Edible Empire

Planet Pulse Pacific

Planet Pulse Pacific—your go-to podcast for conversations about people and planet—is proud to host a special series: Edible Empire.  As the climate and global health crises intensify, the need for meaningful change has never been more urgent. This six-episode series brings together leading voices from around the world to explore the concept of food imperialism, uncover the hidden social and environmental costs of what we eat, and examine how we can build a more just and sustainable food system.  Join your hosts, Ben Eitelberg and Emma Strutt, alongside special series co-host Dr Neal Haddaway, as they dive into the complex and often unseen world of food—how it is produced, traded, and consumed across the globe. Kelly Allum edits the series.

  1. 1d ago

    Simen Sætre - The Salmon and the Tomato

    This episode is a supplementary full interview with Simen Sætre from Episode 4 of the Edible Empire podcast series. Here, we explore the hidden impacts of salmon farming in northern Europe, revealing the human and environmental costs behind cheap, year-round food. What connects salmon farming in northern Europe with tomato farming in southern Spain? These two, seemingly distinct food supply chains ensure that our supermarket shelves are stocked with cheap, year-round food. What we don’t see, however, are the hidden links - the overfishing along the coast of West Africa that destroys local communities’ livelihoods and drives migration to Europe; the dangerous journeys by small boat where 1 in 5 people die; the entrapment of migrants arriving in exploitative agricultural labour in Spain’s intensive greenhouses. This interview examines the story of salmon farming - and highlights the hidden costs of this highly commodified food. Simen uncovers the destructive, interconnected global supply chains linking northern European salmon aquaculture to the overexploitation of West African artisanal fisheries. He traces how the booming Norwegian salmon farming industry relies heavily on wild-caught ocean feed extracted from West Africa, exposing the ecological crises, corporate opacity, and false sustainability narratives surrounding salmon aquaculture. Resources from this interview: https://norla.no/en/books/1286-the-new-fish-the-global-history-of-salmon-farminghttps://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/735421/the-new-fish-by-simen-saetre-and-kjetil-ostli/ To view all the links to the websites and documents, visit the show notes on our website. Please support our work and enable us to deliver more content by buying us a coffee or becoming a member of Athletes for Nature. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook, subscribe to this podcast, and share this episode with your friends and family.

    Simen Sætre - The Salmon and the Tomato
  2. Sep 1

    Professor Jennifer Clapp - Corporate power in the food system

    This episode is a supplementary full interview with Professor Jennifer Clapp from Episode 2 of the Edible Empire podcast series. Here, we explore how an increasingly monopolised system of multinational corporations operates as de facto states within the global food system, exercising power over land, labour, trade, and policy in ways that rival or exceed nation-states. If empires once flew flags, today they file annual reports. This episode examines how large agrifood corporations increasingly function as sovereign actors within global food systems. From controlling vast transnational supply chains and shaping trade rules, to influencing national policy and disciplining labour across borders, corporations now wield powers historically associated with states. Focusing on agribusiness, food traders, and retailers, the episode asks how corporate concentration has reconfigured food imperialism, turning companies into the new “nations” of food empires, and what this means for accountability, democracy, and food sovereignty. Professor Jennifer Clapp highlights how mega-mergers in the agricultural inputs sector allow a small cartel to exercise immense structural power, locking in an industrial model that dictates what society views as "normal" food practices, while trapping countries in the Global South in dependency loops that prioritise luxury exports over local food security. Despite the immense political and economic inertia behind this consolidation, we close with a message of hope, emphasising that because this extractive system was constructed by humans, it can be dismantled through active political engagement and collective action. Resources from this interview: https://uwaterloo.ca/scholar/jclapp/homehttps://ipes-food.org/people/jennifer-clapp/https://uwaterloo.ca/environment-resources-and-sustainability/profiles/jennifer-clappTo view all the links to the websites and documents, visit the show notes on our website. Please support our work and enable us to deliver more content by buying us a coffee or becoming a member of Athletes for Nature. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook, subscribe to this podcast, and share this episode with your friends and family.

    Professor Jennifer Clapp - Corporate power in the food system
  3. Aug 30

    Professor Phil Howard - Corporate power in the food system

    This episode is a supplementary full interview with Professor Phil Howard from Episode 2 of the Edible Empire podcast series. Here, we explore how an increasingly monopolised system of multinational corporations operates as de facto states within the global food system, exercising power over land, labour, trade, and policy in ways that rival or exceed nation-states. If empires once flew flags, today they file annual reports. This episode examines how large agrifood corporations increasingly function as sovereign actors within global food systems. From controlling vast transnational supply chains and shaping trade rules, to influencing national policy and disciplining labour across borders, corporations now wield powers historically associated with states. Focusing on agribusiness, food traders, and retailers, the episode asks how corporate concentration has reconfigured food imperialism, turning companies into the new “nations” of food empires, and what this means for accountability, democracy, and food sovereignty. Professor Phil Howard unpacks how intense corporate concentration has transformed global agriculture into a system dominated by a few powerful transnational firms that operate much like sovereign states. Using the analogy of an hourglass, Phil illustrates how millions of farmers and billions of consumers are squeezed through a dangerously narrow bottleneck controlled by these massive agribusinesses, which deploy specific power plays to manipulate trade rules, capture government subsidies, and avoid accountability for environmental and labour exploitation. Despite the immense political and economic inertia behind this consolidation, we close with a message of hope, emphasising that because this extractive system was constructed by humans, it can be dismantled through active political engagement and collective action. Resources from this interview: https://philhoward.net/ https://ipes-food.org/people/phil-howard/ To view all the links to the websites and documents, visit the show notes on our website. Please support our work and enable us to deliver more content by buying us a coffee or becoming a member of Athletes for Nature. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook, subscribe to this podcast, and share this episode with your friends and family.

    Professor Phil Howard - Corporate power in the food system
  4. Aug 25

    Professor Harriet Friedmann - What is food imperialism?

    This episode is a supplementary full interview with Professor Harriet Friedmann from Episode 1 of the Edible Empire podcast series. Here, we explore how global food systems are shaped by historical power structures and capitalist mechanisms that prioritise corporate profit and "cheap food" over the health of ecosystems and human communities. Where does our food come from? Who works in the fields that produce our fruit and vegetables? Who is making profit from the food we eat? This episode sets the scene for the series, introducing the concept of food supply chains—the intricate trade routes that keep supermarket shelves stocked with produce all year round. But how did these global networks come to be? Tracing the history of our globalised food systems, we uncover why our food systems look the way they do today.  Professor Harriet Friedmann begins by tracing how global power shifted from a British-led system to one dominated by the US dollar. She explains that this change transformed how the world eats, replacing diverse, sustainable local farming with industrial monocultures like wheat and palm oil. This shift prioritised international profit over local cultures and environmental health. Resources from this interview: https://harrietfriedmann.ca https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Harriet-Friedmannhttps://www.sociology.utoronto.ca/people/directories/all-faculty/harriet-friedmannTo view all the links to the websites and documents, visit the show notes on our website. Please support our work and enable us to deliver more content by buying us a coffee or becoming a member of Athletes for Nature. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook, subscribe to this podcast, and share this episode with your friends and family.

    Professor Harriet Friedmann - What is food imperialism?
  5. Aug 23

    Professor Raj Patel - What is food imperialism?

    This episode is a supplementary full interview with Professor Raj Patel from Episode 1 of the Edible Empire podcast series. Here, we explore how global food systems are shaped by historical power structures and capitalist mechanisms that prioritise corporate profit and "cheap food" over the health of ecosystems and human communities. Where does our food come from? Who works in the fields that produce our fruit and vegetables? Who is making profit from the food we eat? This episode sets the scene for the series, introducing the concept of food supply chains—the intricate trade routes that keep supermarket shelves stocked with produce all year round. But how did these global networks come to be? Tracing the history of our globalised food systems, we uncover why our food systems look the way they do today.  Professor Raj Patel exposes the deception of "cheap" food. He argues that low prices are only possible by pushing the true costs onto the planet and underpaid workers. According to Patel, the global food system isn't broken; it is designed to make hunger profitable. He concludes with a call for food sovereignty, demanding we return power to the people who actually grow and harvest our food. Resources from this interview: https://rajpatel.org/https://www.antsandgrasshopper.org/https://rajpatel.org/2009/10/27/stuffed-and-starved/To view all the links to the websites and documents, visit the show notes on our website. Please support our work and enable us to deliver more content by buying us a coffee or becoming a member of Athletes for Nature. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook, subscribe to this podcast, and share this episode with your friends and family.

    Professor Raj Patel - What is food imperialism?

Ratings & Reviews

5
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3 Ratings

About

Planet Pulse Pacific—your go-to podcast for conversations about people and planet—is proud to host a special series: Edible Empire.  As the climate and global health crises intensify, the need for meaningful change has never been more urgent. This six-episode series brings together leading voices from around the world to explore the concept of food imperialism, uncover the hidden social and environmental costs of what we eat, and examine how we can build a more just and sustainable food system.  Join your hosts, Ben Eitelberg and Emma Strutt, alongside special series co-host Dr Neal Haddaway, as they dive into the complex and often unseen world of food—how it is produced, traded, and consumed across the globe. Kelly Allum edits the series.

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