Whether you're eating preservative-enhanced cookies or organically-grown carrot sticks,
food is a source of pleasure and anxiety, a lucrative market for big business and an indicator
of social and political environments. While people in the West may suffer socially and physically
from consuming too much food, for most of human history and for a fifth of the world today, a lack of
food has been the main worry. What will our children and grandchildren be eating in 2050?
Generations spoke with Warren Belasco, American studies professor and expert on the
historical, social and cultural meanings of food.
Will there be enough food?
WB: Historians and food scholars debate over three possible scenarios when it comes to our food
supply. In scenario one, the richest fifth of the world will eat well, mainly animal products and
biotechnically-engineered convenience food; however, a third of the world will have very little food,
this will be in developing countries facing population explosions. Scenario two predicts that as a
result of a natural catastrophe or human wisdom, to return to a more traditional appreciation of
limits, the world will go back to subsistence living. Scenario three is that, through the wonders of
science and capitalism, there will be enough food for everyone.
What will people eat and what will it taste like? Where will the food come from?
WB: In scenario two, people will eat a healthy peasant diet of beans and rice. Food will come from
localized, sustainable agriculture and it will be at the center of the community.
For scenarios one and three, food will be produced by highly industrialized farms and processing
will be even more invisible to the consumer than it is today. Food in the future will have the same
texture and color as food we eat today and similar tastes. People will be even busier and feel like
they don't have time to cook.
What will eating habits reveal about human cultures and lifestyles?
WB: From an historical perspective, we know that we cannot predict how things will change.
Usually, when we think about the future, we think in extrapolations of current trends. Fifty years
ago, no one would have guessed that everyone would have computers on their desk or in their pocket
and people thought we'd be meals in a pill.
I tell my students that if you want to be truly radical, learn to cook. Everybody else wants to do
it for you.
