Stopping the rot: the fight to save fresh food

An American firm has developed an organic coating that extends the shelf-life of fruit and vegetables. Might it save the world?Ten years ago, James Rogers was driving through some of the most productive farmland on the planet, thinking about food. He had recently read an article detailing the challenges of feeding the world's growing population, and as he gazed out over the fertile fields of the Salinas Valley outside Monterey, California, he thought: how is it possible that people go hungry, that people starve, when growing food seems so simple? "You just take these magic beans and..." Rogers, recalling the thought, casts his hand as if tossing seed on the ground. "I realise it's a bit more complicated than that, but, still..."Back then, Rogers was a PhD student in material sciences at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). He wasn't working in anything food-related at all. His PhD research involved creating a kind of paint that, when dried, turned into a solar panel. There was a lab up in Berkeley that had the equipment necessary for his studies, but between the lab and his home in Santa Barbara, he passed the farmland, and the food problem gnawed at him. He wondered if it wasn't merely as simple as he supposed. He began taking classes in environmental economics and natural resources. He learned that, globally, we are indeed producing more than enough food. The problem isn't production, it's what happens next. Continue reading...