For the first time in human history, there is food in abundance throughout the world. More people than ever before are now freed of the struggle for daily survival, yet few of us are aware of how food lands on our plates. Behind every meal you eat, there is a story. Hamburgers in Paradise explains how. In this wise and passionate book, Louise Fresco takes readers on an enticing cultural journey to show how science has enabled us to overcome past scarcities--and why we have every reason to be optimistic about the future. Using hamburgers in the Garden of Eden as a metaphor for the confusion surrounding food today, she looks at everything from the dominance of supermarkets and the decrease of biodiversity to organic foods and GMOs. She casts doubt on many popular claims about sustainability, and takes issue with naive rejections of globalization and the idealization of "true and honest" food. Fresco explores topics such as agriculture in human history, poverty and development, and surplus and obesity. She provides insightful discussions of basic foods such as bread, fish, and meat, and intertwines them with social topics like slow food and other gastronomy movements, the fear of technology and risk, food and climate change, the agricultural landscape, urban food systems, and food in art. The culmination of decades of research, Hamburgers in Paradise provides valuable insights into how our food is produced, how it is consumed, and how we can use the lessons of the past to design food systems to feed all humankind in the future.

About the Author
Louise O. Fresco is president of Wageningen University and Research Centre in the Netherlands. The author of several books, she is a member of the Council of Advisors for the World Food Prize and has worked extensively in developing countries for many years. She lives in Amsterdam.

Reviews
Winner of a 2017 Gourmand World Cookbook Award, National Winner in "Sustainable, for the Public" "[A] fine [book]; the author aims to engage the readers in issues that are crucial to our future existence and well-being, and show us how we can apply them in concrete and meaningful ways."--Amy Bentley, Times Literary Supplement "In Hamburgers in Paradise, Ms. Fresco offers a thought-provoking, encyclopedic analysis of contemporary food issues... Her international perspective is refreshing, her explanations clear and non-technical, and her refusal to endorse easy answers in favor of weighing the costs and benefits of different options a welcome change from the succession of simplistic ideas often found in the media... Hamburgers in Paradise could not come at a more opportune moment."--Rachel Laudan, Wall Street Journal "A pro-capitalist, pro-globalization, pro-technology food book, or so it seems. I am eager to spend more time with this one."--Tyler Cowen, Marginal Revolution "A painstaking study."--Francis Wilson, The Telegraph "In this painstaking study, Fresco has piled her plate high."--New Zealand Herald "A gorgeously produced and fascinating book."--Diane Coyle, The Enlightened Economist "A history of the many foods we eat, the state of global agriculture and a very optimistic view of sustainability in spite of the challenges facing humanity in the near future."--John Farrell, Forbes.com "The abiding and remarkable lingering taste of the book is optimism. This isn't the anticipated rant about food, retail, petrochemical industries, GM Farming, climate change, and every political hot potato, but an enjoyable collection of stories, recollections (and statistics) with an ultimately uplifting tone."--David Haslam, British Journal of General Practice



Book Information
ISBN 9780691163871
Author Louise O. Fresco
Format Hardback
Page Count 560
Imprint Princeton University Press
Publisher Princeton University Press
Weight(grams) 936g