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July 30, 2018

31/07/2018: Glad to be here again, the Palletier column

by Christophe Pelletier
 
Christophe Pelletier

Time flies by. It has been a bit more than a year since I took a break from my monthly column. It is with pleasure that I resume writing in Milling and Grain, all the more so as I understand that some of you were enquiring about me, which is quite humbling. There could not be any reason to turn down such a friendly request. Yet, my approach is slightly different than before. I would like this to be more than just a monthly column. I would like to interact with you. Let’s get in contact and get acquainted.
We have a little value chain between you, the readers the magazine and myself. It is an opportunity to go beyond my column. The feedback I received is that many of you find this column valuable and so does the magazine.
 


Tell me about your work, your hopes and desires, your ideas, as well as perhaps your fears or doubts. I like to make myself easily available. It can happen through my website, email or, my favourite, Skype. With 800 words a month, you can guess that I only scratch the surface. By connecting, there is plenty more available if you wish. This is where value is.

This year of reflection has brought me to revisit my original concept that I had started nine years ago on my blog, The Food Futurist. The future of food and farming is quite a broad topic that deals with many dimensions and layers. Most of the focus seems to be on technology and innovation. In my opinion, it is too restrictive.

This is why I will try not to follow the herd, as usual. Understand me well, technology and innovation are essential for the future and I follow them closely, but the future will be successful and prosperous only if we develop scenarios and strategies that take into account the bigger picture.

By this, I mean that the future of food and agriculture is not just about food and agriculture. It is not just about products, techniques and technologies that are being used or will be used in these two sectors only.

To develop a solid vision of the future of food and agriculture, we must first get a solid vision of the world ahead, of how future human societies will be organised, and what their values will be. In the narrative about the future, one hardly ever hears about values, and yet be assured that they will play a critical role, simply because values strongly influence our perception of the world around us and what we care about or not.

Read the full article in Milling and Grain magazine online, HERE.

Christophe Pelletier is a food and agriculture strategist and futurist from Canada. Working internationally, he has published two books on feeding the world’s growing population: Future Harvests Explores the Future of Food and Farming and We Will Reap What We Sow: Reflections on Human Nature, Leadership and Feeding a Growing Population. He has a very successful blog where you can follow his thoughts at “The Food Futurist: Foresight, Innovation, Philosophy, Critical Thinking and Visionary Leadership for a Prosperous Future of Food and Farming”.

Visit Christophe’s blog, The Food Futurist, HERE.
 

The Global Miller
This blog is maintained by The Global Miller staff and is supported by the magazine Milling and Grain
which is published by Perendale Publishers Limited.


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