Project Description
Project Overview
The goal of this project is to understand how, if at all, policymakers and researchers have discussed and assessed policies historically that create wasted foods today. This work will reveal how wasted food has long historical developments that alter our current thoughts of this challenge as new. Bringing together economics, geography, public health, and nutrition. We are using different data, the text of speeches, and different methods, textual analysis, to develop new knowledge and ways of knowing of the how policy may shape wasted food.
A team of students led by an interdisciplinary group of faculty at the intersection of policy, economics, and computer science used statistical and machine learning methods to assess and map the discourse of speeches (1919-2022) by applied economists on food and agricultural policy. Understanding the historical underpinnings of these policies and the political developments can provide insights into the relationship of food and agricultural policies to climate change and food security today. This project is adjacent to an NSF-funded project on wasted food and will provide opportunities to connect food and agricultural policies to social and environmental policies in the U.S.