ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Louise Fresco - Food and agriculture expert
A powerful thinker and globe-trotting advisor on sustainability, Louise Fresco says it's time to think of food as a topic of social and economic importance on par with oil -- that responsible agriculture and food consumption are crucial to world stability.

Why you should listen

As food, climate and water crises loom, Louise Fresco is looking hard at how we cultivate our crops and tend our livestock on a global scale. An expert on agriculture and sustainability, Fresco shows how cities and rural communities will remain tied through food, even as populations and priorities shift among them.

A former UN director, a contributor to think tanks and an advisor to academies in Europe and the United States, Fresco has noted how social unrest is made worse by hunger, poverty, environmental problems -- and modernization. Responsible agriculture "provides the livelihood for every civilization," Fresco says, but adds that mere food aid is not a solution to world hunger. She hopes that smart, local solutions for food production will improve war-torn areas and ease the pressures of regulations on production.

Fresco teaches at the University of Amsterdam, writes on policy and economics for the Dutch paper NRC Handelsblad and is also a popular novelist.

More profile about the speaker
Louise Fresco | Speaker | TED.com
TED2009

Louise Fresco: We need to feed the whole world

Filmed:
1,092,607 views

Louise Fresco shows us why we should celebrate mass-produced, supermarket-style white bread. She says environmentally sound mass production will feed the world, yet leave a role for small bakeries and traditional methods.
- Food and agriculture expert
A powerful thinker and globe-trotting advisor on sustainability, Louise Fresco says it's time to think of food as a topic of social and economic importance on par with oil -- that responsible agriculture and food consumption are crucial to world stability. Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:12
I'm not at all a cook.
0
0
2000
00:14
So don't fear, this is not going to be a cooking demonstration.
1
2000
3000
00:17
But I do want to talk to you about something
2
5000
2000
00:19
that I think is dear to all of us.
3
7000
3000
00:22
And that is bread -- something which is as simple
4
10000
3000
00:25
as our basic, most fundamental human staple.
5
13000
4000
00:29
And I think few of us spend the day
6
17000
3000
00:32
without eating bread in some form.
7
20000
3000
00:35
Unless you're on one of these Californian low-carb diets,
8
23000
4000
00:39
bread is standard.
9
27000
2000
00:41
Bread is not only standard in the Western diet.
10
29000
2000
00:43
As I will show to you, it is actually
11
31000
2000
00:45
the mainstay of modern life.
12
33000
3000
00:48
So I'm going to bake bread for you.
13
36000
2000
00:50
In the meantime I'm also talking to you,
14
38000
3000
00:53
so my life is going to complicated. Bear with me.
15
41000
3000
00:56
First of all, a little bit of audience participation.
16
44000
4000
01:00
I have two loaves of bread here.
17
48000
3000
01:03
One is a supermarket standard:
18
51000
3000
01:06
white bread, pre-packaged,
19
54000
2000
01:08
which I'm told is called a Wonderbread.
20
56000
3000
01:11
(Laughter)
21
59000
1000
01:12
I didn't know this word until I arrived.
22
60000
2000
01:14
And this is more or less,
23
62000
3000
01:17
a whole-meal, handmade,
24
65000
2000
01:19
small-bakery loaf of bread.
25
67000
2000
01:21
Here we go. I want to see a show of hands.
26
69000
3000
01:24
Who prefers the whole-meal bread?
27
72000
5000
01:29
Okay let me do this differently. Is anybody preferring the Wonderbread at all?
28
77000
4000
01:33
(Laughter)
29
81000
1000
01:34
I have two tentative male hands.
30
82000
4000
01:38
(Laughter)
31
86000
3000
01:41
Okay, now the question is really,
32
89000
3000
01:44
why is this so?
33
92000
2000
01:46
And I think it is because
34
94000
2000
01:48
we feel that this kind of bread
35
96000
3000
01:51
really is about authenticity.
36
99000
3000
01:54
It's about a traditional way of living.
37
102000
3000
01:57
A way that is perhaps more real, more honest.
38
105000
4000
02:01
This is an image from Tuscany, where we feel
39
109000
3000
02:04
agriculture is still about beauty.
40
112000
2000
02:06
And life is really, too.
41
114000
2000
02:08
And this is about good taste, good traditions.
42
116000
4000
02:12
Why do we have this image?
43
120000
2000
02:14
Why do we feel that this is more true than this?
44
122000
5000
02:19
Well I think it has a lot to do with our history.
45
127000
3000
02:22
In the 10,000 years since agriculture evolved,
46
130000
3000
02:25
most of our ancestors have actually been agriculturalists
47
133000
4000
02:29
or they were closely related to food production.
48
137000
3000
02:32
And we have this mythical image
49
140000
2000
02:34
of how life was in rural areas in the past.
50
142000
4000
02:38
Art has helped us to maintain that kind of image.
51
146000
3000
02:41
It was a mythical past.
52
149000
3000
02:44
Of course, the reality is quite different.
53
152000
2000
02:46
These poor farmers
54
154000
2000
02:48
working the land by hand or with their animals,
55
156000
2000
02:50
had yield levels that are comparable
56
158000
3000
02:53
to the poorest farmers today in West Africa.
57
161000
3000
02:56
But we have, somehow,
58
164000
2000
02:58
in the course of the last few centuries, or even decades,
59
166000
4000
03:02
started to cultivate an image of
60
170000
2000
03:04
a mythical, rural agricultural past.
61
172000
4000
03:08
It was only 200 years ago
62
176000
2000
03:10
that we had the advent of the Industrial Revolution.
63
178000
3000
03:13
And while I'm starting to make some bread for you here,
64
181000
3000
03:16
it's very important to understand
65
184000
2000
03:18
what that revolution did to us.
66
186000
3000
03:21
It brought us power. It brought us mechanization, fertilizers.
67
189000
6000
03:27
And it actually drove up our yields.
68
195000
2000
03:29
And even sort of horrible things, like picking beans by hand,
69
197000
4000
03:33
can now be done automatically.
70
201000
3000
03:36
All that is a real, great improvement, as we shall see.
71
204000
5000
03:41
Of course we also, particularly in the last decade,
72
209000
4000
03:45
managed to envelop the world
73
213000
2000
03:47
in a dense chain of supermarkets,
74
215000
3000
03:50
in a chain of global trade.
75
218000
3000
03:53
And it means that you now eat products,
76
221000
2000
03:55
which can come from all around the world.
77
223000
3000
03:58
That is the reality of our modern life.
78
226000
3000
04:01
Now you may prefer this loaf of bread.
79
229000
4000
04:05
Excuse my hands but this is how it is.
80
233000
3000
04:08
But actually the real relevant bread,
81
236000
3000
04:11
historically, is this white Wonder loaf.
82
239000
4000
04:15
And don't despise the white bread
83
243000
3000
04:18
because it really, I think,
84
246000
3000
04:21
symbolizes the fact that bread and food
85
249000
3000
04:24
have become plentiful and affordable to all.
86
252000
4000
04:28
And that is a feat that we
87
256000
2000
04:30
are not really conscious of that much.
88
258000
3000
04:33
But it has changed the world.
89
261000
2000
04:35
This tiny bread that is tasteless in some ways
90
263000
3000
04:38
and has a lot of problems
91
266000
2000
04:40
has changed the world.
92
268000
3000
04:43
So what is happening?
93
271000
2000
04:45
Well the best way to look at that is to do a tiny bit of simplistic statistics.
94
273000
4000
04:49
With the advent of the Industrial Revolution
95
277000
3000
04:52
with modernization of agriculture
96
280000
2000
04:54
in the last few decades, since the 1960s,
97
282000
4000
04:58
food availability, per head, in this world,
98
286000
3000
05:01
has increased by 25 percent.
99
289000
3000
05:04
And the world population in the meantime has doubled.
100
292000
4000
05:08
That means that we have now more food available
101
296000
3000
05:11
than ever before in human history.
102
299000
2000
05:13
And that is the result, directly,
103
301000
2000
05:15
of being so successful
104
303000
2000
05:17
at increasing the scale and volume of our production.
105
305000
4000
05:21
And this is true, as you can see, for all countries,
106
309000
3000
05:24
including the so-called developing countries.
107
312000
2000
05:26
What happened to our bread in the meantime?
108
314000
3000
05:29
As food became plentiful here,
109
317000
2000
05:31
it also meant that we were able to decrease
110
319000
2000
05:33
the number of people working in agriculture
111
321000
4000
05:37
to something like, on average, in the high income countries,
112
325000
4000
05:41
five percent or less of the population.
113
329000
4000
05:45
In the U.S. only one percent of the people are actually farmers.
114
333000
4000
05:49
And it frees us all up to do other things --
115
337000
3000
05:52
to sit at TED meetings and not to worry about our food.
116
340000
3000
05:55
That is, historically, a really unique situation.
117
343000
4000
05:59
Never before has the responsibility to feed the world
118
347000
4000
06:03
been in the hands of so few people.
119
351000
2000
06:05
And never before have so many people
120
353000
3000
06:08
been oblivious of that fact.
121
356000
3000
06:11
So as food became more plentiful, bread became cheaper.
122
359000
4000
06:15
And as it became cheaper, bread manufacturers decided to add in all kinds of things.
123
363000
4000
06:19
We added in more sugar.
124
367000
2000
06:21
We add in raisins and oil and milk
125
369000
6000
06:27
and all kinds of things to make bread,
126
375000
2000
06:29
from a simple food into kind of a support for calories.
127
377000
5000
06:34
And today, bread now is associated with obesity,
128
382000
4000
06:38
which is very strange.
129
386000
2000
06:40
It is the basic, most fundamental food
130
388000
2000
06:42
that we've had in the last ten thousand years.
131
390000
3000
06:45
Wheat is the most important crop -- the first crop we domesticated
132
393000
4000
06:49
and the most important crop we still grow today.
133
397000
2000
06:51
But this is now this strange concoction
134
399000
3000
06:54
of high calories.
135
402000
2000
06:56
And that's not only true in this country,
136
404000
3000
06:59
it is true all over the world.
137
407000
2000
07:01
Bread has migrated to tropical countries,
138
409000
2000
07:03
where the middle classes now eat French rolls and hamburgers
139
411000
4000
07:07
and where the commuters
140
415000
3000
07:10
find bread much more handy to use
141
418000
2000
07:12
than rice or cassava.
142
420000
2000
07:14
So bread has become from a main staple,
143
422000
4000
07:18
a source of calories
144
426000
2000
07:20
associated with obesity
145
428000
2000
07:22
and also a source of modernity,
146
430000
2000
07:24
of modern life.
147
432000
2000
07:26
And the whiter the bread, in many countries, the better it is.
148
434000
3000
07:29
So this is the story of bread as we know it now.
149
437000
3000
07:32
But of course the price of mass production
150
440000
4000
07:36
has been that we moved large-scale.
151
444000
3000
07:39
And large-scale has meant destruction of many of our landscapes,
152
447000
4000
07:43
destruction of biodiversity --
153
451000
2000
07:45
still a lonely emu here
154
453000
2000
07:47
in the Brazilian cerrado soybean fields.
155
455000
3000
07:50
The costs have been tremendous --
156
458000
2000
07:52
water pollution, all the things you know about, destruction of our habitats.
157
460000
4000
07:56
What we need to do is to go back to understanding what our food is about.
158
464000
5000
08:01
And this is where I have to query all of you.
159
469000
2000
08:03
How many of you can actually tell wheat apart from other cereals?
160
471000
4000
08:07
How many of you actually can make a bread
161
475000
3000
08:10
in this way, without starting with a bread machine
162
478000
3000
08:13
or just some kind of packaged flavor?
163
481000
4000
08:17
Can you actually bake bread? Do you know how much a loaf of bread actually costs?
164
485000
4000
08:21
We have become very removed
165
489000
2000
08:23
from what our bread really is,
166
491000
2000
08:25
which, again, evolutionarily speaking,
167
493000
2000
08:27
is very strange.
168
495000
2000
08:29
In fact not many of you know that
169
497000
2000
08:31
our bread, of course, was not a European invention.
170
499000
2000
08:33
It was invented by farmers in Iraq
171
501000
2000
08:35
and Syria in particular.
172
503000
2000
08:37
The tiny spike on the left to the center
173
505000
3000
08:40
is actually the forefather of wheat.
174
508000
3000
08:43
This is where it all comes from,
175
511000
2000
08:45
and where these farmers who actually, ten thousand years ago,
176
513000
3000
08:48
put us on the road of bread.
177
516000
3000
08:51
Now it is not surprising
178
519000
2000
08:53
that with this massification and large-scale production,
179
521000
3000
08:56
there is a counter-movement that emerged --
180
524000
2000
08:58
very much also here in California.
181
526000
2000
09:00
The counter-movement says, "Let's go back to this.
182
528000
3000
09:03
Let's go back to traditional farming.
183
531000
2000
09:05
Let's go back to small-scale, to farmers' markets,
184
533000
4000
09:09
small bakeries and all that." Wonderful.
185
537000
3000
09:12
Don't we all agree? I certainly agree.
186
540000
2000
09:14
I would love to go back to Tuscany
187
542000
2000
09:16
to this kind of traditional setting,
188
544000
2000
09:18
gastronomy, good food.
189
546000
2000
09:20
But this is a fallacy.
190
548000
2000
09:22
And the fallacy comes from idealizing
191
550000
3000
09:25
a past that we have forgotten about.
192
553000
3000
09:28
If we do this, if we want to stay with traditional small-scale farming
193
556000
4000
09:32
we are going, actually, to relegate
194
560000
3000
09:35
these poor farmers and their husbands --
195
563000
3000
09:38
among whom I have lived for many years,
196
566000
2000
09:40
working without electricity and water, to try to improve their food production --
197
568000
3000
09:43
we relegate them to poverty.
198
571000
3000
09:46
What they want are implements
199
574000
2000
09:48
to increase their production:
200
576000
2000
09:50
something to fertilize the soil,
201
578000
2000
09:52
something to protect their crop and to bring it to a market.
202
580000
3000
09:55
We cannot just think that small-scale
203
583000
2000
09:57
is the solution to the world food problem.
204
585000
3000
10:00
It's a luxury solution for us who can afford it,
205
588000
3000
10:03
if you want to afford it.
206
591000
2000
10:05
In fact we do not want this poor woman
207
593000
2000
10:07
to work the land like this.
208
595000
2000
10:09
If we say just small-scale production,
209
597000
2000
10:11
as is the tendency here,
210
599000
2000
10:13
to go back to local food means that a poor man like Hans Rosling
211
601000
3000
10:16
cannot even eat oranges anymore
212
604000
2000
10:18
because in Scandinavia we don't have oranges.
213
606000
3000
10:21
So local food production is out.
214
609000
2000
10:23
But also we do not want
215
611000
2000
10:25
to relegate to poverty in the rural areas.
216
613000
3000
10:28
And we do not want to relegate
217
616000
2000
10:30
the urban poor to starvation.
218
618000
3000
10:33
So we must find other solutions.
219
621000
3000
10:36
One of our problems is that world food production
220
624000
2000
10:38
needs to increase very rapidly --
221
626000
2000
10:40
doubling by about 2030.
222
628000
3000
10:43
The main driver of that is actually meat.
223
631000
3000
10:46
And meat consumption in Southeast Asia and China in particular
224
634000
3000
10:49
is what drives the prices of cereals.
225
637000
5000
10:54
That need for animal protein is going to continue.
226
642000
4000
10:58
We can discuss alternatives in another talk, perhaps one day,
227
646000
3000
11:01
but this is our driving force.
228
649000
2000
11:03
So what can we do?
229
651000
2000
11:05
Can we find a solution to produce more?
230
653000
4000
11:09
Yes. But we need mechanization.
231
657000
4000
11:13
And I'm making a real plea here.
232
661000
2000
11:15
I feel so strongly that you cannot ask a small farmer
233
663000
4000
11:19
to work the land and bend over to grow a hectare of rice,
234
667000
3000
11:22
150,000 times, just to plant a crop and weed it.
235
670000
4000
11:26
You cannot ask people to work under these conditions.
236
674000
3000
11:29
We need clever low-key mechanization
237
677000
3000
11:32
that avoids the problems of the large-scale mechanization that we've had.
238
680000
4000
11:36
So what can we do?
239
684000
2000
11:38
We must feed three billion people in cities.
240
686000
3000
11:41
We will not do that through small farmers' markets
241
689000
2000
11:43
because these people have no small farmers' markets at their disposal.
242
691000
4000
11:47
They have low incomes. And they benefit
243
695000
3000
11:50
from cheap, affordable, safe and diverse food.
244
698000
3000
11:53
That's what we must aim for in the next 20 to 30 years.
245
701000
3000
11:56
But yes there are some solutions.
246
704000
2000
11:58
And let me just do one simple conceptual thing:
247
706000
4000
12:02
if I plot science as a proxy
248
710000
3000
12:05
for control of the production process and scale.
249
713000
4000
12:09
What you see is that we've started
250
717000
2000
12:11
in the left-hand corner with traditional agriculture,
251
719000
3000
12:14
which was sort of small-scale and low-control.
252
722000
3000
12:17
We've moved towards large-scale and very high control.
253
725000
4000
12:21
What I want us to do is to keep up the science and even get more science in there
254
729000
5000
12:26
but go to a kind of regional scale --
255
734000
2000
12:28
not just in terms of the scale of the fields,
256
736000
2000
12:30
but in terms of the entire food network.
257
738000
3000
12:33
That's where we should move.
258
741000
2000
12:35
And the ultimate may be, but it doesn't apply to cereals,
259
743000
3000
12:38
that we have entirely closed ecosystems --
260
746000
3000
12:41
the horticultural systems right at the top left-hand corner.
261
749000
4000
12:45
So we need to think differently about agriculture science.
262
753000
4000
12:49
Agriculture science for most people -- and there are not many farmers
263
757000
2000
12:51
among you here --
264
759000
2000
12:53
has this name of being bad,
265
761000
3000
12:56
of being about pollution, about large-scale,
266
764000
2000
12:58
about the destruction of the environment.
267
766000
2000
13:00
That is not necessary.
268
768000
2000
13:02
We need more science and not less. And we need good science.
269
770000
3000
13:05
So what kind of science can we have?
270
773000
2000
13:07
Well first of all I think
271
775000
2000
13:09
we can do much better on the existing technologies.
272
777000
3000
13:12
Use biotechnology where useful,
273
780000
2000
13:14
particularly in pest and disease resistance.
274
782000
3000
13:17
There are also robots, for example,
275
785000
2000
13:19
who can recognize weeds
276
787000
2000
13:21
with a resolution of half an inch.
277
789000
3000
13:24
We have much cleverer irrigation.
278
792000
2000
13:26
We do not need to spill the water if we don't want to.
279
794000
4000
13:30
And we need to think very dispassionately
280
798000
3000
13:33
about the comparative advantages
281
801000
2000
13:35
of small-scale and large-scale.
282
803000
3000
13:38
We need to think that land is multi-functional.
283
806000
2000
13:40
It has different functions.
284
808000
2000
13:42
There are different ways in which we must use it --
285
810000
3000
13:45
for residential, for nature, for agriculture purposes.
286
813000
3000
13:48
And we also need to re-examine livestock.
287
816000
3000
13:51
Go regional and go to urban food systems.
288
819000
3000
13:54
I want to see fish ponds in parking lots and basements.
289
822000
4000
13:58
I want to have horticulture
290
826000
2000
14:00
and greenhouses on top of residential areas.
291
828000
3000
14:03
And I want to use the energy that comes from those greenhouses
292
831000
3000
14:06
and from the fermentation of crops
293
834000
2000
14:08
to heat our residential areas.
294
836000
2000
14:10
There are all kinds of ways we can do it.
295
838000
2000
14:12
We cannot solve the world food problem
296
840000
2000
14:14
by using biological agriculture.
297
842000
2000
14:16
But we can do a lot more.
298
844000
3000
14:19
And the main thing that I would really ask all of you
299
847000
3000
14:22
as you go back to your countries, or as you stay here:
300
850000
3000
14:25
ask your government for an integrated food policy.
301
853000
4000
14:29
Food is as important as energy,
302
857000
3000
14:32
as security, as the environment.
303
860000
2000
14:34
Everything is linked together.
304
862000
2000
14:36
So we can do that. In fact in a densely populated country
305
864000
3000
14:39
like the River Delta, where I live in the Netherlands,
306
867000
3000
14:42
we have combined these functions.
307
870000
2000
14:44
So this is not science fiction. We can combine things
308
872000
3000
14:47
even in a social sense of making
309
875000
2000
14:49
the rural areas more accessible to people --
310
877000
2000
14:51
to house, for example, the chronically sick.
311
879000
3000
14:54
There is all kinds of things we can do.
312
882000
2000
14:56
But there is something you must do. It's not enough for me to say,
313
884000
3000
14:59
"Let's get more bold science into agriculture."
314
887000
3000
15:02
You must go back
315
890000
2000
15:04
and think about your own food chain.
316
892000
2000
15:06
Talk to farmers. When was the last time
317
894000
2000
15:08
you went to a farm and talked to a farmer?
318
896000
2000
15:10
Talk to people in restaurants.
319
898000
2000
15:12
Understand where you are in the food chain,
320
900000
2000
15:14
where your food comes from.
321
902000
2000
15:16
Understand that you are part
322
904000
2000
15:18
of this enormous chain of events.
323
906000
2000
15:20
And that frees you up to do other things.
324
908000
3000
15:23
And above all, to me, food is about respect.
325
911000
4000
15:27
It's about understanding, when you eat,
326
915000
2000
15:29
that there are also many people who are still in this situation,
327
917000
4000
15:33
who are still struggling for their daily food.
328
921000
3000
15:36
And the kind of simplistic solutions that we sometimes have,
329
924000
3000
15:39
to think that doing everything by hand
330
927000
2000
15:41
is going to be the solution,
331
929000
2000
15:43
is really not morally justified.
332
931000
3000
15:46
We need to help to lift them out of poverty.
333
934000
2000
15:48
We need to make them proud of being a farmer
334
936000
4000
15:52
because they allow us to survive.
335
940000
3000
15:55
Never before, as I said,
336
943000
2000
15:57
has the responsibility for food
337
945000
2000
15:59
been in the hands of so few.
338
947000
2000
16:01
And never before have we had the luxury
339
949000
2000
16:03
of taking it for granted
340
951000
2000
16:05
because it is now so cheap.
341
953000
3000
16:08
And I think there is nobody else who has expressed
342
956000
2000
16:10
better, to me, the idea that food, in the end,
343
958000
4000
16:14
in our own tradition, is something holy.
344
962000
3000
16:17
It's not about nutrients and calories.
345
965000
2000
16:19
It's about sharing. It's about honesty. It's about identity.
346
967000
4000
16:23
Who said this so beautifully was Mahatma Gandhi,
347
971000
3000
16:26
75 years ago, when he spoke about bread.
348
974000
3000
16:29
He did not speak about rice, in India. He said,
349
977000
3000
16:32
"To those who have to go without two meals a day,
350
980000
4000
16:36
God can only appear as bread."
351
984000
3000
16:39
And so as I'm finishing my bread here --
352
987000
4000
16:43
and I've been baking it, and I'll try not to burn my hands.
353
991000
4000
16:47
Let me share
354
995000
2000
16:49
with those of you here in the first row.
355
997000
2000
16:51
Let me share some of the food with you.
356
999000
2000
16:53
Take some of my bread.
357
1001000
2000
16:55
And as you eat it, and as you try it --
358
1003000
3000
16:58
please come and stand up.
359
1006000
2000
17:00
Have some of it.
360
1008000
2000
17:02
I want you to think that every bite connects you
361
1010000
3000
17:05
to the past and the future:
362
1013000
2000
17:07
to these anonymous farmers,
363
1015000
2000
17:09
that first bred the first wheat varieties;
364
1017000
4000
17:13
and to the farmers of today,
365
1021000
2000
17:15
who've been making this. And you don't even know who they are.
366
1023000
3000
17:18
Every meal you eat
367
1026000
2000
17:20
contains ingredients from all across the world.
368
1028000
4000
17:24
Everything makes us so privileged,
369
1032000
3000
17:27
that we can eat this food, that we don't struggle every day.
370
1035000
3000
17:30
And that, I think,
371
1038000
2000
17:32
evolutionarily-speaking is unique.
372
1040000
2000
17:34
We've never had that before.
373
1042000
2000
17:36
So enjoy your bread.
374
1044000
2000
17:38
Eat it, and feel privileged.
375
1046000
2000
17:40
Thank you very much.
376
1048000
2000
17:42
(Applause)
377
1050000
12000

▲Back to top

ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Louise Fresco - Food and agriculture expert
A powerful thinker and globe-trotting advisor on sustainability, Louise Fresco says it's time to think of food as a topic of social and economic importance on par with oil -- that responsible agriculture and food consumption are crucial to world stability.

Why you should listen

As food, climate and water crises loom, Louise Fresco is looking hard at how we cultivate our crops and tend our livestock on a global scale. An expert on agriculture and sustainability, Fresco shows how cities and rural communities will remain tied through food, even as populations and priorities shift among them.

A former UN director, a contributor to think tanks and an advisor to academies in Europe and the United States, Fresco has noted how social unrest is made worse by hunger, poverty, environmental problems -- and modernization. Responsible agriculture "provides the livelihood for every civilization," Fresco says, but adds that mere food aid is not a solution to world hunger. She hopes that smart, local solutions for food production will improve war-torn areas and ease the pressures of regulations on production.

Fresco teaches at the University of Amsterdam, writes on policy and economics for the Dutch paper NRC Handelsblad and is also a popular novelist.

More profile about the speaker
Louise Fresco | Speaker | TED.com

Data provided by TED.

This site was created in May 2015 and the last update was on January 12, 2020. It will no longer be updated.

We are currently creating a new site called "eng.lish.video" and would be grateful if you could access it.

If you have any questions or suggestions, please feel free to write comments in your language on the contact form.

Privacy Policy

Developer's Blog

Buy Me A Coffee