What happens on this planet over the next four decades has the potential to fundamentally alter life as we know it. The world population is expected to reach nine billion people by 2050thats nine billion hungry humans in need of food. The challenge of feeding this rapidly growing population has already been made greater by climate change, which will wreak havoc on the way we produce our food. Disruptions to industrial-scale agriculture, along with rising sea levels, will create millions of environmental refugees, fleeing their homes in search of nourishment and safety. We have also lost touch with the soilfew of us grow our own food or even know where it comes fromand we are at the mercy of the multinationals that control the crops with little foresight about the damage their methods are inflicting on the planet. This puts our very future at risk. In Consumed, award-winning writer Sarah Elton walks fields and farms on four continents, investigating not only the potentialand very realthreats to our food, but also telling the stories of those who are working hard to preserve our future. From Bogota to Beijing, Delhi to Rome, Nairobi to Toronto, people from all walks of life are creating an alternative to the industrial food we have grown accustomed to piling into our shopping carts, and in the process giving us hope not for a daunting future but for a future in which we can all sit at the table.Praise for Consumed“An ambitious and optimistic book, that takes on the food sustainability issues with clarity and skill, and warm understanding too. Through the stories and situations of farmers in India, China, France, and North America, as well as through discussions with scientists, we come to understand how local farming can indeed feed the world. A must-have for anyone interested in food.” Naomi Duguid, author of Burma: Rivers of Flavor and co-author of Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet“For anyone who gives thought to what we consume at our meal tables, this book will take you on a heart-warming trip around the world and return you home enlightened, informed and inspired. A winning argument for the sustainable food movement.” Gill Deacon, author of Theres Lead in Your Lipstick and Green for Life“Sarah Elton has written a delectable and entertaining guide to the new food revolution. How will we feed the planet's hungry billions in the decades to come? The failed experiment of more pesticides and plastic foods is not the answer. Elton travels from rural India, to the mountains of France to that most surprising epicenter of modern agriculturedowntown Detroitto weave a hopeful story of the global reconnection with the food that sustains us. A must-read for anyone who eats!” Rick Smith, co-author of Slow Death by Rubber Duck