The interim report of the UK think tank Institute for Public Policy Research’s Environmental Justice Commission sets out a vision for the transformation of society and the economy. It argues that it is essential to put people at the heart of solving the climate and nature crises.

This blog post from US think tank The Breakthrough Institute examines uncertainties around the environmental impacts of cultured meat. It points out that estimates of the carbon footprint of cultured meat are highly variable, and that the impacts of switching to cultured meat depend on what it is replacing in the diet (e.g. beef, poultry, plant-based meats or tofu).

Local authorities in Wuhan, the Chinese city where the COVID-19 virus is thought to have originally started spreading to humans, have announced a ban on eating wild animals along with a ban on hunting wild animals except for scientific research or population regulation. The city will also buy out wild animal breeders. 

UK supermarket Iceland has reduced its food waste by 23% over two years, according to this report. In 2019/2020, Iceland wasted food equivalent to 0.57% of sales. None of this waste went to landfill. The majority of food waste went to anaerobic digestion, with some surplus bread being converted to animal feed. Small amounts of surplus food were redistributed to people in need or used to brew beer.

In this episode of the Futuremakers podcast, Dr Monika Zurek and Dr Jim Woodhill of the Food Systems Group at the University of Oxford's Environmental Change Institute discuss the future of food in the light of population growth, dietary choices and technologies such as lab-grown meat.

This opinion piece on The Poultry Site by FCRN member Laura Higham of FAI Farms considers the nature and food systems dimensions of the COVID-19 pandemic and the steps we must take to redefine our relationship with animals and the natural world.

This paper from the UK think tank International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) presents the results of research carried out together with women vendors in the dining areas of the Achumani and Obrajes markets in La Paz, Bolivia. The research is guided by the principle of “citizen agency” - involving non-scientists in the research process - which the paper argues is important for avoiding mismatches between public policy and local realities.

This book provides an overview of peatlands and their importance around the world, including chapters on peatland destruction and restoration projects.

FCRN member Bálint Balázs of the Environmental Social Science Research Group, Budapest, Hungary has co-authored this paper, which argues that Eastern European food practices have been overlooked or their importance downgraded in much of the contemporary academic literature. The paper uses three examples to illustrate how evidence from Eastern Europe is often represented by deploying the terminology and concepts developed in West European food scholarship.