The Earth is on the brink of breaching the 1.5°C warming threshold. Coral bleaching has affected 84% of reefs worldwide, marking the largest and most severe bleaching event on record. As Arctic permafrost thaws, it threatens to accelerate the warming process further. We are now triggering the first climate…
I. Women’s Lives Standing at sixty and looking back on my thirties, the distance feels immense, as though I am gazing into another life altogether. Back in the 1990s, during my thirties, the cultural landscape was awash with end-of-the-century prophecies and apocalyptic fiction. Whether in novels or films, the central…
From coordinated crackdowns on ghost kitchens to crops irrigated with “red groundwater,” food and agriculture issues tend to only briefly capture public attention when a safety crisis breaks. Should our focus remain fixated on these isolated incidents, many deeper-rooted problems will continue to be overlooked. Against this backdrop, Foodthink seeks…
Foodthink Says In January this year, a Beijing resident ordered fresh lilies via Hema, but mistakenly received toxic narcissus bulbs instead, leading to the hospitalisation of their 71-year-old mother and 12-year-old son after they consumed them. Addressing the mix-up, Hema explained that during the picking process, a packer had mistakenly…
Although we frequently talk about being “trapped in the algorithm,” it hardly slows algorithms from embedding themselves ever more deeply into daily life. But do internet creators, delivery couriers, e-commerce hosts, media professionals, and ride-hailing drivers—those who work with algorithms on a daily basis—truly lack their own perceptions and understanding…
Grain Rain ( guyu 谷雨 ) has arrived; the showers nurture the fields as the countryside enters the busiest and most vibrant season of the year. After a fortnight of quietude, Foodthink is also taking this solar term as a moment to begin anew. Riding on the season’s rains, we…
I. Farm Machinery Memories of the Post-2000s Generation As far back as I can remember, my family has been farming, cultivating mainly wheat and rice. During school holidays, I used to tail the harvester with my friends, picking up stray rice ears trailing behind it. Harvesters were scarce back then;…
I grew up as a girl who spent her childhood wandering through wet markets. In my day job, I’m an office worker tied to a cubicle, but when the Lunar New Year rolls around, I step in as the “second-in-command” at a market grocer’s stall.What sort of place is a…
Friends were divided on whether Guan Qi was an introvert or an extrovert. Several people had asked him directly, only to receive a different answer each time. After he passed away, as we gathered together, we realised this was a truth that could never be pinned down. Whenever I recall…
On 4 April last year, Foodthink published a “collection of deleted articles”. Since then, each time a piece was taken down, the team would console themselves with an inside joke: “We’ve already got another ‘404ed 404’ for next year.” But the 404s over the past two years aren’t entirely the…
