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Hello, everybody.
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I am here to welcome you
to the Last Supper.
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This menu has been put together
with ingredients
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that experts and models predict
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will not be around
for our kids and our grandkids.
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And you'll see that it's many
of the foods that we that we hold dear.
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Now I started off my career as a chef
and then into policy
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and now working
on technology and innovation,
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trying to build some
of the solutions for the future.
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I first came up
with this menu idea in 2015,
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around COP21 in Paris.
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And the point of this menu
is not to depress you.
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(Laughter)
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It's not to, you know, make you feel bad.
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It's to really talk about what's at stake
when we say the words climate change.
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What do the words
climate change actually mean?
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What does two degrees' warming
actually mean?
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I'm from Chicago,
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like, two degrees' warming,
that sounds good.
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I'm like, "Let's warm it up
a little bit, what about five?"
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And I think we've really failed
to connect what's truly at stake
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when we talk about the issues
that we've been discussing today.
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So let's get into it.
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Let's start with the hors d'oeuvres,
those appetizers.
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Let's turn to fruit.
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Turns out that trees
are really having a tough time.
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And this includes nuts and stone fruit,
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like pistachios and almonds or peaches.
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Last year, we lost 95 percent
of the Georgia peach crop.
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95 percent.
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And when you start to look at the models,
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and how our environment
is changing in our lifetimes,
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I don't believe we'll be growing
peaches in Georgia at all.
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Let's talk about the wheat in your bread
or the rice in your salad,
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or the chickpeas in one of the dishes --
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some of the core commodities,
the core staples that feed the world.
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But in the United States,
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the models show that about
for every one degree of warming,
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we'll lose about 7.5 percent yield.
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We'll decline about 7.5 percent,
year over year.
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That's only part of the story.
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The other challenge is right now,
on a global basis,
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15 percent of the world's wheat
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is produced in persistent
drought conditions.
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But if and when we hit that two degrees,
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60 percent will be produced
in persistent drought conditions.
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So not only are we going to see
a precipitous decline of yields over time,
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we're going to see
much more frequent disruptions
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and complete collapses of harvest
in certain regions.
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It is impossible to comprehend
the economic upheaval
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as we start to see
these core commodities decline,
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the food insecurity and malnutrition
that will result of this,
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and the political instability of forced
migration and conflict over resource
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as these core foods
that feed most of the world
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start to decline because of climate.
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So let's go to your main course,
let's go to salmon.
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Salmon are also having
a really tough time.
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We all know their epic journeys
up rivers to spawn.
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And those rivers are not only warming
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but we're starting to see reduced flows
into them because of reduced snowpack.
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And by about 2050,
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the models show that we will lose
about half of that flow into those rivers
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because of reduced snowpack,
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making that journey for those fry
back to the ocean nearly impossible.
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But there's also massive heat waves
that are flowing through our oceans now.
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Those heat waves lower the oxygen levels
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and make the environment really unsuitable
for many of these life-forms.
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This past year, just a few weeks ago,
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California announced it had closed
the entire commercial fishing
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for the whole state, the whole coast,
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because, essentially,
there weren't any fish to fish.
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This is not some far-out future challenge.
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Now I wish I could tell you, you know,
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you're still going to have your dessert
and everything is fine,
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but I'm sorry, I have to come
for your chocolate, too.
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And in some ways,
chocolate is faring the worst.
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You've probably never had
a bite of chocolate
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that wasn't grown within
about 10 degrees of the equator
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by smallholder farmers.
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And there is not a single model that shows
that, if and when we hit two degrees,
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that any of that region will be suitable
for chocolate production.
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It will be too dry and too hot.
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That means those trees
are going to have to walk and move.
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They're not very good at that.
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And the communities that that will affect
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are ones that do not have the resources
to weather storms of that nature.
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The economic and social upheaval
that will come from those kind of changes
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is profound.
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And again, this year, not in 2040 or 2050,
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chocolate prices are up by 50 percent,
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because those production ecosystems
have been hammered by drought
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and extreme weather.
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50 percent, this year.
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I’m going to give you one more.
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And this is where, like,
I just don't even know what to do.
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I'm ready to do anything
to solve the problem.
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Raise your hand if you’ve had
a cup of coffee today or a cup of tea.
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Oh, yeah. I'm sorry, I know.
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Let's say, how many of you had two cups?
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Three?
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Yeah, four?
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Alright, guys, we should talk,
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because I'm a little worried about you.
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(Laughter)
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Even for me, and I'm a real coffee person,
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that's a little extreme.
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I'm not going to ask five, because then --
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Yeah, exactly.
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I could see it in your face, sir.
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(Laughs)
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So, yeah, coffee too.
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The IDB predicts that,
just similar to wine,
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if and when we hit two degrees,
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about half of the regions
that are currently growing coffee
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will no longer be suitable
for coffee production.
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About 75 of the 124
wild varieties of coffee
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are on the verge of extinction right now,
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and that's really a problem,
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because much of the genetic
material that we will need
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to try to produce hybrid varieties
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that could thrive in much more
volatile climate
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are going to be lost.
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But the point here is not to depress you
or to scare you, it's not.
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No, it's not.
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It's to try to make an emotional
connection in a way that only food can,
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to understand really what's at stake
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when we're having these conversations.
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And I believe what's at stake
is, fundamentally, our way of life
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on planet Earth.
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It's our identities,
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both as individuals
and as communities and cultures.
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It’s the vibrancy
of our country and of the world.
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And fundamentally, as a father
of two young boys aged six and five,
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Cy and Rafa,
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it is fundamentally our ability
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to pass to the next generation
a better life than we were given,
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a life that is as rich and delicious
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as the one we've been
lucky enough to have.
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That is truly at stake now.
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The good news is,
on our plates really does hold
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some of the biggest both problems
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but also potential
to solve these challenges
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of anywhere that we have.
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And that's the part
that gives me a ton of hope.
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We know food is a giant driver
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of environmental
and climate-change damage.
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It's the number-one driver
of biodiversity loss, by a lot,
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number-one driver of deforestation
and land-use change,
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number-one use of the world's
dwindling freshwater.
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70 percent of our water
goes into how we feed ourselves.
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And it's the number-two driver
of greenhouse-gas emissions, globally.
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Now unlike energy and mobility
and transportation,
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where we can see a future
where that curve is going to bend,
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food and agriculture is going straight up,
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with absolutely no end in sight.
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So we must figure out
how to reduce the negative impacts
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the system is having on our planet.
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Full stop.
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The second big part of the work
that we collectively have to do
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is around adaptation and resilience,
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a part that we are simply entirely
unprepared to deal with right now.
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We are now about to enter
an age of extreme volatility,
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with dwindling resources
of water and soil,
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higher energy prices.
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And we essentially are unprepared.
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So we need much more investment and focus
on preparing a food system
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to deal with the reality
that we are entering in today.
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But this third part
is the part that gets me excited
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and gives me a lot of hope.
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Because I firmly believe,
I know it to be true,
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that food and agriculture,
nature-based solutions more broadly --
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namely, you throw in there
oceans and forestry --
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are the only systems on planet Earth
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that has the capacity
to sequester enough carbon
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in the time horizon --
this is the important part --
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110 billion metric tons of carbon
that are in our atmosphere
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used to be in our soils.
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That's 80 years of our current footprint.
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And we are starting to see
tools and technologies
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and rediscovering old techniques
that can take a lot of that carbon
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and put it back into the soil.
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And technologies
that allow our food system
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to become much more efficient and vibrant.
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I'll give you a couple
that are superexciting to me.
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One is a company called Loam Bio
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that has discovered fungi microbes
that coat seeds,
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that are pulling between one and three
tonnes of carbon per acre per year,
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and store that carbon
in more permanent forms in the soil.
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When you do the math
on how many acres are under cultivation,
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this is a tool that can be
transformational.
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Or a company like Inari Agriculture,
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using modern breeding techniques
that can dramatically increase yield
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while reducing the amount
of fertilizer that’s needed
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or pesticides and herbicides
that are needed to protect that plant.
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I could go on and on about these tools.
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They're out there.
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We have the solutions at hand.
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The problem is we're just out of time.
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So for all of us
who are working on these issues,
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or leading in whatever we are doing,
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if we have our plan
and we feel comfortable, like,
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"This feels about right,
I'm doing my thing,"
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then we're simply not doing enough.
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We have to get fundamentally out
of our comfort zone
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and take on a lot more risk
in terms of our actions.
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So I hope that,
as we sit here tonight together
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and eat some of the challenges we face,
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we understand what's truly at stake.
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We understand that we absolutely have
the capacity to solve this challenge,
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but that if we don't act now,
we're going to lose time.
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But I know that we can look back,
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and collectively say to ourselves,
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"We stood up and met the moment,
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and we ensured that our kids
and that our grandkids
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will be able to enjoy a delicious meal
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like the one we’re having here tonight.”
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So thank you for your work,
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and I look forward to seeing
what we can do together.
