The researchers, representing interdisciplinary and international collaborations, suggest that conventional agricultural research has skewed too heavily in support of staple crops including rice, wheat, and maize. They argue that this approach has overlooked factors of nutrition, climate resilience, and cultural relevance.

A “Crops that Nourish” approach shifts the focus on commercial crops to crops that “promote the soil fertility to nutrition pipeline,” Kate Schneider Lecy, Assistant Professor at Arizona State University’s School of Sustainability tells Food Tank.

The researchers frame traditional yet underutilized crops as opportunity crops, uplifting their health and environmental potential. Amaranth, for example, is rich in protein, fiber, and iron, and generally resilient to climate variations, which ultimately benefits neighboring plants and habitats.

To inform more holistic farming decisions, the article calls for transdisciplinary collaboration between areas of expertise. This means incorporating the perspectives of agricultural researchers, nutrition scientists, farmers, and the local communities who consume or utilize the crops. To foster stakeholder engagement along the value chain, from growers to chefs, authors emphasize the value of Participatory Action Research (PAR), which encourages collaboration on everything from seed breeding to market development.

“This is one of our key themes,” Sieglinde Snapp, co-author of the article and Program Director at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, tells Food Tank. “It requires engagement with farmers and farming communities to ensure that modern crop development is oriented towards goals of families, such as nutrition for their children.”

On-farm experimentation, in order to test how a new crop will behave and interact with its surroundings (such as providing soil fertility), is a key part of PAR. And in semi-arid parts of West Africa, researchers are seeing the results: collaboration between seed breeders and small-scale farmers to develop new seed varieties have brought about “markedly increased adoption of millet and sorghum varieties,” says Snapp.

But market demand remains one of the greatest challenges to scaling opportunities crops, Lecy tells Food Tank. She says that if more eaters are interested in eating — and purchasing — these foods, it will incentivize farmers to grow them. The lack of infrastructure to produce and sell at scale is another hurdle. According to Lecy, it is often prohibitively expensive without the help of private sector funding.

Millet and sorghum are two opportunity crops traditionally consumed in African diets and highlighted in the paper. But they tend to be traded in small-scale markets and are not currently sold at scale in sub-Saharan Africa, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization.

“It’s partly an exercise in rebranding,” Lecy tells Food Tank, noting that these crops should be presented as “aspirational” for consumers. “How do we make these healthier, more environmentally [beneficial], more prosocial decisions, the cool things to choose?”

The researchers also urge the importance of leveraging policy instruments to support farmers who grow crops that nourish. Subsidies and federally funded crop insurance for farmers need to be realigned “to favor a diverse set of nutrient dense, climate-adapted, resilient crops” Lecy says.

The article, fundamentally, calls for systemic, locally driven transformation of African food systems that requires collaboration between farmers and researchers, investments in sustained research and development, and supportive government policy.

“We should be prioritizing crops that become foods that are nutrient dense so that people start eating diverse, nutrient-dense diets and send market signals back that prioritize these resilient farming practices,” Lecy tells Food Tank.

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

Photo courtesy of Leeshalom, Creative Commons

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DC Central Kitchen (DCCK), a nonprofit combating hunger and poverty, operates Healthy Corners to deliver fresh and affordable produce to corner stores in D.C.’s low access communities. When the organization decided to help stores expand their offerings, they felt that Stanton Supermarket was best fit for the project.

“Their consistent participation, their vision for creating increased access to produce in their community…and their proximity to residential areas, schools, and public transportation,” made Stanton a top candidate, Yael Reichler, the Director of Healthy Corners, tells Food Tank.

The new department is “an investment in our community’s health,” store owner Yonas Haile tells Food Tank. Haile says the expansion responds to a need for more “visible and convenient” healthy food options in the neighborhood.

Stanton Supermarket is situated within a neighborhood of Washington D.C.’s Ward 8 community, an area home to more than 85,000 residents. For this population—81 percent of whom are Black—there is only one full-service grocery store, according to DC Hunger Solutions’ 2024 Report. Comparatively, on the opposite side of the District is Ward 3, a predominantly White neighborhood with a smaller population size but almost double the income average, and 15 full service grocery stores.

LaMonika Jones, Director of DC Hunger Solutions—an initiative of FRAC—cautions against calling Ward 8 a food desert. “A food desert is a naturally occurring part of our ecosystem,” Jones notes, preferring the term food apartheid, which contextualizes the lack of fresh food in low-income neighborhoods as deliberate, discriminatory policy decisions. “We want to speak to the reason and the cause of the ongoing disinvestment.”

Jones believes that addressing food apartheid is foundational to the Healthy Corners program. Stanton Supermarket is the first of the 56 participating corner stores in the program to expand its infrastructure at this scale. They have grown from one open-air fridge to an additional five full-sized refrigerators, two freezers, and robust shelving – all dedicated to produce. Roughly 30 percent is sourced from local farms.

Jones says the Stanton Supermarket model supports a “community nutrition approach,” enabling customers to meet all their food needs in one place instead of shopping for different types of products, using different benefits, at multiple locations.

Stanton Supermarket accepts both the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). They also offer a SNAP Match program—funded by the USDA and run by Healthy Corners—that allows SNAP shoppers to earn US$5 coupons toward more produce when they buy just one piece. Reichler hopes the expanded produce offerings will help eaters better maximize the SNAP Match program, at a time when it is most needed.

Following the end of pandemic-era emergency allotments and a temporary local benefit in 2024, the minimum monthly SNAP allotment for D.C. households has dropped to US$24. And new research from the Urban Institute projects that cuts to SNAP in the reconciliation bill could cost families about 40 meals per month, on average.

A policy brief from the National WIC Association also warns that the Bill may create higher barriers for women with SNAP and Medicaid to maintain eligibility for WIC benefits.

“With food access and benefit challenges increasing, the Stanton Supermarket produce department provides a consistent and reliable place for the community to purchase quality fresh and frozen fruits and vegetables,” Reichler tells Food Tank.

Choice is also important, Jones says, stating that clients consistently ask for a variety of fresh produce, greater access, and high quality.

And Reichler says Stanton is responding to these demands—that’s why it’s a success. One neighbor “felt like we had provided a dignified display, and she proceeded to call her family member to give her a virtual tour of the new offerings,” Reichler recalls, noting that customers frequently report that stores’ investment in their community informs their choice of where to shop.

“Listen to your customers…expanding produce isn’t just good business,” Haile tells Food Tank, “It builds trust and strengthens community relationships.”

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

Photo courtesy of D.C. Central Kitchen

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1. All Consuming: Why We Eat The Way We Eat Now by Ruby Tandoh

All Consuming is a cultural history of food, from the first television cooking show to the first TikTok food critic. Ruby Tandoh, author of Cook As You Are, explores the sociopolitical factors, such as social media and Michelin stars, that have reshaped our society’s culinary literacy. All Consuming takes a critical and curious look at the tastemakers that influence our consumption patterns and our relationship to food.

2. Agroecology in Practice by Jeffrey W. Bentley and Paul van Mele

Agroecology in Practice is a field guide for farmers, agriculture professionals, policymakers, and environmentalists. Researchers and agricultural scientists Jeffrey W. Bentley and Paul van Mele share tips, tools, and innovative examples from across the globe for implementing agroecological practices and regenerating farmland.

3. Barn Gothic: Three Generations and the Death of the Family Dairy Farm by Ryan Dennis

In Barn Gothic, third generation dairy farmer Ryan Dennis shares about growing up milking calves and watching his father and grandfather struggle to keep their dairy farm alive in a changing world. As corporate corruption rendered 40,000 dairy farms obsolete between 2003 and 2020, Dennis draws on personal narrative and poignant business insights in this story about fighting to preserve agricultural life.

4. Care and Feeding: A Memoir by Laurie Woolever

Care and Feeding is a behind the scenes look at the male-dominated field of restaurant work and food publications, told by Laurie Woolever’s wry candor. Woolever recounts the adventures and misadventures of being a woman in the food industry and in the world at large, reckoning with her own purpose-givers of care and feeding.

5. Dirtbag Billionaire: How Yvon Chouinard Built Patagonia, Made a Fortune, and Gave it All Away by David Gelles 

New York Times reporter and bestselling author David Gelles tells the story of a “dirtbag” in the truest sense: a legendary rock climber who founded the global brand Patagonia, became a billionaire, and committed all profits back to environmental and climate resiliency efforts. Gelles recounts Patagonia Founder Yvon Chouinard’s story of building and managing the brand, diving into the contradictions of creating a mission-driven business in a capitalist society. 

6. Dirty Kitchen: A Memoir of Food and Family by Jill Damatac

Jill Damatac writes a love letter to food as the ultimate comfort in her memoir Dirty Kitchen, a story about her life as an undocumented Filipino immigrant in America for twenty-two years. Damatac recalls cooking her way through her native Philippines, her time studying in the U.K., and her return to the United States with a new perspective and sense of self. Dirty Kitchen shows how food can be the answer to questions of identity, tradition, and belonging in spite of colonial trauma.

7. Food Fight: From Plunder and Profit to People and Planet by Stuart Gillespie

 In Food Fight, Stuart Gillespie explains how the global food system has become the cause of severe public health and planetary crises. With careful analysis, Gillespie shows that colonialism and capitalism affect how and what we eat–and offers a hopeful look at the future of food justice and consumption.

8. Foreign Fruit: A Personal History of the Orange by Katie Goh

In Foreign Fruit, Katie Goh traces the history of the orange alongside her own heritage from east to west to east. In pursuit of investigating the orange, Goh describes growing up queer in a Chinese-Malaysian-Irish household and a homecoming to Malaysia, where she begins to unpeel the layers of her own identity and personhood as well.

9. Formulating Development: How Nestlé Shaped the Aid Industry by Lola Wilhelm

In Formulating Development, author Lola Wilhelm examines how large food corporations have shaped the global food aid industry. Drawing from Nestlé’s historical archives and the records of humanitarian aid agencies, Wilhelm considers the complicated relationships between the food industry’s biggest companies, human health, and agricultural advancement.

10. From Scratch: Adventures in Harvesting, Hunting, Fishing, and Foraging on a Fragile Planet by David Moscow and Jon Moscow

Creator and star of the show From Scratch, David Moscow, takes readers along for a culinary travelogue in his new book. Moscow explores the inside of food ecosystems in over 20 countries, as he talks to hunters, fishers, foragers and many more people along the food supply chain to investigate – sometimes literally – how the sausage is made. From Scratch will show just how interconnected the environment, culture, and community is through food.

11. Gathered: On Foraging, Feasting, and the Seasonal Life by Gabrielle Cerberville

In the upcoming illustrated field guide Gathered, Gabrielle Cerberville, known for her viral presence online as “The Chaotic Forager,” takes readers along on a foraging adventure that will teach them how to find, identify, harvest, and prepare wild food. Structured by seasonality, Gathered is a case for re-wilding our diets and learning to eat in accordance with the natural world.

12. Ginseng Roots: A Memoir by Craig Thompson

Craig Thompson follows up his 2003 autobiography Blankets with a new graphic memoir about growing up as a child laborer in the Wisconsin ginseng farming industry. In Ginseng Roots, Thompson chronicles the 300-year-old global ginseng trade and the individuals who make it up, from ancient Chinese ginseng hunters to migrant farmers in the American Midwest. Ginseng Roots is a reflection on a lost childhood, class divide, industrial agriculture, and finding a sense of home. 

13. Mushroom Day: A Story of 24 Hours and 24 Fungal Lives by Alison Pouliot

In Mushroom Day, ecologist Alison Pouliot brings readers along for an hour in the life of 24 different fungi species. At dusk, the bioluminescent ghost fungus whispers the secrets of the dark forest, while at dawn the porcino mushrooms prepare for the Italian foragers’ arrival. Pouliot takes readers underground into the unique fungal world and their fascinating relationship to plants, lands, and people through vivid prose and evocative illustrations from artist Stuart Patience.

14. My (Half) Latinx Kitchen: An Unforgettable Multicultural Culinary Journey, Spice up Your Cooking Game by Kiera Wright-Ruiz

Part cookbook, part journey of self-discovery, My (Half) Latinx Kitchen is Kiera Wright-Ruiz’s celebration of the flavors that make up her identity. From South America to Asia to the United States, the recipes and heartfelt essays in this book represent the integration of traditions from a first generation voice.

15. Reaping What She Sows: How Women are Rebuilding a Broken Food System by Nancy Matsumoto

In Reaping What She Sows, James Beard Award winner Nancy Matsumoto poses the ultimate question “how should we eat?” in a time when grocery prices are high and supermarkets are short on products. The answer: relying on our own communities. Matsumoto highlights the women trailblazers who are saving and rebuilding local and regional food systems, from a Black women-led rice cooperative to indigenous kelp hatchery owners.

16. Recipes from the American South by Michael Twitty

From critically acclaimed chef, author, and cultural historian Michael Twitty comes the new cookbook, Recipes from the American South. Recipes will take readers from Louisiana to the Chesapeake Bay, highlighting more than 260 of the region’s most iconic dishes. Twitty lends his well-researched and lyrical storytelling to complementary essays that explore the cultural influences that impact Southern cuisine.

17. Saturdays at Harlem Grown: How One Big Idea Transformed a Neighborhood by Tony Hillery, illustrated by Jessie Hartland

Tony Hillery, founder and director of the nonprofit Harlem Grown, adds a new book to his nonfiction picture book series about the real-life urban garden in Harlem teaching children how to grow their own food. Saturdays at Harlem Grown tells the story of a teacher, a student, and the community they grew from their garden seeds. 

18. Sea Change: Unlikely Allies and a Success Story of Oceanic Proportions by Amanda Leland and James Workman

Sea Change is a hopeful vote of confidence for revolutionizing the fishing industry. Amanda  Leland and James Workman share the stories of the individuals fighting against overfishing and the quick band-aid fixes to the boom and bust fishing economy. And throughout the pages, they demonstrate that leaning on unlikely partnerships can lead to surprising and sustainable solutions.

19. Strong Roots: A Memoir of Food, Family, and Ukraine by Olia Hercules

From chef and and co-founder of the #CookforUkraine movement Oli Hercules comes a sweeping memoir of life, family, and food in Ukraine from Soviet rule to Russian invasion. Making it her mission to preserve family recipes and stories that connect her family to the land, Hercules’ memoir is a documentation and declaration of Ukrainian identity and resilience.

20. The Accidental Seed Heroes: Growing a Delicious Food Future for All of Us by Adam Alexander

 The Accidental Seed Heroes celebrates the tiny seeds at the center of our worldwide food system, combining lessons on traditional seed varieties with new sustainable plant science. Building on his past book, The Seed Detective, Alexander argues that protecting traditional seeds goes hand in hand with creating innovative new produce that can feed humanity and protect the planet.

21. The Last Supper: How to Overcome the Coming Food Crisis by Sam Kass

Senior food policy advisor to the Obama administration Sam Kass shares what he has learned about investing in accessible and effective food policy in his new book The Last Supper. Kass breaks down how to maximize nutrition while minimizing environmental damage and protecting against climate change through updates in culture, legislation, business, and technology.

22. The Light Between Apple Trees: Rediscovering the Wild Through a Beloved American Fruit by Priyanka Kumar

The Light Between Apples gives a glimpse into the rich history of the 16,000 apple varieties that once existed in America – only one fifth of those now remain. Kumar traces the story of the apple from its roots in Kazakhstan to its home in Spanish orchards in the Southwest, and blends childhood memories with science to paint a vivid picture of how at its core, an apple can rewild our relationship with nature.

23. Turtle Island: Foods and Traditions of the Indigenous Peoples of North America by Sean Sherman (forthcoming November 2025)

Sean Sherman, also known as the Sioux-Chef, is a three-time James Beard Award winner and a leading figure in the Indigenous food movement. In his new book Turtle Island, Sherman curates more than 100 ancestral and modern recipes from Indigenous peoples across North America, as well as deep narrative histories of how Native food pathways can teach us to connect with our natural world.

24. What if Soil Microbes Mattered?: Our Health Depends on Them by Leo Horrigan

 On behalf of the Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future, Leo Horrigan examines the potential for alternatives to conventional chemical farming. What if Soil Microbes Mattered? looks at how these organisms can restore the biodiversity of soil that has been damaged by chemical applications. Through this exploration, the book — available as a PDF — presents regenerative farming methods that pose the potential for rebuilding healthy soil to better nourish our land and ourselves.

25. What to Eat Now: The Indispensable Guide to Good Food, How to Find It, and Why It Matters by Marion Nestle (forthcoming November 2025)

Twenty years after her trailblazing What to Eat, Marion Nestle is asking the same question in a radically changed food environment in her new book. With over 30,000 products in a typical American supermarket and a rapidly changing news cycle, choosing what to eat can often be a daunting task. In What to Eat Now, Nestle cuts through the noise and establishes clear pathways for eating simply, sustainably, and ethically. 

26. Will Work for Food: Labor across the Food Chain by Laura-Anne Minkoff-Zern and Teresa M. Mares

Will Work For Food is an argument for centering fair labor practices in popular discourse about sustainable food and agriculture systems. Authors Laura-Anne Minkoff-Zern and Teresa M. Mares combine thorough labor justice research and anecdotes from laborers across the food chain to outline action steps that can help us build systems that are better for workers and eaters alike.

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

The post Food Tank’s Fall Reads for Food, Farming, and Our Future appeared first on Food Tank.