Farm To Table Talk

Building a bridge from where Agriculture is now to where the public and policy makers want it to go is advisable.  Even for the best of reasons ranchers are not able to just flip a switch to new prevailing expectations without suffering from unintended and under considered consequences. States like California that are out front with new initiatives make it especially difficult to be competitive wi...

If we reimagine how water flows across our landscape, we can help both fish and our farms.  At Eco Farm in Pacific Grove, California that was the message to farmers from all over the world from a popular keynote presentation by Jacob Katz, the Lead Scientist with California Trout. Mas Masomoto, legendary Organic pioneer sets the stage for the stimulating ideas that always surface at ECO Farms when...

I t’s Meeting Season for farmers and others in the food chain when they gather to agree to disagree and ultimately find middle ground (or high ground). What’s decided when they put their heads together can impact public policy and public opinion.  To cover  this critical process Natalie Kovarik and Tara VanderDussen followed the American Farm Bureau to Puerto Rico where 5,000 farmers a...

Owning land isn’t a prerequisite to loving land, regenerating land and producing healthy food. Andy Breiter does not own a single acre of land since beginning in 2020 but has grown a land base to approximately 400 acres across 7 non contiguous parcels. It has been done through building partnerships with private and public land owners. The focus of the business is utilizing livestock to regen...

Powerful movements are happening in our food system and Liz Carlisle, the author of Healing Grounds shares a glimpse of these movements at Eco Farm and on an earlier 2022 episode of Farm To Table.  Liz is an Assistant Professor in the Environmental Studies Program at UC Santa Barbara, where she teaches courses on food and farming. Born and raised in Montana, she got hooked on agriculture while wor...

For holiday dinners, when your guests like both the idea of “plant based” and the taste of animal protein, there is a way to work-around. Vegan options may still need to be offered because this work-around is serving beef from cattle that were raised on a plant based diet. For the most part the plants the cattle consumed are largely cellulose such as grass that people can’t digest but when convert...

After near extinction, the in-nii (American Bison) are slowly returning to Native American tribes who have the resources to run reintroduction programs. Latrice Tatsey, Buffalo Stone Woman, is an ecologist and cattle producer who advocates for tribally-directed bison restoration and regenerative cattle grazing. Currently, she is a graduate student in Land Resources and Environmental Sciences study...

‘High Tech High Touch’ is an early Silicon Valley term that implies a dynamic paradox.  It is still a paradox in today’s agriculture where “faster/bigger” and “slower/smaller” each have a wave.  In the wake of this wave, Social Scientists like Dr. Julie Guthman of the University of California in Santa Cruz are asking “how do you bring digital product...

Slow water always wins however we can still thrive in this emerging age of climate change caused drought and deluges. Erica Gies has written a book,  about “Slow Water” innovations that are helping us adapt to the increasing water dilemmas. Respect for water’s winning ways is where it all begins as this Journalist/Author shares the ways we must work for smart and slow water systems at the Ec...

Farmers face challenges ranging from rising costs for them to low prices to them and seemingly endless regulations that need more time and attention than they have the ability to give. They need to be more resourceful than ever, whether they have been farming for generations or just coming in to it from a non-farming background, Michael Kilpatrick has been helping farmers make resourceful, sometim...

The California Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) has reached a multimillion-dollar legal agreement with online retail giant Amazon.com Services, LLC. (Amazon) for the illegal sale of pesticides in California. Under the terms of the agreement, Amazon will pay DPR a total of $4.97 million – $3.69 million in unpaid pesticide sales assessment fees and related late penalties, and $1.28 million i...

Thirty years ago “The Death of Ramon Gonzalez was published and subsequently began making an impression on thousands of people around the world with, as Wes Jackson of The Land Institute said,” a new way of looking at the tragic human and environmental consequences of chemical-dependent agriculture”. The author of this ground breaking book, Angus Wright recently passed away after a productive life...

  Wendell Berry has shared his unique wisdom for over 50 years in over 50 books. The new book,”The Need To Be Whole” was introduced by Wendell himself at the Kentucky Book Festival at the Joseph-Beth Book Sellers in Lexington, Kentucky. Farm To Table Talk host, Rodger Wasson was there to hear Wendell wisdom first hand. All of Wendell’s books are worth a read but “The U...

Food communicates origin, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) and global health upstream, downstream and around our tables. Progressive brands realize that in a true cost accounting future, they will need to be able to provide a suite of environmental impact metrics that go beyond just carbon to include soil, health, water data and biodiversity metrics...

Sequestering atmospheric carbon and placing it in soil  will be a part of the solution to climate change and greater economic resilience and security. Ben Cloud, CEO of BodelAG has commercialized a plant extract discovery with broad  application to improve the health and economic welfare of humans, animals, and plants. The loss of soil’s microbial biomass and the functionality the microbes provide...

Creation takes place in our food chain at the farm, in the kitchen and in our favorite restaurants that “curate” a tasting experience to be savored and remembered. At the Tasting Kitchen in Los Angeles, Executive Chef Travis Passeroti creates daily hand written menus that curate the best of what is on offer that day from the Santa Monica Farmers Market and other select local suppliers...

Resilience is what’s needed for a viable food system and there are more resilient alternatives available today than ever. The supply disruption and fragility exposed by the pandemic highlights the overlooked advantages of smaller local food suppliers. With food costs from the global system climbing, the price gap between the big and the small operations has shrunk. The author of 15 books, thousand...

50 years ago the White House conducted a conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health. It has finally happened again as President Biden announced a national plan for ending hunger in the United States by 2030 with these actions: 1) Improve food access and affordability; 2) Integrate nutrition and health; 3) Empower all consumers to make and have access to healthy choices; 4) Support physical activit...

When most consumers buy pork chops or bacon, it seldom occurs to them to wonder how much space does a pig need?  That question is increasingly coming up to supermarkets, restaurants, curious consumers and their legislators.  The pig space question focuses on the stage between a female hog (sow or gilt) being bred and giving birth to a littler of pigs 3 months, 3 weeks and 3 days later.  In that ti...

“Food to live for” could be the theme of Sacramento’s annual harvest celebration of the regions pride in being America’s Farm To Fork Capitol. Talented chefs and local farmers are joined by the whole region including over 300,000 food appreciative consumers at a weekend street festival with music and food for all tastes. One of the most coveted tickets in town gets you dinner with 850 fellow farm...

Some of the most productive farmland in the world has been knocked out of production by an historic drought. And in California alone over a million citizens lack access to clean drinking water and according to the California Dry Well Reporting System, communities have reported that 966 wells have gone dry this year. If this isn’t a crisis what is? When we look for solutions we may need to look for...

1 in 3 people worldwide didn’t have access to adequate food in 2021, up 350 million from pre pandemic levels. How can agriculture address this widening gulf in the global food supply– becoming more sustainable and efficient? Potash is one of the most prominent minerals used in agricultural fertilization and is sourced and transported in great quantities from far off countries like Russia and...

When you’ve had it with the corporate track, why not take a step towards changing the world? Drew Levich took that step because he believes that each of us can make a difference.  He created “Drew’s Cookies” with the underlying purpose to demonstrate that it is simple to be a change maker.  In addition to marketing cookies and popcorn, they are donating a share of profits t...

If pesticide residues are discovered in California, it is more likely from imports than state grown. Controlling pests any where must be a priority to be done safely and sustainably.  That’s a key part of the job for Julie Henderson, the Director of the California Department of Pesticide Regulation. Formerly the Deputy Secretary for Public Policy at the California EPA, her vision is for coll...

Diverse soil biology affects the farm and our evolving food system. It starts with decoding soil biology using a global data base of millions of microorganisms to both analyze which microbes are currently present and exactly what role they are playing. Adrian Ferrero, a co-founder of Biome Makers, joins Farm To Table Talk to explain the logic of a biological future with implications for the whole...