A collaboration between The Sustainable Food Initiative, the Berkeley Haas Center for Responsible Business, and the Edible Schoolyard Project
Brief Course Overview
This uniquely UC Berkeley course, now in its eighth year, explores the future of food, its diverse systems and movements. Edible Education 101 is a weekly lecture series that brings renowned experts—leading academics and practitioners—to campus to share their visions, research, and experiences about food and its critical role in our culture, well-being and survival.
The food system is a complex web of interconnected relationships and disciplines. It is also estimated to be at least a $12 trillion dollar business globally. The way food tastes, is produced, distributed and eaten has everything to do with our personal, public and planetary health and sustainability. Edible Education 101 reveals the systematic links between agroecology, agronomy, anthropology, biology, business, cooking, economics, nutrition, philosophy, policy, sociology, technology and the arts. Past lecture topics have included organic agriculture, school lunch reform, food safety, hunger and food security, global inequities in food, chef-seed breeder collaborations, urban agriculture, food sovereignty, and local food economies.
This course is different each year it is offered, keeping the content fresh and unique. It is a special co-creation of the faculty, student learners, and distinguished guests who bring their perspectives and passions to the course in ways intended to inform and inspire you.
Course Organizers
William Rosenzweig is a Fellow at the Institute for Business and Social Impact at Berkeley Haas. In 1990, Will served as founding CEO of The Republic of Tea and has had a prolific career as an entrepreneur cultivating early-stage companies focused on health and sustainability. He is the recipient of the 2010 Oslo Business for Peace Award and was named one of seven people shaping the future of food by Bon Appetit magazine.
Alice Waters is a 1967 graduate of UC Berkeley and the founder of Chez Panisse and The Edible Schoolyard Project. She is respected as one of the most influential people in the world of food in the past 50 years and is a recipient of many honors including the 2014 National Humanities Medal, presented by President Obama.