In Washington DC’s Ward 8, adults who are diagnosed with hypertension, pre-diabetes, or diabetes are now being prescribed a visit to their local Giant supermarket. Instead of picking up antihypertensive medications or insulin from a pharmacist, some patients fulfill a $20 produce prescription using their grocery loyalty card and consult with an on-site nutritionist. The […]
The negative impacts of our trade war with China reverberate throughout the U.S. food and agricultural industries, causing significant changes to our food system and how we interact with it. Where American farmers once relied on robust trade agreements with countries like China, they now find themselves faced with the daunting task of identifying and […]
The Climate Action Summit of the UN Secretary General and the Global #WeekforFuture organized in response to youth activist Greta Thunberg both took place this week. It also marked the conclusion of Covering Climate Now, a reporting initiative led by the Columbia Journalism Review and The Nation “aimed at strengthening the media’s focus on the […]
This is an excerpt from a longer article recently published in Sight & Life magazine (August 2019). It is co-authored by Refresh Working Group members Danielle Nierenberg, Alicia Powers and Sarah Papazoglakis. Recent digital innovations in e-commerce, online grocery shopping, and food and meal delivery services are helping to address food and nutrition insecurity by […]
Datasets are a key ingredient that feeds data-driven tools for the food system. They are repositories of statistics, images, and/or other relevant information about a particular subject. In the food system, these collections of information on agriculture, food retail, or nutrition, for example, are among the important reservoirs of data used to develop food and […]
For Kevin Krueger—the Procurement and Sustainability Manager at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and a Refresh Working Group Member—the hospital cafeteria plays a vital role in the fight to prevent, treat, and cure catastrophic pediatric diseases. In this role, he is responsible for sourcing well over one million meals a year. Inspired by the innovative […]
[Re-post from Food Tank] This article by Thea Walmsley and Danielle Nierenberg originally appeared on the blog for Food Tank, a think tank committed to environmentally, socially, and economically sustainable ways to fortify the global food system. Nierenberg is President of Food Tank and an expert in sustainable agriculture and gender and populations. In the […]
The Shifting Landscape of Food Retail Building what The Wall Street Journal calls the “store of the future,” major grocers are investing in new, digitally-networked models that track consumer data and incentivize customer loyalty through cloud-based rewards programs. In fact, the same article calls technologically optimized shopping experiences “one of the most important weapons in […]