What's For Dinner?

Ernesto Mendez is a University of Vermont professor whose specialty is Agroecology and Rural Livelihoods. Imagine undergraduates, faculty and graduate students, Vermont farmers, researchers, Latin American coffee growers, and agricultural extension agents all collaborating in a loose network of work and study. They learn how ecosystems where food is grown can produce food without compromising water, air and soil quality. Imagine this happening in classrooms and on farms where they apply on-the-ground farming knowledge plus environmental studies, soil science, anthropology, sociology, ecology, ecological economics, gender and food systems studies. Their mutual work produces results to help farmers adapt to climate change and to make the food system more sustainable. Ernesto describes a real network like this, which is as productive, challenging and exciting as it sounds.