Three steps to a slimmer footprint

Growing crops is one of the principal ways that we alter the planet. Our global food system is a major driver of climate change, biodiversity loss, depletion of freshwater resources, and nutrient pollution. A recent report has looked at our options for limiting these impacts while at the same time ensuring that we can feed ourselves nutritious diets. Predictably, the authors of the report don't find a simple solution or a single magic bullet. But they outline some straightforward approaches that we can start trying. These include shifting diets towards healthier and less impactful mixes of food, improving farm practices partly through better technology, and by reducing food waste.  Check out the report here:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0594-0

Oh, its about to get real

That's the basic conclusion from the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). If we want to keep global warming to 1.5 Celsius above per-industrial levels (a goal set by the Paris Agreement in 2016) we will need to cut our emissions in half before 2030 and go carbon neutral by 2050. The report then lays out some of the stark consequences of not doing that such as communities and even some entire nations drowned by rising sea level, food shortages caused by prolonged droughts, and more frequent or intense natural disasters such as tropical storms and fires. Given what little we have so far done to avert disaster, even many optimistic people see those warnings as a fait accompli at this point. It still doesn't have to be. But perhaps more pragmatically, we need to act now to prevent things from getting even worse.

Read the report here: http://www.ipcc.ch/report/sr15/