humans consume. Yeah, the land issue is 344 00:20:46,320 --> 00:20:50,000 Speaker 1: so interesting and so important. Right. We all hate urban sprawl, right, 345 00:20:50,040 --> 00:20:52,199 Speaker 1: and we're right to hate urban sprawl because it's very 346 00:20:52,240 --> 00:20:54,159 Speaker 1: bad for the countryside and it's also very bad for 347 00:20:54,200 --> 00:20:58,320 Speaker 1: our cities. But the entire urban area that humanity uses, 348 00:20:58,359 --> 00:21:01,360 Speaker 1: whether in towns, village, is what ever is one percent 349 00:21:01,680 --> 00:21:05,440 Speaker 1: of the terrestrial planet's surface. Right, much of the rest 350 00:21:05,440 --> 00:21:09,000 Speaker 1: of the world is ice cap, desert, rocky mountains, which 351 00:21:09,200 --> 00:21:12,280 Speaker 1: you know, we can't really use for extractive industries, and 352 00:21:12,480 --> 00:21:16,560 Speaker 1: about fifteen percent is protected area. Forty percent is used 353 00:21:16,600 --> 00:21:20,880 Speaker 1: for agriculture. But of that forty percent, the twelve percent 354 00:21:21,560 --> 00:21:25,040 Speaker 1: is used for growing crops, right, and roughly half of 355 00:21:25,119 --> 00:21:28,400 Speaker 1: that of those crops are going into livestock. But then 356 00:21:28,600 --> 00:21:32,119 Speaker 1: what about the twenty eight percent. That twenty eight percent, 357 00:21:32,240 --> 00:21:34,480 Speaker 1: the biggest thing, the worst thing we do to the 358 00:21:34,520 --> 00:21:40,120 Speaker 1: planet is entirely for pasture fed animals. Of that from 359 00:21:40,119 --> 00:21:43,960 Speaker 1: the animals which get their food from grazing alone, they 360 00:21:44,040 --> 00:21:47,639 Speaker 1: produce just one percent of our protein one percent. This 361 00:21:47,720 --> 00:21:52,399 Speaker 1: is the most wasteful, profligate, destructive way of producing our 362 00:21:52,440 --> 00:21:55,320 Speaker 1: food you could possibly imagine. And you might ask yourself 363 00:21:55,359 --> 00:21:58,439 Speaker 1: why in the twenty first century are we using a 364 00:21:58,520 --> 00:22:05,760 Speaker 1: neolithic means to produce our protein rich foods. After the break, 365 00:22:05,880 --> 00:22:09,199 Speaker 1: George discusses the technologies that can help bring farming and 366 00:22:09,400 --> 00:22:21,720 Speaker 1: protein production into the twenty first century. I want to 367 00:22:21,800 --> 00:22:24,160 Speaker 1: move to the solutions part of the book, because there 368 00:22:24,200 --> 00:22:27,760 Speaker 1: are different solutions. There is growing meat and labs, there's 369 00:22:27,920 --> 00:22:32,280 Speaker 1: insect protein, there is using AI for farming. But the 370 00:22:32,320 --> 00:22:35,240 Speaker 1: solution that you put forward are much more radical. It's 371 00:22:35,280 --> 00:22:38,840 Speaker 1: to do away with the farm entirely. You call it 372 00:22:38,880 --> 00:22:43,040 Speaker 1: the techno ethical shift. What is it? So I'm not 373 00:22:43,080 --> 00:22:45,359 Speaker 1: calling for an all farming. I am calling for an 374 00:22:45,440 --> 00:22:48,320 Speaker 1: end of all livestock farming. I think that we just 375 00:22:48,600 --> 00:22:52,360 Speaker 1: can't afford to indulge this way of feeding ourselves anymore. 376 00:22:52,800 --> 00:22:56,320 Speaker 1: It is an indulgence that the planet cannot accommodate anymore. 377 00:22:56,320 --> 00:22:58,080 Speaker 1: There's just not the space for it. If we're going 378 00:22:58,119 --> 00:23:01,879 Speaker 1: to get through this century, we have to stop livestop farming. 379 00:23:01,920 --> 00:23:03,840 Speaker 1: It really is as simple as that. Yeah, you like 380 00:23:03,960 --> 00:23:07,320 Speaker 1: your steak, but I quite like a habitable planet or 381 00:23:07,440 --> 00:23:12,120 Speaker 1: state habitable planet. Tough choice. So what I'm calling for, yes, 382 00:23:12,240 --> 00:23:15,320 Speaker 1: is the end of livestop farming. And we are incredibly 383 00:23:15,320 --> 00:23:19,919 Speaker 1: fortunate because just as we need that shift, we have 384 00:23:20,000 --> 00:23:22,800 Speaker 1: the means of doing it far more effectively than ever before. 385 00:23:22,920 --> 00:23:25,320 Speaker 1: At this point, I would go, you're talking about lab 386 00:23:25,359 --> 00:23:29,000 Speaker 1: grown meat, right, Yeah, except I'm not. I thought I 387 00:23:29,040 --> 00:23:32,280 Speaker 1: thought when I started research for this book that lab 388 00:23:32,280 --> 00:23:34,239 Speaker 1: grown meat was going to be a big part of 389 00:23:34,240 --> 00:23:36,919 Speaker 1: the answer. This cultured meat where you can actually like 390 00:23:37,119 --> 00:23:39,920 Speaker 1: grow your steak, or grow your lamb chop, or grow 391 00:23:39,960 --> 00:23:43,320 Speaker 1: your tune and fill it in a flask in a factory, 392 00:23:43,400 --> 00:23:46,880 Speaker 1: in a bioreactor. I think there are now just too 393 00:23:46,960 --> 00:23:51,640 Speaker 1: many technical and financial barriers to doing that at scale, 394 00:23:51,760 --> 00:23:55,479 Speaker 1: not least because you need to maintain clinical standards of 395 00:23:55,760 --> 00:23:58,560 Speaker 1: hygiene to do it, which is very expensive, because if 396 00:23:58,560 --> 00:24:01,720 Speaker 1: you don't, the issue is at mammalian cells double every 397 00:24:01,760 --> 00:24:04,560 Speaker 1: twenty four hours, Well, bacterial cells double every twenty minutes. 398 00:24:04,880 --> 00:24:07,720 Speaker 1: So unless you've got clinical standards, you're going to have 399 00:24:07,720 --> 00:24:12,240 Speaker 1: a bacterial culture, not a mammalian culture. And that is 400 00:24:12,760 --> 00:24:17,320 Speaker 1: where actually the answer comes in bacterial cultures, because bacterial 401 00:24:17,320 --> 00:24:20,959 Speaker 1: cultures are really really easy to grow and super productive 402 00:24:21,000 --> 00:24:24,879 Speaker 1: and much much cheaper, not just than cultured meat, but 403 00:24:25,040 --> 00:24:28,040 Speaker 1: in fact, any protein rich food that we produced today, 404 00:24:28,200 --> 00:24:32,040 Speaker 1: well they've had three billion years on this planet evolved 405 00:24:32,080 --> 00:24:37,000 Speaker 1: and become efficient. That's right, And I feel very privileged. 406 00:24:37,480 --> 00:24:39,960 Speaker 1: This is a pure vanity thing. But when I went 407 00:24:40,000 --> 00:24:42,880 Speaker 1: to Helsinki to look at a company which was one 408 00:24:42,920 --> 00:24:45,639 Speaker 1: of the early movers in this field, it's called Solar Foods, 409 00:24:45,640 --> 00:24:50,399 Speaker 1: and it's producing this protein rich flour from a hydrogen 410 00:24:50,440 --> 00:24:54,480 Speaker 1: oxygenating bacterium found in the soil, which whose feedstock is hydrogen. 411 00:24:54,560 --> 00:24:58,240 Speaker 1: It doesn't eat any photosynthetic product. In fact, it turns 412 00:24:58,440 --> 00:25:03,320 Speaker 1: hydrogen into it. It's useful energy and creates itselves that way. 413 00:25:03,440 --> 00:25:07,000 Speaker 1: And we can make hydrogen by splitting water using sunlight 414 00:25:07,080 --> 00:25:10,920 Speaker 1: anywhere on Earth, well particularly places which are hungry, which 415 00:25:11,040 --> 00:25:13,640 Speaker 1: tend to have a lot of sunlight. And so you've 416 00:25:13,680 --> 00:25:17,119 Speaker 1: got this enormous potential. So anyway, I was the first 417 00:25:17,160 --> 00:25:19,520 Speaker 1: person outside the lab, and this is where the vanity 418 00:25:19,600 --> 00:25:24,000 Speaker 1: comes in to eat a pancake made from this bacterial flower, 419 00:25:24,040 --> 00:25:28,080 Speaker 1: a small flip for man, and amazingly, it tasted just 420 00:25:28,119 --> 00:25:31,760 Speaker 1: like a pancake. You had to dilute it because normally, 421 00:25:31,840 --> 00:25:33,840 Speaker 1: you know, if you're making a Western style pancake, you 422 00:25:33,880 --> 00:25:36,399 Speaker 1: start with your wheat flower, right, and that doesn't have 423 00:25:36,520 --> 00:25:39,040 Speaker 1: enough protein and fat to make a proper pancake, so 424 00:25:39,080 --> 00:25:41,600 Speaker 1: you add eggs and milk. But in this case, because 425 00:25:41,760 --> 00:25:44,600 Speaker 1: the bacterial flower is like sixty percent protein or about 426 00:25:44,640 --> 00:25:46,720 Speaker 1: thirty percent fat, you have to dilute it. Otherwise you'd 427 00:25:46,760 --> 00:25:50,040 Speaker 1: make an omelet and mix it with wheat flower, bring 428 00:25:50,040 --> 00:25:52,800 Speaker 1: the wheat flowering, mix it with the wheat flower, and 429 00:25:52,880 --> 00:25:56,000 Speaker 1: it was just uncanny. This is a pancake. It's just 430 00:25:56,040 --> 00:25:59,119 Speaker 1: an ordinary pancake. Now, obviously they're not just in the 431 00:25:59,119 --> 00:26:02,520 Speaker 1: business of making kicks, because what you can do is 432 00:26:02,560 --> 00:26:05,439 Speaker 1: to produce the exact mix of proteins and fats and 433 00:26:05,520 --> 00:26:08,920 Speaker 1: things that you need a to replace animal products very 434 00:26:09,200 --> 00:26:13,119 Speaker 1: very cheaply, eventually, and with a tiny fraction of the 435 00:26:13,200 --> 00:26:16,639 Speaker 1: land footprint, the water footprint, the nutrient footprint, all the 436 00:26:16,760 --> 00:26:19,720 Speaker 1: key elements of what it takes to make food. That's 437 00:26:19,800 --> 00:26:22,960 Speaker 1: even after you account for the solar farms and the 438 00:26:23,040 --> 00:26:27,280 Speaker 1: wind turbines and the electrolyzers that would split water absolutely 439 00:26:27,280 --> 00:26:30,720 Speaker 1: would be needed for all the hydrogen. So on my estimates, 440 00:26:31,119 --> 00:26:32,760 Speaker 1: you could if you wanted to do it all in 441 00:26:32,800 --> 00:26:35,000 Speaker 1: one place, and I very strongly advocate that we don't, 442 00:26:35,080 --> 00:26:38,040 Speaker 1: that it should be a highly distributed system, but you 443 00:26:38,080 --> 00:26:40,200 Speaker 1: could produce all the world's protein in an area the 444 00:26:40,240 --> 00:26:43,359 Speaker 1: size of Greater London well, and that then gives us 445 00:26:43,400 --> 00:26:49,160 Speaker 1: this tremendous ability to release land for ecosystems, for rewilding, 446 00:26:49,480 --> 00:26:51,960 Speaker 1: to bring back the forests and the wetlands and the 447 00:26:51,960 --> 00:26:55,280 Speaker 1: savannahs and the natural grasslands on which we depend on 448 00:26:55,320 --> 00:26:58,040 Speaker 1: which our entire life support systems depend I mean, if 449 00:26:58,080 --> 00:27:03,159 Speaker 1: we can't restore much of what we've destroyed on this planet, 450 00:27:03,200 --> 00:27:06,320 Speaker 1: the entire Earth system is going to reach its tipping point. 451 00:27:06,400 --> 00:27:08,920 Speaker 1: I mean that again, seems clear. You know, we're seeing 452 00:27:08,920 --> 00:27:12,639 Speaker 1: the flickering. These wild weather events that are hitting us 453 00:27:12,680 --> 00:27:15,679 Speaker 1: more and more look very much like the flickering in 454 00:27:15,720 --> 00:27:19,320 Speaker 1: a complex system that precedes a tipping point. Right. Well, 455 00:27:19,359 --> 00:27:21,479 Speaker 1: so you're looking at the food system. You're saying, Okay, 456 00:27:21,520 --> 00:27:26,239 Speaker 1: we need proteins and vitamins and carbohydrates and fat, and 457 00:27:26,280 --> 00:27:29,760 Speaker 1: the protein and the fat could come through this system. 458 00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:33,560 Speaker 1: But we've had vegetarian diets. I grew up in India 459 00:27:33,640 --> 00:27:37,400 Speaker 1: with a vegetarian diet for a very long time. They 460 00:27:37,440 --> 00:27:40,359 Speaker 1: are not being adopted more widely. So why do you 461 00:27:40,480 --> 00:27:43,880 Speaker 1: think people would turn around and say, yes, George, you've 462 00:27:43,920 --> 00:27:46,639 Speaker 1: made a really good point. That's just solve flip overright now. 463 00:27:46,960 --> 00:27:49,000 Speaker 1: It's not going to happen like that. That's not how 464 00:27:49,280 --> 00:27:51,960 Speaker 1: change happened. I mean change that the margin happens. Yeah, 465 00:27:52,240 --> 00:27:55,000 Speaker 1: I've got a plant based diet. You know, a small 466 00:27:55,080 --> 00:27:57,760 Speaker 1: percentage of people in Europe have plant based diets, but 467 00:27:57,840 --> 00:28:01,639 Speaker 1: that's no way catching up with the tremendous speed of 468 00:28:01,680 --> 00:28:05,400 Speaker 1: expansion of animal farming, so we can't rely on that 469 00:28:05,440 --> 00:28:09,639 Speaker 1: moral suasion to get people to change. It's partly going 470 00:28:09,640 --> 00:28:13,000 Speaker 1: to be on price. That these new technologies have steep 471 00:28:13,040 --> 00:28:15,440 Speaker 1: cost curves and is not going to be long at 472 00:28:15,440 --> 00:28:18,960 Speaker 1: all before they undercut even the cheapest form of plant protein, 473 00:28:19,000 --> 00:28:20,960 Speaker 1: which is soil, which is a lot cheaper than any 474 00:28:20,960 --> 00:28:24,080 Speaker 1: animal protein. So they'll compete very well on price, but 475 00:28:24,160 --> 00:28:27,560 Speaker 1: also on quality. I mean the plant based substitutes for me, 476 00:28:28,320 --> 00:28:30,920 Speaker 1: a lot of them are not great, and it's because 477 00:28:31,160 --> 00:28:34,280 Speaker 1: they are dealing with these big, complex ingredients which have 478 00:28:34,359 --> 00:28:37,600 Speaker 1: to be broken down and extracted. There's a lot of 479 00:28:37,640 --> 00:28:40,720 Speaker 1: processing involved. You have to disguise some of the flavors, 480 00:28:40,760 --> 00:28:44,600 Speaker 1: particularly if using coconut, often the fats are greasy rather 481 00:28:44,640 --> 00:28:47,320 Speaker 1: than juicy. You've got a whole lot of issues, and 482 00:28:47,360 --> 00:28:50,880 Speaker 1: these can be much more easily tackled through precision fermentation, 483 00:28:50,920 --> 00:28:55,160 Speaker 1: where you're making the exact proteins and components that you want, 484 00:28:55,200 --> 00:28:58,440 Speaker 1: and so you have much less processing, much healthier products, 485 00:28:58,520 --> 00:29:02,040 Speaker 1: Cheaper products. First of all, can replace the great majority 486 00:29:02,040 --> 00:29:03,880 Speaker 1: of the meat wheat, which is the meat that comes 487 00:29:03,880 --> 00:29:06,360 Speaker 1: from factory farming, that is in all the chicken nuggets, 488 00:29:06,360 --> 00:29:08,880 Speaker 1: and the burgers and the sausages and stuff, and then 489 00:29:08,960 --> 00:29:12,960 Speaker 1: you can start moving up that value chain. But even 490 00:29:13,000 --> 00:29:15,000 Speaker 1: more importantly, I think we're going to see a great 491 00:29:15,000 --> 00:29:18,440 Speaker 1: flowering of new diets of things we can't even conceive 492 00:29:18,480 --> 00:29:21,800 Speaker 1: of any more than the first Neolithic farmers to capture 493 00:29:21,800 --> 00:29:25,120 Speaker 1: a while cow. We're thinking about cammbert right. There's going 494 00:29:25,160 --> 00:29:28,000 Speaker 1: to be a whole load of products emerging from these 495 00:29:28,040 --> 00:29:31,160 Speaker 1: new technologies which we haven't imagined. There was an ad 496 00:29:31,200 --> 00:29:33,160 Speaker 1: that came in two thousand. I don't know if you've 497 00:29:33,240 --> 00:29:37,640 Speaker 1: seen it. A spaceship in the form of a Coca 498 00:29:37,720 --> 00:29:41,600 Speaker 1: Cola bottle lands on Mars. It shoots such straws, and 499 00:29:41,680 --> 00:29:45,360 Speaker 1: all the aliens Martians come and sip on the Coca 500 00:29:45,440 --> 00:29:48,240 Speaker 1: cola and finish it up, and then they form a 501 00:29:48,280 --> 00:29:53,360 Speaker 1: message on the planet that says send more. That is 502 00:29:53,360 --> 00:29:58,200 Speaker 1: a kind of aspiration that sells clearly. Yeah, do we 503 00:29:58,400 --> 00:30:03,120 Speaker 1: need a send more or cook version for this new 504 00:30:03,280 --> 00:30:08,320 Speaker 1: form of eating. Well, it certainly needs a publicity boost 505 00:30:08,320 --> 00:30:10,120 Speaker 1: because a lot of people will say, oh, I'm not 506 00:30:10,160 --> 00:30:12,600 Speaker 1: eating bacteria, and I say, well, hang on a moment. 507 00:30:12,640 --> 00:30:16,120 Speaker 1: First of all, you eat bacteria. That's right, In fact, 508 00:30:16,240 --> 00:30:20,560 Speaker 1: worse than that you're composed to a large extent of bacteria, 509 00:30:21,720 --> 00:30:25,160 Speaker 1: and we deliberately add live bacteria into some of our food. 510 00:30:25,160 --> 00:30:27,440 Speaker 1: I mean, I mean, let's let's think about cheese, right, Okay, 511 00:30:27,440 --> 00:30:31,160 Speaker 1: So cheese. You start with the mammary secretions from from 512 00:30:31,200 --> 00:30:35,120 Speaker 1: another species called a cow, and you mix those traditionally 513 00:30:35,280 --> 00:30:38,600 Speaker 1: with a chemical extracted from the fourth stomach of a 514 00:30:38,720 --> 00:30:42,160 Speaker 1: nursing calf called rennet, and you mix that up with 515 00:30:42,160 --> 00:30:44,880 Speaker 1: the mammary secretions. You create this wobbly mass of fat 516 00:30:44,880 --> 00:30:48,760 Speaker 1: and protein rap and then you inject bacteria into that, 517 00:30:49,160 --> 00:30:52,240 Speaker 1: and the bacteria digests that wobbly mass, and then they're 518 00:30:52,320 --> 00:30:56,320 Speaker 1: excrements turn into this yellow, stinky stuff and if you 519 00:30:56,400 --> 00:30:59,000 Speaker 1: leave it long enough, it gets really nice and stinky 520 00:30:59,000 --> 00:31:05,440 Speaker 1: and moldy. And then we eat that and people say, bacteria, no, no, no, yeah, 521 00:31:05,480 --> 00:31:07,440 Speaker 1: hang on, they know what we're looking at. What's coming 522 00:31:07,440 --> 00:31:09,640 Speaker 1: out the end of this process. It's basically a flower. 523 00:31:09,680 --> 00:31:11,560 Speaker 1: It's just a protein rich flower, that's what it is. 524 00:31:11,600 --> 00:31:13,600 Speaker 1: It happens to be made from bacterial cells. But you 525 00:31:13,600 --> 00:31:17,080 Speaker 1: wouldn't see the difference between that and any other flower, 526 00:31:17,400 --> 00:31:20,640 Speaker 1: except it's incredibly high in protein and fat. And you 527 00:31:20,720 --> 00:31:22,760 Speaker 1: just smell it in thing. Oh well, that's nice, you know, 528 00:31:22,800 --> 00:31:25,320 Speaker 1: because we've got a very strong attraction to protein right 529 00:31:25,360 --> 00:31:28,840 Speaker 1: as humans. And then you can turn that into anything 530 00:31:29,080 --> 00:31:34,120 Speaker 1: without all the cruelty, without the epidemics of disease, without 531 00:31:34,160 --> 00:31:36,920 Speaker 1: all the slaughterhouse and the blood and the guts and 532 00:31:36,960 --> 00:31:40,480 Speaker 1: the gore and stuff. And do you think microbial food 533 00:31:40,560 --> 00:31:46,840 Speaker 1: is disgusting? So the other solution, if you solve protein 534 00:31:46,880 --> 00:31:51,560 Speaker 1: and fat with these precision fermentation thats is to try 535 00:31:51,640 --> 00:31:57,640 Speaker 1: and address the crop problem. And you look at perennials, yeah, those, 536 00:31:58,240 --> 00:32:01,920 Speaker 1: So this is I think a really exciting way forward here. 537 00:32:02,360 --> 00:32:05,440 Speaker 1: The great majority of our grain crops come from annual plants. 538 00:32:05,440 --> 00:32:07,560 Speaker 1: In how the words plants which live and die within 539 00:32:07,720 --> 00:32:11,200 Speaker 1: one year. And now large areas covered by annual plants 540 00:32:11,240 --> 00:32:13,880 Speaker 1: are quite rare in nature, and they generally only occur 541 00:32:13,960 --> 00:32:15,959 Speaker 1: in the wake of a disaster. So where there's been 542 00:32:16,000 --> 00:32:19,280 Speaker 1: a landslide or a fire or a volcanic eruption and 543 00:32:19,320 --> 00:32:22,560 Speaker 1: it clears the ground, and the annual plants are our 544 00:32:22,600 --> 00:32:27,000 Speaker 1: specialists in colonizing bare ground, and so they'll quickly colonize it, 545 00:32:27,000 --> 00:32:30,240 Speaker 1: they'll reproduce very fast, dominate for a couple of years. 546 00:32:30,480 --> 00:32:33,600 Speaker 1: And then the longer lasting plants are perennials, which live 547 00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:36,720 Speaker 1: more than one year. They then come in and swallow 548 00:32:36,800 --> 00:32:40,680 Speaker 1: up that space and push the annuals out. So almost 549 00:32:40,720 --> 00:32:43,000 Speaker 1: all our grain crops are annual, and that means that 550 00:32:43,440 --> 00:32:45,720 Speaker 1: to grow them we need to create a disaster. Every year. 551 00:32:46,000 --> 00:32:47,680 Speaker 1: We need to clear the land, and we do it 552 00:32:47,720 --> 00:32:50,600 Speaker 1: either by plowing or by spraying, and then we carry 553 00:32:50,600 --> 00:32:53,760 Speaker 1: on spraying to kill the competition and to kill the 554 00:32:53,760 --> 00:32:56,840 Speaker 1: pests which might eat these very tender little shoots which 555 00:32:56,880 --> 00:32:59,360 Speaker 1: are coming up. And then we have to splash on 556 00:32:59,400 --> 00:33:03,520 Speaker 1: the fertile and use loads of water and really pamper 557 00:33:03,560 --> 00:33:07,400 Speaker 1: them to get them going, and it's a catastrophic system. Now. 558 00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:09,760 Speaker 1: For the past one hundred years or so, some scientists 559 00:33:09,760 --> 00:33:13,040 Speaker 1: have had the dream of replacing these annual crops with 560 00:33:13,120 --> 00:33:17,200 Speaker 1: perennial crops because they see the enormous difference that could 561 00:33:17,200 --> 00:33:20,880 Speaker 1: make in terms of environmental damage but also potentially food security. 562 00:33:21,360 --> 00:33:24,640 Speaker 1: And finally, at last that dream is being realized, driven 563 00:33:24,680 --> 00:33:27,719 Speaker 1: primarily by this group called the Land Institute in Selena 564 00:33:27,760 --> 00:33:30,520 Speaker 1: in Kansas. One of the crops has gone all the 565 00:33:30,560 --> 00:33:33,000 Speaker 1: way now and is fully commercialized and it's a variety 566 00:33:33,040 --> 00:33:37,040 Speaker 1: of rice which they've developed with Unan university in southern China. 567 00:33:37,360 --> 00:33:40,880 Speaker 1: Already there's many thousands of hectares of this rice being grown. 568 00:33:41,360 --> 00:33:44,840 Speaker 1: In some cases it's been harvested for six harvests continuously 569 00:33:44,880 --> 00:33:48,800 Speaker 1: and is still producing the same meals as annual rice produces, 570 00:33:48,840 --> 00:33:52,200 Speaker 1: and the farmers are desperate for it. A because there's 571 00:33:52,280 --> 00:33:54,760 Speaker 1: much less soil erosion involves. You don't have to plow 572 00:33:54,840 --> 00:33:57,360 Speaker 1: every year. I mean, eventually you have to replace the crops, 573 00:33:57,400 --> 00:34:01,240 Speaker 1: but after several years rather than every year. And secondly 574 00:34:01,240 --> 00:34:04,280 Speaker 1: that they're desperately short of labor because a lot of 575 00:34:04,280 --> 00:34:05,960 Speaker 1: the young people have moved to the cities. And of 576 00:34:06,000 --> 00:34:08,919 Speaker 1: course you don't have to plant every year. So I've 577 00:34:08,960 --> 00:34:11,799 Speaker 1: eaten this rice. It's just the same as any other 578 00:34:11,800 --> 00:34:15,840 Speaker 1: short grain rice. You know, I really would could not 579 00:34:15,960 --> 00:34:19,040 Speaker 1: tell the difference. And then they're developing a whole series 580 00:34:19,280 --> 00:34:23,920 Speaker 1: of other grain crops now types of wheat or related 581 00:34:24,080 --> 00:34:31,239 Speaker 1: species to wheat, barley, sorghum, sunflower, beans, peas, lentils. Not 582 00:34:31,280 --> 00:34:33,480 Speaker 1: all of them have gone very far down the line. 583 00:34:33,520 --> 00:34:36,759 Speaker 1: Some of them are progressing faster than others, but they're 584 00:34:36,800 --> 00:34:42,520 Speaker 1: tremendously exciting, not just because you create less environmental damage 585 00:34:42,520 --> 00:34:45,200 Speaker 1: in growing them, but also because they appear to be 586 00:34:45,280 --> 00:34:50,000 Speaker 1: more resilient to environmental crisis. So to give you an example, 587 00:34:50,040 --> 00:34:54,319 Speaker 1: the Land Institute is developing this very promising perennial sunflower 588 00:34:55,000 --> 00:34:58,600 Speaker 1: and it's been growing it's blocks of perennial sunflowers alongside 589 00:34:58,600 --> 00:35:01,879 Speaker 1: blocks of annual sunflowers. And one year it was hit 590 00:35:01,880 --> 00:35:05,640 Speaker 1: by a major drought, completely wiped out the annual sunflowers, 591 00:35:05,680 --> 00:35:08,560 Speaker 1: and the perennials just sailed through. And the reason for 592 00:35:08,680 --> 00:35:11,880 Speaker 1: that is their roots are down deeper, their structures above 593 00:35:11,920 --> 00:35:15,759 Speaker 1: ground are tougher and more robust, and yeah, they just 594 00:35:15,760 --> 00:35:19,920 Speaker 1: shook the drought off. Well, now, the solutions you are 595 00:35:20,360 --> 00:35:24,319 Speaker 1: suggesting may take the same industrial route that some of 596 00:35:24,320 --> 00:35:28,040 Speaker 1: the solutions that are now problems have taken. So you 597 00:35:28,120 --> 00:35:32,840 Speaker 1: might get consolidation, you might get these limited varieties being grown. 598 00:35:33,280 --> 00:35:35,160 Speaker 1: You know, just like we have big agriculture, we might 599 00:35:35,200 --> 00:35:39,239 Speaker 1: have big fermentations. And so would that be okay? Well no, 600 00:35:39,520 --> 00:35:42,120 Speaker 1: I mean we have to be constantly on our guard 601 00:35:42,239 --> 00:35:47,160 Speaker 1: against these tendencies, the tendency towards concentration, the tendency towards monopoly. 602 00:35:47,480 --> 00:35:49,799 Speaker 1: There was a time when governments were they had strong 603 00:35:49,840 --> 00:35:53,640 Speaker 1: antitrust laws, they had weak intellectual property laws. But it's 604 00:35:54,360 --> 00:35:56,160 Speaker 1: turned on its head now and we now have weak 605 00:35:56,200 --> 00:35:59,600 Speaker 1: antitrust laws and strong intellectual property laws, and that creates 606 00:35:59,600 --> 00:36:03,960 Speaker 1: consult aidation, drives the process and mergers and acquisitions as 607 00:36:04,080 --> 00:36:08,440 Speaker 1: corporations try to concentrate intellectual property in one place, and 608 00:36:08,480 --> 00:36:11,560 Speaker 1: that is deadly. It doesn't matter which sector you're looking at. 609 00:36:11,719 --> 00:36:15,640 Speaker 1: It's harmful to competition, it's harmful to human welfare, it's 610 00:36:15,680 --> 00:36:19,160 Speaker 1: harmful to workers right across the board. This is bad news. 611 00:36:19,160 --> 00:36:22,359 Speaker 1: And we've been given this great gift to humanity, which 612 00:36:22,440 --> 00:36:25,680 Speaker 1: is precision fermentation, which has come along just when we 613 00:36:25,719 --> 00:36:28,200 Speaker 1: need it most. Are we going to squander this by 614 00:36:28,200 --> 00:36:31,920 Speaker 1: allowing a few big corporations to control it? Well, no, 615 00:36:32,080 --> 00:36:34,160 Speaker 1: we must fight that. You know, the problem is not 616 00:36:34,200 --> 00:36:36,440 Speaker 1: the technology. It's the same with all of these issues. 617 00:36:36,800 --> 00:36:40,160 Speaker 1: It's the control of the technology. It's the ownership of 618 00:36:40,239 --> 00:36:42,960 Speaker 1: the technology. And that is something we need to get 619 00:36:43,000 --> 00:36:44,920 Speaker 1: ahead of. And instead of just sort of sitting there 620 00:36:44,960 --> 00:36:47,000 Speaker 1: and waiting for it to happen, we need to be 621 00:36:47,080 --> 00:36:53,000 Speaker 1: campaigning vociferously to ensure that we have a distributed food 622 00:36:53,040 --> 00:36:56,080 Speaker 1: system rather than a concentrated food system, because that's one 623 00:36:56,120 --> 00:36:58,920 Speaker 1: of those elements of resilience. If it's still got its 624 00:36:58,960 --> 00:37:03,600 Speaker 1: backup systems and circuit breakers and the modularity within the system, 625 00:37:03,760 --> 00:37:08,000 Speaker 1: which which a distributed and diverse food system can give you, 626 00:37:08,560 --> 00:37:11,560 Speaker 1: then it's much more likely that the system as a 627 00:37:11,560 --> 00:37:15,000 Speaker 1: whole is resilient than with this kind of situation we've 628 00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:19,440 Speaker 1: got today. Now, capitalism has its problems, yeah, but one 629 00:37:19,480 --> 00:37:22,680 Speaker 1: thing it does is while it's concentrating capital, it also 630 00:37:22,719 --> 00:37:25,279 Speaker 1: makes things more efficient. And some of the solutions you're 631 00:37:25,320 --> 00:37:28,520 Speaker 1: suggesting need to become more efficient. And so how do 632 00:37:28,560 --> 00:37:32,839 Speaker 1: you split the problems that capitalism brings with the advantages 633 00:37:32,960 --> 00:37:35,640 Speaker 1: that it does have is a very good question, and 634 00:37:35,960 --> 00:37:38,759 Speaker 1: the answer always is regulation. I mean, I would love 635 00:37:38,800 --> 00:37:41,160 Speaker 1: to see much more public ownership. Incidentally, and I don't 636 00:37:41,200 --> 00:37:43,719 Speaker 1: just mean state ownership, but community ownership. I mean this 637 00:37:43,880 --> 00:37:47,719 Speaker 1: orchard where we are today is part of a commons 638 00:37:47,800 --> 00:37:51,360 Speaker 1: which is managed collectively by the two hundred and twenty 639 00:37:51,440 --> 00:37:55,640 Speaker 1: plot holders who run this allotment system. Now, you can 640 00:37:55,680 --> 00:38:00,600 Speaker 1: have a commons with technology, and Linux is a classic 641 00:38:00,600 --> 00:38:04,239 Speaker 1: example of a technological commons. You can have it with 642 00:38:04,320 --> 00:38:07,440 Speaker 1: open source technology, you can have it with creative commons. 643 00:38:07,520 --> 00:38:11,359 Speaker 1: Licensed technology, and I want to see far more of 644 00:38:11,400 --> 00:38:15,839 Speaker 1: our economy directed into the commons. But even within the 645 00:38:15,880 --> 00:38:19,400 Speaker 1: capitalist economy, which is a totally different economy to the commons, 646 00:38:19,480 --> 00:38:23,680 Speaker 1: we need to see far more regulation, far more response 647 00:38:23,840 --> 00:38:27,200 Speaker 1: to the generalized needs of humanity rather than just the 648 00:38:27,280 --> 00:38:31,040 Speaker 1: needs of shareholders. And with food that is more of 649 00:38:31,080 --> 00:38:34,400 Speaker 1: an issue than in virtually any other sector, because well, 650 00:38:34,719 --> 00:38:38,560 Speaker 1: we all kind of depend on it. Yeah, if there 651 00:38:38,640 --> 00:38:41,439 Speaker 1: was a billboard outside of your house, what message would 652 00:38:41,480 --> 00:38:44,880 Speaker 1: you put on it? Ah, that's a good question. Private 653 00:38:44,920 --> 00:38:51,759 Speaker 1: sufficiency public luxury explainer. Yeah, there's enough ecological space on 654 00:38:51,800 --> 00:38:54,480 Speaker 1: Earth and enough physical space for us all to have 655 00:38:54,520 --> 00:38:57,760 Speaker 1: wonderful public parks and public technis courts and public swimming 656 00:38:57,760 --> 00:39:02,400 Speaker 1: pools and public transport networks to have luxurious public domain 657 00:39:02,560 --> 00:39:06,000 Speaker 1: which we share. But there's simply not enough for us 658 00:39:06,000 --> 00:39:08,720 Speaker 1: all to have private luxury. Yeah, some people have private 659 00:39:08,800 --> 00:39:11,200 Speaker 1: luxury only because other people don't. I mean, if everyone 660 00:39:11,239 --> 00:39:13,160 Speaker 1: had their own swimming pool and tennis court and the 661 00:39:13,160 --> 00:39:14,880 Speaker 1: rest of it, London would be the size of England, 662 00:39:14,920 --> 00:39:16,839 Speaker 1: ling that would be the size of Europe. Where would 663 00:39:16,840 --> 00:39:21,040 Speaker 1: everyone else live? And there's not enough ecological space as well, 664 00:39:21,120 --> 00:39:24,000 Speaker 1: so we can have our own private sufficiency, our own 665 00:39:24,040 --> 00:39:27,080 Speaker 1: small domain at home where our basic needs are met. 666 00:39:27,120 --> 00:39:31,719 Speaker 1: But if we want luxury, we do it together. That 667 00:39:31,840 --> 00:39:34,439 Speaker 1: was a fascinating conversation. Thanks for coming on the show. 668 00:39:34,880 --> 00:39:37,200 Speaker 1: It was a total pleasure. It's really great you asked 669 00:39:37,239 --> 00:39:42,759 Speaker 1: all the right questions, sir. Thank you. Food is such 670 00:39:42,760 --> 00:39:45,759 Speaker 1: an integral part of our lives, but we rarely think 671 00:39:45,800 --> 00:39:49,440 Speaker 1: about how it's produced, and it's stunning impact on the planet. 672 00:39:50,200 --> 00:39:53,160 Speaker 1: If the numbers in our conversation didn't already blow your mind, 673 00:39:53,440 --> 00:39:57,880 Speaker 1: I'd highly recommend reading George's book ReGenesis. The solutions he 674 00:39:57,960 --> 00:40:01,399 Speaker 1: lays out may seem fanciful, they can work, and they're 675 00:40:01,440 --> 00:40:05,400 Speaker 1: not the only technologies we have to tackle this problem. 676 00:40:05,400 --> 00:40:08,000 Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to Zero. If you like the show, 677 00:40:08,080 --> 00:40:11,200 Speaker 1: please rate, review and subscribe, Tell a friend or tell 678 00:40:11,360 --> 00:40:14,360 Speaker 1: your favorite farmer. If you've got a suggestion for a 679 00:40:14,480 --> 00:40:16,719 Speaker 1: guest or topic or something you just want us to 680 00:40:16,760 --> 00:40:19,560 Speaker 1: look into, get in touch at zero Pod at Bloomberg 681 00:40:19,640 --> 00:40:23,480 Speaker 1: dot Net. Zero's producer is Oscar Boyd and senior producer 682 00:40:23,560 --> 00:40:27,160 Speaker 1: is Christine Riskell. Our theme music is composed by Wonderlely. 683 00:40:28,160 --> 00:40:30,920 Speaker 1: Many people help make the show a success this week. 684 00:40:31,040 --> 00:40:34,160 Speaker 1: Thanks to summer. Sadi a podcast producer in London who 685 00:40:34,200 --> 00:40:37,399 Speaker 1: makes sure that the growing podcast team always has food 686 00:40:37,440 --> 00:40:40,759 Speaker 1: to eat. I'm Kshatrati back next week.