Alcohol marketing has crossed borders and entered the metaverse. Massey University professor of public health Sally Casswell explores how we regulate the new digital risks. The World Health Organization’s newly released report on regulating cross-border...
Opinion
Every week The Feed interviews the movers, the shakers and the makers in the New Zealand food industry. Check out the interviews on The Feed Weekly podcast or in a Q&A format below. And if you’ve got a story to tell or an opinion to share, drop us a line at editor@thefeed.co.nz
Cultured meats – talking alt protein and the new way to catch fish, with Dr Georgina Dowd
Alt-protein is such an amorphous category of technology and food, we haven't really fully unpacked it. Vincent Heering was joined on Feed Weekly podcast by Dr Georgina Dowd, of Plant & Food Research, to talk all things cultured meat and about her work exploring...
Global hunger crisis: 47 million people on edge of famine. What are some potential solutions.
Forty-seven million people in the world are on the edge of famine. What can be done? The world is facing a “hunger catastrophe”, the World Food Programme (WFP) is warning. The United Nations food aid organization says at least 47 million people in 81 countries could...
Removing GST on food is back in the news — a reheat of a bad idea?
Removing GST on food is back in the news. Stephen Hickson, an Economics Lecturer at the University of Canterbury, says that just proves some bad ideas just never go away. Removing the goods and services tax (GST) from food is not a new idea. Te Pāti Māori are...
Social prescriptions: Why some health-care practitioners are prescribing food to their patients
In Guelph, Ontario, food prescriptions provide patients with vouchers that can be spent on fruits and vegetables. Angela is a 54-year-old mother of two living with Type 2 diabetes in a small apartment in the Canadian city, Guelph, Ontario. Despite steady access to...
We need to talk about food waste: $870 million of it, says Dr Jeff Seadon
New Zealand households throw out 230,000 tonnes of food waste annually, of which 54% was avoidable - that is, still edible. That’s enough to feed two cities the size of Dunedin or to provide lunches for all school-aged children for three years. Yikes. Where doe sit...
Interview: Prof Grant Schofield on school lunches, virtue signalling, food fads and more
The government is set to ban sugary drinks from schools. Given that one in three New Zealand kids are overweight or obese, you’d think that might make a professor of public health happy. But Grant Schofield of AUT University is unimpressed. He think the ban will do...
How ‘added value’ is killing us one packet of chips at a time
I doubt Michael Pollan was thinking of the New Zealand primary sector when he wrote his seminal work, In Defence of Food, but he might as well have. His now-famous phrase could be our national food strategy: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." The sentence,...
Winetopia leads the way for food tourism experiences
Rob Eliott and his team are the driving force behind food events that you'll know like Taste of Auckland and Winetopia. Rob's also on the board of Eat New Zealand. Following on from our op-ed on food tourism, we spoke to Rob about what's actually happening in the...
Cheaper food comes with other costs – why cutting GST isn’t the answer
As New Zealand considers the removal of the goods and services tax (GST) from food to reduce costs for low income households, advocates need to consider the impact cheap food has on the environment and whether there are better options to help struggling families,...
‘Too many people, not enough food’ isn’t the cause of hunger and food insecurity
By Gisèle Yasmeen, University of British Columbia Nearly one in three people in the world did not have access to enough food in 2020. That’s an increase of almost 320 million people in one year and it’s expected to get worse with rising food prices and the war...
The Chunk Missing out of Food Tourism Strategy
Co-founder Tash McGill has spent years working and consulting in the tourism sector. She offers some insight into why our food tourism strategy is disintegrated and lagging behind the rest of the world. Agree or disagree? Either way, she's offering to buy you a flight...
The alcohol industry you never knew – and why you should
We’re soaking in it but do we realise just how important the alcohol sector is in New Zealand.? I’ll be honest – I didn’t. Last week the Alcohol Beverages Council published a report by NZIER taking a comprehensive look into the sector – as an employer, tax payer,...
Ultra-processed foods are trashing our health – and the planet
Our world is facing a huge challenge: we need to create enough high-quality, diverse and nutritious food to feed a growing population – and do so within the boundaries of our planet. This means significantly reducing the environmental impact of the global food system....
Farmers back themselves to reduce emissions. Will they though?
Farmers and growers have had their say and it’s looking like they’re opting for a farm-level approach to managing greenhouse gas emissions. The commitment – some 19 years after a carbon tax was successfully lobbied away as a fart tax – will soon be put to the...
How the war in Ukraine will affect food prices
By Alfons Weersink, University of Guelph and Michael von Massow, University of Guelph / Republished from The Conversation Even before the Russian army crossed into Ukraine, food prices had been on the rise for the past year. But the world has seen large jumps...
Ultra-processed foods are trashing our health – and the planet
Kim Anastasiou, Deakin University; Mark Lawrence, Deakin University; Michalis Hadjikakou, Deakin University, and Phillip Baker, Deakin University Our world is facing a huge challenge: we need to create enough high-quality, diverse and nutritious food to feed a...
Now’s the time to fix long-standing hospo industry failings: expert
The hospitality sector must improve its poor employment record if it is to be considered a sustainable industry, says an AUT researcher whose survey of workers found a disturbing record of abuse, illegal pay, high turnover and lack of training. The survey of 400...
The Groundswell protest – the economic numbers disagree
By Mike joy, Lisa Marriott, Simon Chapple Prime minister Jacinda Ardern is due to meet the leaders of last year’s Groundswell protests, who argue that environmental regulation and the “ute tax” have hurt parts of the primary sector and, by extension, the rest of the...
Cruising the blue economy
Aquaculture is booming. Half of the world's seafood comes from aquaculture and this is expected to grow a third again by 2030. New Zealand wants to grow our agriculture industry from today’s 600 million to 1 billion by 2025 and 3 billion by 2035. Trouble is, while...
Who said what about the ComCom grocery report? All the responses in one handy place
The highly anticipated release of the Market Study into the Grocery Sector by the Commerce Commission has met with a flurry of responses - one jubilant, one relieved, several disgusted and the majority only partially satisfied with the outcome. And there’s more to...