Edible Empire

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-Friedmann
https://www.sociology.utoronto.ca/people/directories/all-faculty/harriet-friedmann
To view all the links to the websites and documents, visit the show notes on our website.

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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.

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This is the epilogue of a six-part series on food imperialism. Welcome to Edible Empire, a podcast by Planet Pulse Pacific about the hidden cost of our food.
This episode explores the systemic hidden costs of the global food system by reflecting on the core themes of the Edible Empire series, examining how modern corporate power and historical food imperialism drive global resource extraction and labour exploitation. Hosts Ben, Neal, and Emma look back across the series to dismantle the complex mechanisms that keep consumers blind to the true human and environmental price of the food on their plates.
Welcome to the epilogue episode of our podcast series. As we bring this journey to a close, we return to the questions that started it all: what are the true costs of our food, and who pays them? Can we imagine a fairer world where the food on our plates doesn’t cost the Earth?
This podcast series has traced the hidden links of food imperialism from New Zealand dairy backed by Western Saharan "blood phosphate" to West African palm oil on modern supermarket shelves. Today's food empire is driven by corporate power and annual reports rather than national flags, relying on a playbook of resource extraction and labour exploitation. A few massive multinational corporations dominate the global supply chain, creating an "hourglass squeeze" that exploits both producers and consumers whilst masking the true ecological and human costs of cheap, intensively produced food.
A fairer future demands that we challenge these corporate middlemen and rebuild transparency through concepts like food sovereignty, degrowth, and stronger protections for small-scale farmers and workers. This journey requires reclaiming our relationship with food, moving away from a system that treats the consumer as just another commodity. As several of our wonderful guests noted, our current food system was constructed by humans, meaning that we can be the ones who change it!
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Resources from this episode:
https://www.thesalmonandthetomato.org 
To view all the links to the websites and documents, visit the show notes on our website.

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This is episode 6 of a six-part series on food imperialism. Welcome to Edible Empire, a podcast by Planet Pulse Pacific about the hidden cost of our food.
Food isn’t just taste—it’s power. This podcast explores how empires and corporations built control through agriculture, reshaping cultures and feeding some at the expense of others.
This episode explores visions for a fairer food system that support producers, ensure diverse food choices, and challenge the intensive nature of current supply chains.
Having heard about the deep history of extraction and exploitation inherent in globalised food supply chains, what does a fair food system look like? How could we ensure sufficient, diverse food choices for all whilst supporting those who produce it? This episode dives into proposed futures that challenge the intensive nature of traditional agrifood systems and the supply chains that deliver it, eventually, to our homes.
Our final episode shifts focus toward practical frameworks, hopeful visions, and grassroots models for establishing a more equitable, localised, and sustainable global food system. Here, the discussion moves from macro-level economic theory to community-led action.
Degrowth scholar Professor Anitra Nelson details how dismantling profit-driven corporate commodity markets can create needs-based local economies that respect ecological boundaries.
Dr Million Belay, General Coordinator of the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa, explains how reclaiming community control over seeds, land, and traditional knowledge allows populations to resist corporate dependency and build resilient agricultural systems.
Turning to localised solutions within the United Kingdom, Shrewsbury Food Hub co-founder Ali Thomas demonstrates the power of volunteer-led redistribution networks that intercept supermarket surplus to foster social solidarity and tackle the systemic absurdity of food waste.
Finally, author and smallholder Chris Smaje makes a compelling case for a decentralised network of diverse smallholdings, arguing that a return to small-scale agroecological farming is a modern necessity capable of restoring degraded landscapes, revitalising rural economies, and breaking the entrenched grip of transnational agribusiness.
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Resources from this episode:
https://anitranelson.info/food-for-degrowth/ 
https://www.routledge.com/Food-for-Degrowth-Perspectives-and-Practices/Nelson-Edwards/p/book/9780367436469
https://ipes-food.org/people/million-belay/
https://afsafrica.org/meet-the-team/
https://www.agroecologyconference.eoai-africa.org/Dr_million.html
https://afsafrica.org/14083/
https://www.shrewsburyfoodhub.org.uk/
https://chrissmaje.com 
To view all the links to the websites and documents, visit the show notes on our website.

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This is episode 5 of a six-part series on food imperialism. Welcome to Edible Empire, a podcast by Planet Pulse Pacific about the hidden cost of our food.
Beyond recipes lies a story of power. From colonial plantations to modern agribusiness, this podcast reveals how the pursuit of food has redrawn maps, exploited people, and still shapes who holds control today.
This episode explores how New Zealand’s dairy industry links local landscapes to global extraction, ecological harm, and the wider machinery of food imperialism.
New Zealand’s image of clean, green pastures hides one of the world’s most intensive dairy industries. Behind each glass of milk there is a hidden web of global extraction: phosphate mined from occupied Western Sahara, palm kernel imported from deforested Southeast Asia, and polluted rivers flowing through Māori ancestral lands. This episode traces how New Zealand’s dairy boom reshapes both local ecosystems and distant economies, from illegally occupied territories in West Africa to political power in New Zealand. Through the story of “white gold”, we uncover how even the purest landscapes are bound into the machinery of food imperialism.
Here, we discuss the environmentally destructive and geopolitically fraught supply chains connecting intensive dairy production in Aotearoa New Zealand with phosphate mining in the illegally occupied territory of Western Sahara. Our three expert guests detail how New Zealand’s export-driven commodity model creates intense global market pressures for corporate profit and high-yield volume. 
Freshwater ecologist Dr Mike Joy exposes the catastrophic local consequences of this system, explaining how excessive synthetic nitrogen and fertiliser inputs poison rivers, disrupt aquatic ecosystems, and contaminate drinking water. 
Geographer Dr Milena Bojovic unpacks the structural traps forcing farmers into continual intensification, which in turn fuels a dependency on rare, internationally contested mineral resources.
Finally, researcher and artist Dr Crystall Bennes traces the physical journey of this phosphate rock, revealing how Western agricultural high yields rely heavily on wealth extracted under colonial conditions from the Boo Cra mine, highlighting the profound human and environmental costs borne by displaced Sahrawi populations.
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Resources from this episode:
https://ojs.victoria.ac.nz/pq/article/view/9629/8507
https://people.wgtn.ac.nz/mike.joy 
https://www.gofundme.com/f/almasar-library-education-centre-for-children-and-women 
https://wsrw.org/en 
https://www.crystalbennes.com/ 
To view all the links to the websites and documents, visit the show notes on our website.

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