State of the Planet

News from the Columbia Climate School

food5

  • Daniel Hillel, Originator of High-Efficiency Irrigation, to Receive World Food Prize

    Daniel Hillel, Originator of High-Efficiency Irrigation, to Receive World Food Prize

    Daniel Hillel, an adjunct senior scientist at Columbia University’s Earth Institute, has been awarded the World Food Prize for his work in conceiving and promoting water-saving methods that have increased crop production on arid lands in 30 countries.

  • Climates Services: Must Help Us Understand Risks

    Climates Services: Must Help Us Understand Risks

    The point is setting priorities right, and for an agency like the World Food Programme, our focus is of course vulnerable people in the most vulnerable countries, countries where climate change is a multiplier of hunger risk. –- WFP’s Carlo Scaramella, in the fifth in a series of video interviews.

  • Wasting Food = Wasting Water

    Wasting Food = Wasting Water

    The world is teetering on the edge of a food crisis due to the growing population, soaring food prices, and water scarcity, yet a shocking one third of the food produced around the world goes to waste.

  • New Program Tackles Climate Threats to Food Security

    A new multimillion dollar research program by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research aims to alleviate climate-related threats to the food security, livelihoods and environment of people living in the developing world. One of the key intellectual forces behind this initiative has been the IRI‘s Jim Hansen. He’ll be leading efforts within the program…

  • Getting Back on Track: Ending Global Hunger and Undernutrition

    One of the targets of the first Millennium Development Goal (MDG) is to reduce the proportion of people who suffer from hunger by half between 1990 and 2015, with hunger measured as the proportion of the population who are undernourished and the prevalence of children under five who are underweight.

  • Food Miles, Fair Miles

    It’s not often that when we purchase food from a bodega or grocery store that we consider where it came from.  Is my apple from New York, Washington, or China?  Were my tomatoes grown in Florida, California, or Mexico?  Whose hands planted and picked them?  Why did this planter choose this variety? Wherever our food…

  • Changing the Urban Relationship to Food

    With an Italian background, from a culture of food, as biologist and one time theatre producer, to me it makes sense to work with a research group that has the courage to break many taboos and re-discuss academic assumptions in an open and innovative way.

  • The Stuff of Sustainability

    Recently, New York Times reporter, Leslie Kaufman wrote an excellent story on an interesting and important video called “The Story of Stuff”.  Kaufman writes that: “The video is a cheerful but brutal assessment of how much Americans waste, and it has its detractors… The video was created by Annie Leonard, a former Greenpeace employee and…

Photo of the Earth from space with the text "Lamont at AGU25" on top.

AGU25, the premier Earth and space science conference, takes place December 15-19, 2025 in New Orleans, Louisiana. This year’s theme—Where Science Connects Us—puts in focus how science depends on connection, from the lab to the field to the ballot box. Once again, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and Columbia Climate School scientists, experts, students, and educators are playing an active role, sharing our research and helping shape the future of our planet. #AGU25 Learn More

  • Daniel Hillel, Originator of High-Efficiency Irrigation, to Receive World Food Prize

    Daniel Hillel, Originator of High-Efficiency Irrigation, to Receive World Food Prize

    Daniel Hillel, an adjunct senior scientist at Columbia University’s Earth Institute, has been awarded the World Food Prize for his work in conceiving and promoting water-saving methods that have increased crop production on arid lands in 30 countries.

  • Climates Services: Must Help Us Understand Risks

    Climates Services: Must Help Us Understand Risks

    The point is setting priorities right, and for an agency like the World Food Programme, our focus is of course vulnerable people in the most vulnerable countries, countries where climate change is a multiplier of hunger risk. –- WFP’s Carlo Scaramella, in the fifth in a series of video interviews.

  • Wasting Food = Wasting Water

    Wasting Food = Wasting Water

    The world is teetering on the edge of a food crisis due to the growing population, soaring food prices, and water scarcity, yet a shocking one third of the food produced around the world goes to waste.

  • New Program Tackles Climate Threats to Food Security

    A new multimillion dollar research program by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research aims to alleviate climate-related threats to the food security, livelihoods and environment of people living in the developing world. One of the key intellectual forces behind this initiative has been the IRI‘s Jim Hansen. He’ll be leading efforts within the program…

  • Getting Back on Track: Ending Global Hunger and Undernutrition

    One of the targets of the first Millennium Development Goal (MDG) is to reduce the proportion of people who suffer from hunger by half between 1990 and 2015, with hunger measured as the proportion of the population who are undernourished and the prevalence of children under five who are underweight.

  • Food Miles, Fair Miles

    It’s not often that when we purchase food from a bodega or grocery store that we consider where it came from.  Is my apple from New York, Washington, or China?  Were my tomatoes grown in Florida, California, or Mexico?  Whose hands planted and picked them?  Why did this planter choose this variety? Wherever our food…

  • Changing the Urban Relationship to Food

    With an Italian background, from a culture of food, as biologist and one time theatre producer, to me it makes sense to work with a research group that has the courage to break many taboos and re-discuss academic assumptions in an open and innovative way.

  • The Stuff of Sustainability

    Recently, New York Times reporter, Leslie Kaufman wrote an excellent story on an interesting and important video called “The Story of Stuff”.  Kaufman writes that: “The video is a cheerful but brutal assessment of how much Americans waste, and it has its detractors… The video was created by Annie Leonard, a former Greenpeace employee and…