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Featured Writers

Cat Modlin-Jackson

Reporter & radio producer based in Richmond, Va., the city I love.

Grey Moran

I'm a Staff Writer at Civil Eats and freelance reporter. My work focuses on climate change, the food system, and corporate malfeasance. I live in New Orleans, by way of …

Jeff Burtka

I am a freelance writer based in metro Detroit. I have written for The Guardian, Outside, Nolo, Crain's Detroit Business, Civil Eats, Global Sport Matters, and more. My main areas …

Kait Sweeney

policy wonk. communications strategist. campaign professional.

Liz Susman Karp

Tori Truscheit

Writer in Sacramento, CA

Latest Articles

A Florida Immigration Law Is Turning Farm Towns Into ‘Ghost Towns’

Florida is one of a growing number of states threatening to use E-Verify as a way to intimidate and control farmworkers. As farmers face worker shortages and farm communities lose residents, are GOP lawmakers shooting themselves in the foot?

By Grey Moran
7th February 2024 • Civil Eats

Nighttime Harvests Protect Farmworkers From Extreme Heat, but Bring Other Risks

Farmworkers are laboring in the dark more often due to climate change. Experts say more data, and more protections against new risks are needed.

By Amy Mayer
27th September 2023 • Civil Eats

How Crop Insurance Prevents Some Farmers From Adapting to Climate Change

The Federal Crop Insurance Program helps steer the direction of U.S. agriculture. But advocates and farmers say its policies have often failed to benefit the most climate-adaptive farms—and penalizes farmers for adopting some climate-friendly strategies.

By Grey Moran
20th September 2023 • Civil Eats

A New Podcast Takes on Sugar Subsidies in the Farm Bill

Host Celeste Headlee wants the public to understand how decades-old subsidies for sugar companies benefit billionaires at the expense of the environment, farmworkers, and the nutrition of the nation.

By Amy Mayer
8th August 2023 • Civil Eats

Cheap Imports Leave US Shrimpers Struggling With 'Starvation Wages'

The majority of migrant farmworkers live below the federal poverty line, without easy access to healthy foods or affordable housing. To survive, many in this tight-knit community have found strategies for mutual aid and collaborative resilience.

By Grey Moran
20th June 2023 • Civil Eats

Bringing Oats Back to American Farms

Adding oats to a farm’s rotation can improve soil health and reduce fossil fuels, but the crop has all but disappeared in the U.S. Now, a nascent movement fueled by oat milk’s popularity may help reverse the trend.

By Amy Mayer
12th June 2023 • Civil Eats

Paraquat, the Deadliest Chemical in US Agriculture, Goes on Trial

Amid lawsuits filed by thousands of farmers linking the herbicide to Parkinson’s disease, the EPA is reconsidering its analysis of paraquat’s risks.

By Grey Moran
22nd March 2023 • Civil Eats

A Contested Election Is Fracturing a Farmworkers’ Union

Baldemar Velasquez has presided over the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, the nation’s second-largest farmworker union, for its entire 55-year history. This year, he faced a challenger in a contested election for the first time. Chaos ensued.

By Grey Moran
30th January 2023 • Civil Eats

Inside the Brooklyn Packers’ Vision for a Community-Based Micro Food Hub

The worker-owned, Black-led food cooperative quickly shifted their operation to provide emergency food during the height of the pandemic.

By Grey Moran
11th July 2022 • Civil Eats

Farmers Trial Climate-Friendly Chickpeas in Upstate New York

Only a third of factory farms have permits to discharge waste into water, soil, and air. A new legal effort from environmental groups seeks enforcement of the Clean Water Act.

By Liz Susman Karp
3rd May 2022 • Civil Eats

In the Battle Over the Right to Repair, Open-Source Tractors Offer an Alternative

The cost of specialized farm equipment is one of the biggest barriers for small-scale and beginning farmers. Cooperatives are springing up around the nation to help bridge the gap.

By Grey Moran
27th April 2022 • Civil Eats

As Investors Bet on 'Milk Without Cows,' Questions About Transparency Loom

By
8th March 2022 • Civil Eats

NYC Community Gardeners Might Have New Protection in the Fight Against Development

“I’ve often said, ‘You bulldoze a community garden, you bulldoze a community,’” said Raymond Figueroa, Jr., a Bronx-based community organizer.

By Grey Moran
7th February 2022 • Civil Eats

Beginning Farmers, Farmers of Color Outbid as Farmland Prices Soar

The pandemic-fueled land rush has brought wealthier buyers to rural areas, making land even harder to access—a crisis that has become especially acute in the Northeast.

By Grey Moran
3rd January 2022 • Civil Eats

Our 2021 Food and Farming Holiday Book Gift Guide

We read, reviewed, and recommend more than 40 food and farming books for your gift-giving pleasure.

By Liz Susman Karp
29th November 2021 • Civil Eats

The Resurgence of Waffle Gardens Is Helping Indigenous Farmers Grow Food with Less Water

In the face of climate change and persistent droughts, a growing number of people from Zuni Pueblo in New Mexico and elsewhere are adopting the traditional farming practice.

By Grey Moran
26th October 2021 • Civil Eats

Don Lewis Is Reviving the Grain Economy in New York's Hudson Valley

Only a third of factory farms have permits to discharge waste into water, soil, and air. A new legal effort from environmental groups seeks enforcement of the Clean Water Act.

By Liz Susman Karp
25th October 2021 • Civil Eats

Could Climate Change Put an End to Arizona's Alfalfa Heyday?

As the Colorado River drops to new lows, the future of the water-intensive cattle feed crop in the state—and the dairy industry it makes possible—are in question.

By Grey Moran
15th September 2021 • Civil Eats

As the Climate Emergency Grows, Farmworkers Lack Protection from Deadly Heat

A majority migrant and undocumented workforce, farmworkers are especially vulnerable to extreme heat, not only because of their direct exposure, but also because of a lack of other social and labor protections.

By Grey Moran
14th June 2021 • Civil Eats

As the West Faces a Drought Emergency, Some Ranchers Are Restoring Grasslands to Build Water Reserves

Also in this week’s Field Report, a deeper look at the global fertilizer cartel, and the political battle over SNAP continues.

By Grey Moran
17th May 2021 • Civil Eats

What Will it Take for Farmers to Grow More Organic Cotton?

By Nicole Rasul
15th March 2021 • Civil Eats

As Food Scrap Collection Peaks, NYC Community Compost Sites Face Evictions

Big questions remain about the future of food waste disposal in a city of 8 million that committed to sending zero waste to the landfill by 2030.

By Grey Moran
3rd March 2021 • Civil Eats

Questions Remain about Big Food's Influence on the New Dietary Guidelines

Advocates and experts point to a long-standing pattern of corporate influence on the nation’s ‘go-to source of nutrition advice.’

By Grey Moran
28th January 2021 • Civil Eats

Grassland 2.0 Aims to Replace Soy and Corn Farming with Perennial Pasture in the Upper Midwest

By Nicole Rasul
11th November 2020 • Civil Eats

Get Out the Vote Efforts in Farm Country Are Reaching Young, Latinx, and Rural Voters

“After the caucuses, I feel like there was definitely a consensus that we need to rally together to defeat Donald Trump,” said Jeanina Messerly, a district field director for the Progressive Turnout Project, a PAC working to drive Democratic voter turnout with field offices across the U.S. “So much has …

By Kait Sweeney
27th October 2020 • Civil Eats

Want More New Farmers on the Land? Give Landowners a Tax Break.

By Nicole Rasul
20th August 2020 • Civil Eats

COVID Brought SNAP Users Online. Advocates Say Mega-Retailers Are Selling Them Junk Food

By Nicole Rasul
23rd July 2020 • Civil Eats

The Lake Erie Bill of Rights is Dead. A Voluntary Effort Will Pay Farmers to Reduce Runoff Instead.

By Nicole Rasul
22nd June 2020 • Civil Eats

Rediscovering Detroit’s Roots Through Indigenous Food

On a frigid mid-February Saturday, a small crowd gathers in a silent, snow-covered clearing in the woods. The atmosphere was more reminiscent of a far-off forest in northern Michigan than urban Detroit’s Rouge Park.

By Jeff Burtka
18th June 2020 • Civil Eats

States Are Embracing Extra Funds from Pandemic EBT to Cover Missing School Meals

By Nicole Rasul
4th May 2020 • Civil Eats