Feeding The Future

Two culinary-world luminaries debate the best way to approach sustainable eating.

Chef Dan Barber, co-owner of the Michelin-starred restaurants Blue Hill and Blue Hill at Stone Barns, helped pioneer the farm-to-table movement and continues to advocate for sustainable food and agricultural policies. Tech veteran Kimbal Musk runs the Kitchen, a restaurant group, venture fund, and philanthropic organization that develops teaching gardens within municipal school systems. They talk to food editor and entrepreneur Dana Cowin about their differing views for improving agriculture— and our health.

Let’s start by discussing the problem of industrial food. What are the challenges, and what do you think are the solutions?

KIMBAL MUSK : More than 50 years ago, we created this marketing term: “We have to feed the world.” We ended up taking our farmland and using it for high-calorie, low-nutrition food. We had massive oversupply. It fed high-calorie food especially into our poor. And so we have rampant obesity and diabetes across this country. Twenty-five million acres of land today is used to grow corn ethanol, twice the size of the Central Valley in California. It takes 1 gallon of oil to make 1 gallon of corn ethanol. So it’s neutral at best for the environment, but a total waste of land if you want real food to be grown.