We Are Eating the Earth

The Race to Fix Our Food System and Save Our Climate

By: Michael Grunwald

Narrated by: Kevin R. Free

From the author of New York Times bestseller The New New Deal, a groundbreaking piece of reportage from the trenches of the next climate war: the fight to fix our food system.

Humanity has cleared a land mass the size of Asia plus Europe to grow food, and our food system generates a third of our carbon emissions. By 2050, we’re going to need a lot more calories to fill nearly 10 billion bellies, but we can’t feed the world without frying it if we keep tearing down an acre of rainforest every six seconds. We are eating the earth, and the greatest challenge facing our species will be to slow our relentless expansion of farmland into nature. Even if we quit fossil fuels, we’ll keep hurtling towards climate chaos if we don’t solve our food and land problems.

In this rollicking, shocking narrative, Grunwald shows how the world, after decades of ignoring the climate problem at the center of our plates, has pivoted to making it worse, embracing solutions that sound sustainable but could make it even harder to grow more food with less land. But he also tells the stories of the dynamic scientists and entrepreneurs pursuing real solutions, from a jungle-tough miracle crop called pongamia to genetically-edited cattle embryos, from Impossible Whoppers to a non-polluting pesticide that uses the technology behind the COVID vaccines to constipate beetles to death. It’s an often infuriating saga of lobbyists, politicians, and even the scientific establishment making terrible choices for humanity, but it’s also a hopeful account of the people figuring out what needs to be done—and trying to do it.

Michael Grunwald, bestselling author of The Swamp and The New New Deal, builds his narrative around a brilliant, relentless, unforgettable food and land expert named Tim Searchinger. He chronicles Searchinger’s uphill battles against bad science and bad politics, both driven by the overwhelming influence of agricultural interests. And he illuminates a path that could save our planetary home for ourselves and future generations—through better policy, technology, and behavior, as well as a new land ethic recognizing that every acre matters.

Critic reviews

"Golden Voice Kevin R. Free delivers the urgent tone, informative style, and crisp pacing of this eye-opening work...The text is at once a jeremiad about ignoring the role land use plays in the climate crisis and an exploration of the many experiments that have taken place in food science, farming, and growing crops in alternative spaces."

Powerful, eye-opening book

A MUST-READ book that will open your eyes wide! Is everything hopeless? NO. But science must prevail

Comprehensive examination of food systems

The book appears to dwell on a tangential and unlikable supernerd for several chapters, but this is well justified as Tim Searchinger turns out to be practically the only expert questioning seriously flawed assumptions about the carbon footprints of agriculture, forestry and food production. While the book – due to the state of current research, policy and industry – can not supply a rainbow ending, it does provide a very thorough overview of what works, what doesn’t and what both systems (governments/corporations) as well as individuals can do to help us survive the mess we’ve made. A well worthy and enlightening read.

Informative and interesting

I credit the author for writing a book heavy on environmental science that never gets boring. He keeps it interesting with a lot of fascinating content, entertaining descriptions of his main protagonist and often funny writing - e.g., when he notes how the dairy industry has banned soy and almond milks from being called “milk” even though we’re allowed to sell hamburgers that contain no ham and Girl Scout cookies that contain no Girl Scouts…

At times, I felt like the author was trying too hard to be contrarian. For example, at the end, be criticizes environmentalists for pushing to move from a focus on individual choices to collective action. But good lord, the whole idea that it’s up to each of us to save the Earth individually has been so overdone, while we’ve let our leaders and elites so far off the hook, of course we need to course correct! I think a lot of people understand that their choices have impacts but so many of us are sick of hearing about it while governments and corporations do so damn little.

Bottom line: a very worthwhile listen even if the author sometimes gets a bit carried away.

If you eat food, you should read this.

You’ll change your thinking about food production. I wish this book had existed twenty years ago.

truth

liked knowing and learning that land is more important than CO2 but both are important.