A Tiger’s Start, But No Snake’s Tail! | Foodthink’s 2022
For most people, 2022 was a real rollercoaster of highs and lows.
Our colleagues at Foodthink shared the same sentiments. Our work plans shifted from the bold ambitions of 2021—aiming to tackle every challenge head-on—to a state of anxious uncertainty.
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Fortunately, last year’s work still yielded much to celebrate. Thanks to the dedication of our friends and collaborators, Foodthink delivered nearly 100 original articles, over 40 public events, 13 podcast episodes, and a host of other projects that are almost too numerous to count. We would like to extend a special thank you to all of you.
As we begin work for the new year, we invite our readers to join us in looking back at 2022 as recorded by Foodthink. Pick it up, then set it down, and welcome a fresh new year.
Uncertainty
Foodthink 2022
After those past two months, the lockdowns of 2022 already feel like a lifetime ago. Throughout the rolling city closures and restrictions, Foodthink has been documenting the stories of ordinary people and their food during the pandemic: How did Shanghai residents desperately scramble for groceries when confined to their homes? With lockdown looming, what essentials should you stockpile? If supermarkets and online grocers faced supply shortages, where could you turn? What were the best tips for storing food? Could the wild greens sprouting in residential compounds be safely foraged? What do you do if you get trapped in your office? Is it still too late to start growing vegetables from scratch?
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In December last year, Foodthink’s “Pandemic and Food” series came to a formal close, yet the ripple effects of the pandemic continued to spread. This Lunar New Year, many made their way back to hometowns they had long been separated from, witnessed the loss of loved ones, or sat vigil by hospital beds… We will not forget 2022.
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The global food system also faced significant turbulence. With food exports from war-torn Ukraine severely disrupted, the shortage not only threatened grain supplies across developing nations, but its butterfly effect even reached Singapore’s iconic dish, Hainanese chicken rice.
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Resilience
Foodthink 2022
The hardships and anxieties of the past year have prompted us to rethink urban living and our ingrained consumption habits. Is clinging to an ever-expanding yet increasingly uncertain system our only recourse? Can we envision a future that is more sustainable and resilient?
Many place their hopes in top-down solutions: take, for instance, the Dutch government’s agricultural nitrogen reduction plan introduced in June 2022. Yet the plan’s unrealistic targets, coupled with a lack of supporting transition measures, sparked widespread protests among Dutch farmers.
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Is third-party organic certification the answer to food safety and environmental concerns? How, then, should we view the largest fraud case in the history of the US organic sector? Why were regulators unable to detect farmers passing off inferior goods as premium, let alone break down the barriers between producers and consumers?
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Furthermore, farms that can afford organic certification tend to operate on a larger scale. Research shows that, among certified organic farms, the greater the size of the operation, the less likely its managers are to implement ecologically beneficial practices. Large-scale organic farms can, in turn, squeeze out smaller producers, leaving them with little room to survive.
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We are more keen to champion bottom-up transformation. Looking further afield, we draw inspiration from abroad: the UK’s Transition Town of Totnes relies on its local food system to build resilience against uncertainty; writer Wang Bang, based in Britain, engages with grassroots politics through the local food movement; and young Dutch brewers craft distinctive ales to support local ecological smallholders…
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Closer to home, we see action and practice within China: Grandma Kouzi, living self-sufficiently in Evil Man Valley; educated farmers Wenzhenzi and Changjiaoling, based at Lishan in the Beijing suburbs; community greengrocers operated by Beijing Organic Farmers’ Markets; the Tsinghua-Peking Consumer Cooperative, which connects directly with producers; and the Fengnianqing Harvest Festival, a food and agriculture gathering that bridges urban and rural life…
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Technology
Foodthink 2022
Over the past few years, the metaverse has captivated the internet, but do we truly need this digital utopia crafted by technology experts? While technology is widely regarded as the foremost driving force of productivity, can it actually address agriculture’s fundamental challenges?
Can e-commerce, which appears to seamlessly connect small-scale farmers with consumers, truly resolve the market challenges facing agricultural producers? According to research by Professor Feng Xiaojun at China Agricultural University, the technical and financial barriers to entry for agricultural e-commerce are steadily rising. Small-scale farmers have virtually no room for negotiation on these platforms and remain governed by the dynamics of capital and user traffic.
While small-scale farmers who enter the e-commerce space may see increased sales, they often find themselves kept running round in circles by the stringent rules enforced by platform customer service. Meanwhile, the production and distribution hurdles faced by fruit growers grow increasingly overlooked by consumers who prioritise visual appeal and service standards above all else.
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Blockchain, which enjoyed immense popularity a few years ago, was once hailed as the next technological breakthrough for agriculture. Yet, confronted with the hurdles of real-world application and the monopolistic tendencies that the technology can reinforce, one is left to wonder whether agricultural blockchain is little more than empty rhetoric.
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Returning to food itself, the “cutting-edge technology” behind plant-based meat has also become a recent favourite in investment circles. These protein isolates, extracted from legumes and blended with numerous additives to mimic the taste and appearance of meat, are ultimately just another highly processed product. Compared to a genuine plant-based diet, they are certainly less healthy and not necessarily more environmentally friendly. Truly responsible consumption demands a deeper understanding of food and agriculture; we cannot simply be swayed by technological gimmicks.
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The ecological catastrophe dramatised through dinosaur spectacles in *Jurassic World 3* has, in fact, been unfolding repeatedly in the real world. The highly lucrative duo that generates massive profits for seed companies—herbicides and herbicide-resistant GM soybeans—has severely damaged biodiversity.
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Rachel Carson used Silent Spring to remind us that humanity’s attempt to eradicate pests once and for all with pesticides ultimately backfired, leading to technological blowback and the disruption of ecological balance.
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It is time to ask ourselves honestly: will technology ultimately trap humanity in a web of its own making?
Climate Change
Foodthink 2022
The second most intense Dragon Boat rains in the Pearl River basin since 1961, the scorching heat baking the nation, the anomalous drought during the flood season along the Yangtze, the continuous summer and autumn droughts across the south, and the abrupt cold waves… The frequent extreme weather events of 2022 allowed more people to acutely feel the climate disasters wrought by global warming.
Yet we have found that media reporting and public discourse on climate issues tend to centre on food security, while overlooking the perspectives and voices of ecological farmers. How do small-scale eco-farmers perceive climate change? What impacts do the anomalous and extreme weather patterns triggered by climate change have upon them? How are they adapting? What shortfalls and obstacles remain on their path to adaptation in the future?
In order to answer these questions and showcase the ingenuity, practices, and efforts of ecological farmers in responding to climate change, as well as the challenges they face, Foodthink and the Friends of Nature Linglong Project—both long-term advocates for ecological agriculture and climate issues—collaboratively launched the Research on Climate Change and Small-scale Ecological Farmers in 2022, covering the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei and Southern China regions.
Beginning in May, Project Officer Qihua and Linglong Partner Qianyao commenced participatory fieldwork in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. In late July, amidst an unprecedented heatwave, Qihua and colleagues visited 12 ecological farms across Southern China. Balancing a demanding research schedule, they documented the stories of small-scale farmers enduring torrential rain, high-temperature droughts, hail, and snowstorms. Upon concluding the fieldwork, they promptly shared their observations and experiences gathered along the way.
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We would like to extend our particular thanks to Dr Xu Yinlong from the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Dr Xu not only provided invaluable advice for this research initiative, but also led two sharing sessions for Foodthink readers, exploring the impact of climate change on agriculture and how the sector can adapt to a changing climate.
Beyond presenting rigorous scientific findings, Foodthink also hopes that the narratives linking climate change and agriculture will reach a broader, everyday audience. With this in mind, in August, Foodthink partnered with Friends of Nature to host a reading group for The Earth Doesn’t Care: Climate Change and the Ruined Table. Exploring topics such as water resources and crop pests in the context of a shifting climate, we connected with grassroots ecological farmers across China, inviting them to share their firsthand experiences of the climate crisis.
Resilient ecological farmers are also gradually navigating the crisis, piecing together wisdom for adapting to climate change: enhancing soil health, practising crop rotation, upgrading farm infrastructure, and switching crop varieties…
At the UN Climate Change Conference (COP27) and the UN Biodiversity Conference (COP15), Foodthink’s founding editor, Tianle, shared with a global audience the actions and experiences of China’s ecological smallholders in mitigating and adapting to climate change, alongside the challenges they face and the support they need. The accompanying research report, *Climate Change and Ecological Smallholders*, will be officially released in the first half of this year—please stay tuned!
Diversity
Foodthink 2022
A healthy society should not be dominated by a single voice. Healthy agriculture, too, must encompass a diversity of crops, farming systems, and participants.
Through our research and farm visits, we found that crop diversification is a vital strategy for ecological farms adapting to climate change. In a similar vein, when the Tieguanyin market took a downturn, tea farmers in Anxi, Fujian, turned to diversifying their crops to spread the risk.
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Safeguarding agricultural biodiversity at its root depends on the collection and use of heirloom seeds. During the Beijing Harvest Festival, Foodthink brought together partners from the Farmers’ Seed Network and Phase III of the Lianhe Initiative to discuss the stories behind conserving heirloom seeds, offering perspectives from both growers and food enthusiasts. As an everyday urban shopper, you too can do your bit for biodiversity conservation within your means.
A healthy farm should not grow just one crop, nor should a vibrant marketplace be monopolised by a single business model. As the commercial climate and consumer habits shift, and urban regeneration accelerates, is there still a place for traditional food markets? Foodthink authors Pi Dan and Qi Ran, alongside editor Wang Hao, discuss: why we still need our local markets.
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If local markets are destined to fade away, then seize the moment to shop and to document them! Just like Xiaoyan, who grew up around Shanghai’s markets, she captured portrait photographs of more than a dozen stallholders as a tribute to the Aohua Market, which has since been demolished.
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Diversity means recognising no distinction between the so-called advanced and backward, drawing no boundaries between ethnic groups, and offering equal respect to every culture alongside the livelihoods and lifestyles it sustains. In 2022, Foodthink’s gaze turned to China’s inland frontiers: we visited the Jiarong Tibetan villages of Danba County, celebrated as the “Land of a Thousand Watchtowers”, joined beekeepers in the Longnan mountain villages to harvest honey, shared meals and quarters with herders on the Ujimqin Grassland, documented the Lisu villages tradition of crafting meals from locally foraged ingredients, and, tracing the warp and weft of weaving and dyeing, chronicled the shifting rhythms of daily life in the Dong villages of Guizhou.
Last year, we began to step beyond our familiar discourse, seeking greater dialogue and collaboration with the art world. This journey began with an online conversation sparked by the exhibition “The Boundless Sea”, followed by an online discussion inspired by wild vegetables and co-curated with LEAP, alongside a collaborative segment at the Beijing Harvest Festival titled “Artistic Activists in the Vegetable Garden”.
Interns
Foodthink 2022
Since its founding in August 2017, Foodthink has documented the stories of dozens of ecological farmers across the country. Through years of growth, their farms have accumulated a wealth of invaluable experience in farm management, production techniques, sales, and promotion.
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Collating this knowledge for young people considering a return to rural life would help reduce the learning curve and the costs of trial and error. Their involvement would also bring new vitality to the farms, injecting fresh energy into the sustainable food and farming sector.
Consequently, in early 2022, Foodthink launched the inaugural cohort of the ‘Ecological Agriculture Internship Programme’. We selected and matched 18 young people from diverse backgrounds with 12 ecological farms across the country, and they all successfully completed their placements, which ranged from three months to a year.
Following their placements, many opted to extend their stay, take up full-time positions on the farms, or continue exploring careers in ecological agriculture, learning directly from the land and the farmers.
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Those who chose not to remain on the farms nonetheless gained fresh perspectives and renewed strength from the experience, continuing to forge ahead courageously on their own paths.
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The farms that hosted our first cohort of interns have spoken highly of the programme. Most are keen to continue supporting Foodthink’s second intake, hoping to recruit more interns.
If you care about food and are passionate about agriculture-related issues such as the environment, livelihoods, and equity, whilst also exploring further possibilities for your life, you are welcome to join Foodthink’s Second Ecological Farm Internship Programme, which is now open for applications.
On 9 February, we will also be hosting a special sharing session, inviting interns and mentors from the first cohort to reflect on their experiences. We will open a Tencent Meeting room and stream live via the Foodthink Channel. If you would like to learn more about the specifics of the internship programme, please feel free to ask questions online.
Food Talk
Foodthink 2022
Foodthink’s logo is a microphone sprouting from the fields. In 2022, we truly took our microphones on the road, travelling far and wide to gather voices straight from the fields. We launched ‘Food Talk’ across various podcast platforms and released 13 episodes.
By ‘fields’, we mean the actual land and frontline agricultural work. During our research in South China, Guo Rui from Yinlin Ecological Farm shared his decade-long journey back to the countryside with our hosts; we also invited the ‘citrus greening disease expert’, Senior Agricultural Technician Luo Lishuang, to discuss the technical guidance he provides to smallholder farmers and his observations on ecological agriculture.
The countryside represents the authentic rural landscape and those residents who recognise its value. On Food Talk, you’ll hear musician Banong explain why he returned home to embrace a life of “farming with his head down and singing with it raised”; and listen to Jingwen and Zimin from Yinlin Farm, who arrived under different circumstances, on why they chose to stay and become new villagers.
Our fieldwork also connected urban researchers, activists, and everyday people concerned with food and agriculture: the wet market’s anthropologist Pidandan, rural household vegetable plot researcher Fang Ping, Yunnan wild mushroom market regular Junjun, founder of the ‘Kaopu’ (Reliable) Consumer Cooperative for Peking and Tsinghua University families Jin Hailan, and head of the forest kindergarten at Gaia Nature School Liu Lan…… and, of course, ordinary people left anxious about food and personal freedom amid pandemic restrictions.
In 2023, Food Talk’s hosts will continue to travel across the country with microphones in hand, bringing you the sounds of the fields and the land. Guided by food, we will explore the world and learn to see one another more clearly.
We’d love to hear from you on whichever podcast platform you use, or you can add ‘Foodthink Official’ on WeChat (WeChat ID: foodthinkcn) to request an invite to our listeners’ group. Tell us which food and agriculture topics catch your interest, or which guests you’d love to see on the show, and Food Talk might just make it happen!
Bountiful Year Festival
Foodthink 2022
How can the countryside be seen by the city? Can food and farming serve as the bond for a harmonious coexistence between humans and nature? Do I know where the food I eat every day comes from? What kind of life do I want? What can individual action change?
To explore these questions, multiple organisations in Guangdong focused on urban-rural community development and sustainable living jointly launched the Guangdong Harvest Festival in 2017. It keeps small-scale farmers and citizens at its core, prioritising environmental care and urban-rural mutual aid. Foodthink, an active participant in the Guangdong Harvest Festival, also decided to establish the festival in Beijing in 2022.
Having seen the precedent set by our partners in Guangdong, we hoped the Beijing Bountiful Year Festival could likewise become a large-scale carnival centred on sustainable food, farming, and lifestyle themes, bringing together exhibitions, sharing sessions, film screenings, markets, and open mic events. However, venue changes, shifting pandemic policies, lockdown experiences, and contracting COVID-19 quickly brought us back to reality.
Consequently, Foodthink and our co-creation partners shifted online. Towards the end of 2022, we hosted one workshop, two book clubs, and seven sharing sessions, all centred on themes of diversity and sustainable living. We also held an end-of-year market on 15 January, bringing the Bountiful Year Festival to a close with a final in-person gathering.
This was by no means a flawless first attempt, but the Beijing Abundance Festival is a commitment we intend to uphold in the long term. We extend our sincere gratitude to this year’s co-creation partners (in no particular order): Beijing Organic Farmers’ Market, Farmers’ Seed Network, Friends of Nature, Friends of Nature · Gaia Nature School, Wang Jue, Zheng Yuan, Beijing Hongyan Social Work Service Centre, and Toxin-Free Pioneer.
Gathered like fireflies, we need not wait for a torch to light the path. In 2023, we look forward to more organisations and individuals joining us to co-create the Beijing Abundance Festival and drive change together!
Co-learning
Foodthink 2022
In 2022, Foodthink organised more than 40 online events, including sharing sessions and group readings of eight books alongside our readers. The discussions covered a wide range of topics: climate change and agriculture; an overview of regenerative agriculture and practical case studies; the environmental impact of pesticides and herbicides; industrial livestock farming and the antibiotic crisis; the collection and living preservation of heritage seeds; the ‘half-farmer, half-X’ rural lifestyle; fermentation and brewing; dietary patterns and gut health; and food packaging and reducing plastic in takeaway meals…
Our online community brings together participants from events past. Alongside lively discussions, members share dishes from different regions and offer mutual encouragement. When circumstances allow us to meet in person, we also work the land together, cook side by side, and swap seeds and books.
In 2022, opportunities to host in-person events were severely restricted for various reasons. Consequently, Foodthink shifted the majority of its activities online. To make it easier for members to register or simply click to watch, we introduced live streams on WeChat Channels alongside our sessions on Tencent Meeting.
All sessions were recorded and uploaded to Foodthink’s Bilibili and WeChat Channels. If you missed the live broadcast, you are welcome to watch the recordings at your convenience.
If you have taken part in any of our co-learning sessions, please spare a few moments to complete the questionnaire below. Your feedback will help us improve the quality and experience of our future events.
2023 may well be another year marked by uncertainty. Yet we believe that even in the ruins, there is scope for greater dialogue and connection. In the year ahead, Foodthink looks forward to EAT, THINK, ACT alongside you all.
Editor: Ze’en