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Richard Waite

@waiterich

13 May 20

Can increasing carbon sequestration in soils—through practices broadly referred to as regenerative agriculture—be a leading climate solution? Our read of the evidence suggests that soil C sequestration has limited potential to mitigate climate change. 1/ wri.org/blog/2020/05/r…

Although regenerative agriculture has no universal definition, it is often used to describe practices aimed at promoting soil health & restoring soil organic C.

Practices include no-till, cover crops, diverse crop rotations, improved grazing, and reduced chemical inputs. 2/

There is broad agreement that regenerative agriculture practices are good for soil health and have other environmental benefits, including water retention and reduced water pollution. 3/

Read 12 tweets

Richard Waite

@waiterich

22 Mar 20

Thread: Delicious dishes from Cameroon 🇨🇲 with recipes. 1/

Ndole: often referred to as Cameroon’s national dish. Made with a bitter leaf, but spinach or other green will do in a pinch. Includes peanuts and meat or fish, can be eaten with plantains or another starch. africanbites.com/ndole/ 2/

Fufu and njama njama: cornmeal (like polenta) with huckleberry leaves (again other greens can sub in) fried with tomato, onion, and hot pepper. In Cameroon I lived next to a family from the North West Region and ate this a lot. africanbites.com/njama-njama-an… 3/

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Richard Waite

@waiterich

10 Dec 19

@davidfickling

Thread: You've probably heard of peak oil (hasn't happened yet). You may have heard of peak wild fish (happened in 1990s). But are we near peak beef? @davidfickling took a look at some of the trends. Below are a few thoughts. 1/
bloomberg.com/opinion/articl…

@davidfickling

@davidfickling It's clear that per capita beef consumption has peaked in places like the U.S. and Europe, where it's been declining since the 1970s (and largely replaced in diets by chicken). I discussed some of these trends here: wri.org/blog/2018/01/2… 2/

@davidfickling

@davidfickling But globally are we near peak production & consumption? If you look at the graph below, it seems like it. However, I'm not sure that presenting beef production like a compounding bank account tells the clearest story. The denominator has grown a *lot*, thus % growth is down. 3/

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Richard Waite

@waiterich

30 Oct 19

@UN

Hi @UN - great to see some advice on food-related climate action, but the best 2 rules of thumb to reduce diet-related emissions (in high-income countries) are minimizing food waste and eating a plant-rich diet: wri.org/blog/2017/10/t…. 1/

https://twitter.com/UN/status/1188622911080415235

@UN

@UN ~6% of global food GHGs from transport, so local food is not a leading climate strategy. science.sciencemag.org/content/360/63…

Re: organic, higher land use (lower yields) means GHGs can actually increase; halting deforestation while feeding 10B is a key challenge. advances.sciencemag.org/content/3/3/e1… 2/2

@UN

@UN h/t @_HannahRitchie

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Richard Waite

@waiterich

24 Sep 19

It's #ClimateWeek2019, so let's have a THREAD about carbon opportunity costs, since we can't keep warming below 2°C (let alone 1.5°) without halting deforestation - and probably reforesting large areas. How we produce and consume food has a large bearing on what's possible. 1/

In recent years, agriculture and associated land-use change have been responsible for roughly a quarter of total annual GHG emissions from all sectors. The data below are from 2010 (Source: sustainablefoodfuture.org). 2/

Those numbers above are from GHG emissions in a recent year. But massive amounts of former forest land have already been cleared for agriculture, which currently occupies nearly half of the world's vegetated lands. And agriculture remains the leading driver of deforestation. 3/

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Richard Waite

@waiterich

3 May 18

Thread: let's talk a bit more about the recent study that estimated the environmental impacts of U.S. food waste--and also included the finding that healthier diets actually result in higher amounts of food waste. 1/
wapo.st/2qHrTRN?tid=ss…

First, the wasted resources are huge: an area of cropland the size of Pennsylvania (and that doesn't even count grazing land!), 4.2 trillion gallons of irrigation water, and 6 billion pounds of fertilizer each year. 1/4 of food (by weight) and 30% (by calories) wasted. Yikes! 2/

And the tradeoff expressed most simply: wasted food, by weight, grows from ~300g to >500g per capita per day as diet quality improves, because fruits and vegetables (of which more are present in a high quality diet) are also wasted more often than other foods. 3/

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