Growing Up Everywhere: The Future of Farming

(Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt from my forthcoming book, 20/20 Foresight: A Futurist Looks Ahead to the Ten Trends That Will Shape the World of 2020, that I am writing with the able assistance of fellow futurist Simon Anderson. This chapter takes a look at the future of agriculture.) On a 7,000 acre farm in [...]

By |2012-02-21T13:18:29-06:00February 21, 2012|Agriculture, Future, Trends|Comments Off on Growing Up Everywhere: The Future of Farming

Tricking Your Taste Buds into the Future

What if we could end childhood diabetes, fight world poverty and engage in a more sustainable form of agriculture just by tricking our taste buds? Sounds farfetched--if not impossible--doesn't it? After watching this insightful TEDx talk by Homaru Canto and Ben Roche, two innovative chefs from Chicago, I think you might have a more open [...]

By |2012-01-24T07:00:35-06:00January 24, 2012|Agriculture, Future|Comments Off on Tricking Your Taste Buds into the Future

Unlearning & the Future of Food

What if we could end childhood diabetes, fight world poverty and engage in a more sustainable form of agriculture just by tricking our taste buds? Sounds farfetched--if not impossible--doesn't it? After watching this insightful TEDx talk by Homaru Canto and Ben Roche, two innovative chefs from Chicago, I think you might have a more open [...]

By |2012-01-23T16:57:20-06:00January 23, 2012|Agriculture, Creativity|Comments Off on Unlearning & the Future of Food

Futurist Jack Uldrich's Predictions for 2012

#1: In an attempt to appease consumer unease over the growing use of facial-recognition technology, a handful of retailers will admit prior to “Black Friday” that they have deployed the technology during the 2012 Holiday season but will claim they are using it only as a “safety tool” to monitor crowds and prevent unruly shopper [...]

By |2011-12-07T23:43:26-06:00December 7, 2011|Agriculture|Comments Off on Futurist Jack Uldrich's Predictions for 2012

A Perennial Idea About the Future of Farming

I'm in Guelph, Ontario today to deliver a keynote on innovation to the Agricultural Adaptation Council. One of the ideas I intend to put on their radar screen is that of perennial crops. Before the invention of agriculture all crops were perennial. With the advent of modern farming, annual crops become the norm. The transition [...]

By |2011-12-01T12:38:55-06:00December 1, 2011|Agriculture, Future|Comments Off on A Perennial Idea About the Future of Farming

Farming the Future for Insights

As I was preparing my keynote presentation for the AgGateway 2011 Annual Conference (which I'll deliver tomorrow in Las Vegas), it occurred to me that 100 years ago (when the population of the United States was roughly 160 million), 50 percent of all Americans were involved with agriculture--meaning 80 million people. Today, there are an [...]

By |2011-11-08T14:28:24-06:00November 8, 2011|Agriculture|Comments Off on Farming the Future for Insights

The Future of Biofuels

"The scope of what you can do is expanding as the cost of sequencing is dropping like a rock." The above quotation is from Andrew Paterson who led the sorghum sequencing project. Sorghum might not sound all that exciting but it is the number two biofuel crop in America after corn. If sorghum can be genetically manipulated [...]

By |2011-11-03T05:00:57-05:00November 3, 2011|Agriculture, Energy|Comments Off on The Future of Biofuels

Sustainability & the Future

I'm in Winnipeg, Manitoba today to deliver the opening keynote at BioFibe 2011. One of the more significant trends I'll be discussing is synthetic biology. To better appreciate the field's vast potential, consider this recent quote from the October 17, 2011 Wall Street Journal article, A Faster Path to Biofuels: "The technology has the exciting [...]

By |2011-10-24T00:05:36-05:00October 24, 2011|Agriculture, Energy|Comments Off on Sustainability & the Future
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