Syllabus

Short Course Description

The food we choose to eat and the way it is produced has mounting consequences to global health, environment, current and future food security and the fabric of society. The outcomes in the form of obesity, hunger, malnutrition, environmental degradation, loss of biodiversity and climate change ? all warrant a new approach to the current fragmented discourse on food. This interdisciplinary course is an introductory course to food systems and will unravel how food is related to environment, society, oceans, economics, health, sustainability and most importantly - planetary health on the local, regional and global levels. Through lectures, guest lectures, scientific reading, discussions and debates students will reflect on the critical issues related to food from production to consumption as well as to the proposed solutions of promoting food systems that offer human and environmental co benefits.

Aims of the courses:
1) Provide the student with the basic understanding and building blocks of the emerging discipline of food systems.
2) Expose the student to the current scientific discourse of sustainable diets through scientific readings, discussions and debates.
3) Develop intuition and a knowledge base to aid the student in examining the issues and solutions to the mounting food crisis.
4) Apply interdisciplinary approaches to the study of sustainable food systems.

The course will include lectures (including guest lectures), discussions in class, debates and scientific readings. The course consists of 13 lectures (2 academic points) in which the students will participate, lead debates and discussions and present their final project.
Prerequisites: none.
Office hours: meetings are by appointment via emails.