The Polyculture Project.

Conventional meat production has been (justly) criticized for the strain it puts on the environment and the deplorable conditions in which animals are kept. However, there is an alternative to conventional farming. Diversified, pasture-based farms, also called polycultures, work with the land such that the farm becomes integrated into the natural ecosystem. Multiple species of animals are raised together along with crops that can be used for animal feed and for human consumption. Overall, this type of farming provides many environmental benefits and a higher quality of life for the animals than conventional farms.

A criticism of polyculture farming is that it isn’t productive enough to meet the needs of our population, and thus, meat could only ever be a small part of a sustainable food system. Although often repeated, I have rarely seen this statement quantified, which has led me to ask the following question.

How much polyculture farmland would it take to produce enough meat to feed the US population?

Answering this question requires two types of data: the amount of meat we need for everyone in the US and the amount of meat, per acre, produced on polyculture farms. The USDA and FDA collect and distribute vast amounts of data on the productivity of US farms, but I couldn’t find anything on the productivity of pasture-based, diversified farms. So I set out to collect the data myself.

I first reached out to the farm where I currently get my meat: North Mountain Pastures (NMP), a polyculture farm in Pennsylvania. My family has been part of their Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program for several years now. Every month, we get a box of meat with a variety of cuts from a variety of animals. The farm is run by Brooks and Anna Miller, who graciously contributed to this project.

Brooks and Anna put together this table of their farm’s output in 2013, which includes all of the animals they raised and the edible pounds of meat typically provided by each animal. The total weight they compute is consistent with a rough estimate based on the amount of meat supplied through their CSA. Brooks and Anna also calculated the acreage of their farm and the land required to produce some additional grains they feed their chickens and pigs. Dividing the total number of pounds (49,855) by the total acreage used (114), gives an annual output of 437.33 pounds of meat per acre.

The other key piece of data is the amount of meat required for the entire US. The USDA recommends that typical adults get about 6 oz of protein each day, which is 0.375 pounds (see MyPlate for more info). For this analysis, let’s assume that all of the protein comes from meat. Throughout a whole year, we would need to produce 42 billion pounds of meat to feed all 308 million Americans their recommended 6 oz. of meat every day. Americans actually consume about 52 billion pounds of meat each year (Earth Policy Institute).

Assuming the productivity of North Mountain Pastures farm, we would need just under 100 million acres of land to produce 42 billion pounds of meat each year and 119 million acres to match current demand for meat.

Those are such big numbers that it’s hard to interpret them without some context. So, let’s compare them to the amount of land we currently use for grazing. According to the USDA (as cited by the EPA), the US devoted about 600 million acres to animal grazing in 2007.

That means we could produce enough meat for the entire US population by converting 16% of our current grazing land to polyculture farming. We would need to convert 20% to match current meat demand.

That doesn’t seem like a lot of land at all. In fact, it seems like diversified farms could actually reduce the amount of land we devote to meat production without reducing the amount of meat people eat. Now, that doesn’t necessarily mean that meat is totally sustainable. There are other environmental impacts we should consider, such as water usage and carbon emission. From the perspective of land use though, diversified, pasture-based farms can provide more than enough meat without requiring any additional land.

If people choose to get less of their protein from meat, it would further lessen the land burden of raising animals. For example, North Mountain Pastures also produces eggs, which we did not include in their meat production numbers. Fish, nuts, seeds, and legumes are also high in protein and can serve as alternatives to meat. However, if sustainability is the goal, we would need to consider the relative environmental impact and scalability of obtaining these other foods to that of meat raised on polyculture farms.

Another benefit of diversified, pasture-based farming is that it hasn’t yet been fully optimized. Farmers and scientists around the world are working on advances that can boost efficiency and lessen the environmental impact of raising animals for food. At North Mountain Pastures, they are working with grain farmers who use no-till agriculture and other ecofriendly methods, exploring ways of reducing off-site feed, and adding an orchard. In a much broader effort, the Savory Institute is devoted to restoring badly managed grazing land and promoting ecologically-sound land management. If we actually wanted to convert current grazing land to polyculture farms, the Savory Institute’s research could help bring the productivity of marginal land closer to a farm like North Mountain Pastures. Additional improvements, as well as more widespread adoption, are also likely to lower the cost of producing meat in this way, a savings that can be passed on to the consumer. Currently, members of the NMP CSA pay about $8 per pound for their meat.

One other potential barrier to producing all our meat on polyculture farms is that we would have to change the way we eat meat. North Mountain Pastures raised 7 different animal species with a wide range in the number of animals of each species. For example, they raised only 12 cows and 10 goats but 240 turkeys and 5200 chickens. To take advantage of a diversified farm requires that we diversify both the types of animals and the cuts of meat we that we regularly eat.

For this analysis, I’ve assumed that any diversified farm could be as productive as North Mountain Pastures. Without any additional data, it’s hard to know if this assumption is reasonable. I will say that I didn’t know how productive NMP would be when I approached them about this project, although that doesn’t necessarily mean that their productivity is typical. And productivity can vary a lot depending on the location of the farm. That’s why I would like to expand upon this study to include as many polyculture farms as I can find. That way, I can better quantify the productivity and scalability of polyculture farms, assess additional environmental concerns, and help develop a pathway to a food system that produces meat without destroying the environment or abusing animals.

It’s a lofty goal and one that I can’t achieve on my own. If you, or someone you know, has data on the productivity of a polyculture farm, please consider sharing it with me. Together, we can turn the polyculture project into a polyculture solution.

Note: This material was originally presented at the 2014 Ancestral Health Symposium. I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to participate in this terrific event and for all of the interest and feedback I received from my fellow attendees.

AHS13: A caveman's guide to world hunger.

In August, I had the privilege of speaking at the third annual Ancestral Health Symposium, which focused on an evolutionary approach to nutrition and health. The title of my talk, “Give them grains? Analyzing approached to world hunger”, was intentionally provocative as this group has pretty negative views of the role of grains in human nutrition. I wanted to get people’s attention because, quite often, the response I get from this community is that they care about making healthy choices for themselves, whether or not those choices are sustainable or widely accessible. While I understand this view, opting out of the conversation about our global food future means that we are less likely to develop a food system that meets the demands of health-conscious people. As it happens, I also care about the accessibility of food, especially for the poor. What follows is the content of my presentation at AHS13.   

According to the UN’s Food & Agriculture Organization, there are more than 850 million starving people in the world. Moreover, there are a staggering 2 billion malnourished people. In fact, malnutrition kills 2.6 million children each year, and 1 in 4 children experience irreversible stunted growth. Vitamin A deficiency alone affects 250 million preschool-aged children; many become blind as a result, and half of the children who become blind die within a year.

Clearly, when we think about how to feed the world, we need to be considering the nutritional value of food as well as its caloric yield. Calories may keep a starving person alive for a day or a week, but to have someone survive for months, years, or decades, nutrition is key.

The most common proposed solution to world hunger is based on the premise that we can use grains to increase the total number of available calories, worldwide. We can do this by growing more grains, increasing grain productivity, and eating more of the grains we currently grow rather than using them for animal feed or fuel. This last point is especially relevant for industrial corn. Several studies have analyzed precisely how many more calories could be consumed if they were eaten “directly” rather than eating animals fed with corn.

To really determine whether eating more corn can help feed the world, we need to consider the type of food produced in this system and the trade-offs between corn and other crops.

In 2011, the US harvested 83 million acres of industrial corn, which does not include sweet corn that you would eat on the cob or out of a can. The same amount of land comprises the entire National Parks system. According to the USDA, 52% of the 2011 corn crop was used for fuel and exports, thereby contributing zero calories to the US food supply. Another 37% of the corn was used as animal feed, leaving only 11% of the crop for food. It seems pretty clear that using more corn for food would produce more calories, but how much more? 

The above chart shows my estimate of the caloric yield of the corn crop based on the current usage distribution. If 37% of the corn crop was eaten indirectly through corn-fed animals and 11% was eaten directly as “food”, I estimate a yield of 1.8 million calories from the 2011 corn harvest. If, however, we had eaten the animal feed ourselves (for a total of 48% in the food category), it could have delivered 2.5 million calories. And, if the entire crop were used for food, it would yield 5.3 million calories. That means we could just about triple the number of corn calories in the food system simply by devoting it all to food. Let’s take this one step further, though. What kind of food do we actually produce from industrial corn?

Before humans can consume industrial corn, it has to be heavily processed. Again, based on USDA statistics, the 2011 corn calories were delivered in the form of high fructose corn syrup, glucose and dextrose, corn starch, alcohol, and corn oil (which makes up the majority of the "Cereals, other" category). Despite the calories, no one can survive on a diet made of these foods. More importantly, consuming calories in these forms does little to reduce the total number of calories a person needs. For example, studies have shown that drinking a soda, which delivers a few hundred calories, will not cause someone to eat fewer calories throughout the day. That means, regardless of how many additional corn syrup calories we can deliver to the food system, we will still need to produce the same number of calories from other foods to meet everyone’s caloric needs. To borrow a term from economics, corn-based calories have diminishing marginal utility.

But let’s forget about calories for a moment. Given that billions of people in the world are malnourished, what are the relative amount of micronutrients that corn would deliver in each of these systems? I chose two micronutrients, vitamin A and folate, for this analysis because deficiencies are known to cause serious, life-threatening health problems.

It turns out that the best source of corn-based micronutrients (based on efficiency and content) actually comes from chicken liver. A back-of-the-envelope calculation reveals that, based on our current corn usage, an acre of industrial corn could provide 141 people with their recommended daily amount of vitamin A and 66 people their RDA of folate through the consumption of corn-fed chicken livers. On the other hand, if we stopped feeding corn to animals, and used it instead to make corn syrup, corn oil, and the like, we would produce zero RDAs of these micronutrients. Finally, if we used all of our corn in such a way as to maximize vitamin A and folate production, we would feed all of our corn to chickens, which would enable us to feed 385 people their RDA of vitamin A and 180 people their RDA of folate with one acre of corn.

Eating our corn directly would provide an increase in available calories, but it would also reduce the already minimal micronutrients delivered by corn. The standard American diet is already rich in the types of food that corn can produce. As a nation, we already generate 3770 calories per person per day, and 70% of the average American’s calories come from refined grain, added sugar, and refined vegetable oil. We also have a nation of very sick people. Over 35% of adults are obese, more than 23 million have Type 2 diabetes, and another 79 million have pre-diabetes. Is this really the diet we want to use to end world hunger?

Given that corn is such an abysmal source of vital micronutrients, it’s worth asking if there is anything better we could grow. Organic produce is more sustainable than conventional agriculture and typically more diverse. The USDA’s organic production survey compiled statistics for the 22 highest yielding fruits and vegetables, which were grow on a tiny 118,000 acres – that’s 0.14% of the land devoted to industrial corn.

Using nutrition data from self.nutritiondata.com, I calculated that the 22 highest yielding organic crops generated 3 million calories per acre. That’s more than corn delivers even if we stopped feeding corn to animals but less than if we devoted the entire crop to food. Nutritionally, however, the organic crops clearly dominate.

To simplify the calculations, I selected two organic crops and used the USDA data to determine the per acre yield of each one. I then calculated the RDAs of both vitamin A and folate. If we grew an acre of organic carrots, we could deliver ¾ of a million people their RDA of vitamin A and more than 1600 people their RDA of folate. From an acre of organic spinach, we would supply almost 61,000 people their RDA of vitamin A and 14,000 people their RDA of folate. 

To summarize, we could produce more calories by eating more corn products, but it would reduce the amount of available micronutrients and not do much to reduce the caloric needs of our population. Sustaining a healthy population is even more problematic as corn provides either micronutrients or calories, but not both. Corn agriculture also requires a great deal of inputs with many negative outputs. In contrast, organic agriculture can provide about 50% of the maximum caloric yield of corn, while also providing prodigious micronutrients. In marginal environments, which are more common in the developing world, organic agriculture can actually produce more calories than conventional, input-intensive agriculture. However, developing truly sustainable agricultural systems, worldwide, will require dedication, creativity, and investments in research and labor.

Overall, growing nutritious crops will likely produce fewer calories. However, globally, we already grow more than 2700 calories per person per day. Even in the countries with the highest rates of hunger, only two actually have too few calories available, and even those are within 100 calories of their daily per capita needs. Chronic hunger and malnutrition are caused by poverty, political instability, and lack of infrastructure. Simply producing more calories, in any form, is unlikely to end world hunger if issues of access are not addressed. Hence, the lower caloric yield of organic crops seems worth the trade-off given their delivery of vital micronutrients, promising yields in places where the poor actually live, and the potential for sustainability.

I think I have made the case that eating more corn products, rather than eating corn-fed animals, is not a good solution to world hunger. In fact, eating corn-fed animal products is the only way to get micronutrients from corn. However, I do not, in any way, support feeding corn to ruminants or raising animals in confinement. Rather, I think we should stop growing industrial corn and go back to raising animals in traditional pasture-based systems. This would likely reduce the amount of meat available in the food system, although I have yet to see a detailed study of the potential yields of polyculture, pasture-based farming systems. Regardless, limiting our consumption of animal products to the level that can be produced sustainably seems like the right approach. 

Overall, this analysis has revealed the importance of considering nutrition, in addition to caloric yield, when making decisions about what we should grow and eat. This above slide lists several ways we can support real solutions to world hunger and organizations who appear, to me, to be taking the right approach. Whether you base your eating habits on what is healthy for you or healthy for the world, I encourage you to get involved and make the food system work for everyone.

I want to thank Eric Huff and Tess McEnulty for their assistance with this project and the Ancestral Health Society for creating a forum for this type of work. Additional citations and background for the calculation of the caloric yield of corn can be found in my previous post. Supporting materials for the hunger assessment by country and specific inputs and outputs of the conventional food system can be found in my 2012 AHS talk, which is described in detail here.

Paleo for the planet.

Back in August, I had the opportunity to attend the Ancestral Health Symposium 2012. Last year, I attended the inaugural event as part of the interview team, and it was a fantastic experience (read my recap). This year, I worked with my good friend and collaborator, Tess McEnulty, to submit an abstract to speak at the symposium. We were honored when the AHS organizers selected our abstract! All of the presentations at AHS12 were recorded, but they won’t be online for a while, so I thought I would give you all a preview of our presentation: Sustainability and world hunger from a Paleo perspective.

In the year 2000, we devoted an area larger than the state of California to the growing of industrial corn, wheat, and soy. I say “industrial” because these are crops that have been developed for yield and are not directly edible by human beings. Instead, they have to be processed. In fact, 70% of the wheat and 12% of the corn we grow goes into processed food products like cereal, pasta, soda, and candy; 80% of the corn and 22% of the wheat is fed to animals.

This system of food production requires a lot of inputs in order to function. According to the USGS, conventional agriculture uses 128 billion gallons of water each day for crop irrigation, whereas domestic usage (i.e. water for showering and washing dishes) totals 2 billion gallons per day. Heavy machinery and chemical pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers rely on fossil fuels and other natural resources that cannot be replenished nearly as quickly as they are being depleted. The beef industry, which relies on corn and wheat for cheap animal feed, also relies on large quantities of antibiotics to keep the cows from dying from acidosis (caused by eating grain rather than grass) and hormones to increase weight given the shortened life span of grain-fed feedlot cows. And this entire system is kept solvent by federal subsidies, which make corn and wheat incredibly cheap.

For all of these inputs, what do we get in return? Feedlots produce lagoons of chemical-laden animal waste that pollute the air and nearby water resources. They are also major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions. Growing the grains that feedlots depend on has led to increased environmental degradation – loss of species diversity, soil erosion, and depletion of soil nutrients. The processed food we produce in this system makes us sick. The process by which we raise animals makes them sick, and agricultural antibiotic usage has led to drug-resistant strains of disease to which we are susceptible. In the bigger picture, our food supply is quite vulnerable because it is so reliant upon very few crops. Drought, disease, or pests that affect any of these few species could have disastrous consequences for our nation’s food supply. And sadly, we as consumers have very little control over our food. Despite all of these negative outputs, the conventional food system does provide a surplus of (apparently) cheap calories on grocery store shelves. This outcome is often suggested as an end that justifies the means in the face of an expanding population that too often goes hungry.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, there were 850 million starving people in the world in 2008. However, global food production provides over 2700 calories per person per day (estimate from 2002, with similar rates of malnourishment to 2008). Of course, neither the calories nor the malnourishment are distributed evenly throughout the world. The above table, using data from FAOSTAT, shows statistics for the ten countries with the highest percentage of undernourished people (38% to 65% of the total population of each country). It also shows the number of calories in the country each day and the estimated average caloric need per person per day, which is based on the age and sex break-down within the country. Of these ten countries, only two actually have fewer calories than the population should require, and even in those cases, the deficit is less than 100 calories per person per day. These numbers tell us that global hunger is not solely a matter of producing too few calories.

In the developing world, hunger is caused mainly by inequality and poverty; people are simply too poor to buy food. Political instability and lack of infrastructure also impair people’s ability to access food. In addition to the hunger problem, 2 billion people do not get enough iron or iodine, and more than 200 million children are deficient in protein and vitamin A to the point that they are developmentally impaired. The situation seems grim given that the world population is expected to rise and global climate change may make resources even more scarce.

In the United States, there are over 3700 calories available per person per day. About 5% of the population reports having to reduce their food intake for financial reasons, although this reduction doesn’t necessarily mean they are getting too few calories. Unlike the developing world, in which starvation is a major problem, Americans have skyrocketing rates of obesity and diet-related diseases. Even the country’s homeless have similar rates of obesity and Type-2 diabetes as the rest of the population.

Americans, on average, consume 70% of their calories in the form of refined grains, vegetable oils, and added sugars – calories created from the three crops we devote so many resources to growing. Calories are not a problem in the US, but it seems like the type of calories we consume are making us very sick.

Worldwide, people are not getting enough nutritious food. In the developing world, distribution limits access to sufficient calories. In the US, nutritionally-poor foods and hidden calories have led to a population that is overfed but nutrient-deficient. At the same time, conventional agriculture is too resource-dependent to be sustainable, is ruining our environment, and provides nutritionally-poor calories.

Big Agriculture has offered their solution to feeding the world sustainably. We should continue to purchase their technology and chemicals in order to increase grain production and, subsequently, add more calories to the world’s supply. This is not actually a solution. We don’t need more calories to feed the world, and this approach will neither produce more healthy food nor improve food access to the world’s poor. And while biotech companies have long promised that genetically-modified seeds will offer enhanced food production in the face of climate change, they have yet to deliver on such promises. Also, poor farmers who adopt these growing practices will not be producing food they can eat, and the additional costs of proprietary seeds and chemicals make it harder to turn a profit and thus afford to buy food.

What if we tried to improve conventional agriculture by increasing efficiency? In a research paper by a group from the Institute on the Environment at the University of Minnesota (Foley et al., 2011), smarter use of irrigation and fertilizer could reduce resource usage without reducing food production. However, the crops that would thrive under this more-efficient system include several types of grains, sugarbeets and sugarcane, oil crops, and two kinds of starchy root vegetables. In other words, the same nutritionally-poor foods we currently produce. Improving efficiency may provide us with the same calories for fewer resources, but it will do nothing to improve access to food - so it won’t alleviate hunger - or to improve the healthfulness of the food that is available.

Another solution the group proposed was to consume calories more efficiently. They point out that the number of calories produced feeding grain to cows is far less than the number available from the grain itself. For the same resources, we could eat more calories in the form of processed grains, refined vegetable oils, and added sugars than we can get from eating grain-fed cows. A true statement, but would we be any better off adding these calories to our diets?

Which brings us to the question of diet...

Perhaps we could increase the sustainability of food production by eating the least resource-intensive foods. A study by Eshel et al. (2010) compared the land use and reactive nitrogen (i.e. chemical fertilizer) requirements of different foods. They found that plant foods demand far fewer of these resources than conventionally-grown animal foods, which is unsurprising given that we currently grow plants to feed to animals. More interesting, though, is the list of the ten least resource-intensive foods, which again consists of several types of grains and oils, grapes, and sweet potatoes. Based on these metrics, the best diet would consist of 55% of calories in the form of grains and more than 30% in the form of peanut, corn, and soybean oils. That means consuming even more grains and oils, as a fraction of total calories, than Americans currently eat.

It turns out that vegetables are actually quite resource intensive compared to grains, at least the way they are conventionally grown. In fact, vegetables can require as many resources as animal products. However, these are the most nutritious foods we can eat. This illustrates the importance of considering nutrition along with sustainability. Everything we do has an impact. Every choice we make requires resources. Shouldn’t we strive to make the best use of those resources rather than solely trying to limit our consumption?

Truly sustainable agriculture provides the healthiest food with the least environmental impact. On the other hand, grain agriculture wastes scarce resources because it does a poor job of producing calories that keep us healthy. If we want to feed the world sustainably, we need to (1) empower the poor to alleviate hunger, (2) defend healthy foods even if they come at a higher environmental cost, and (3) support sustainable agriculture to minimize the impact of healthy food production.

Human beings had millions of years to adapt to a diet that included meat, fish, and plants. Research within the ancestral health community has shown that our bodies function optimally when we eat the foods that have been a part of our diet for millennia. However, the exact proportions of meat, fish, and plants that we require to be healthy is not known and may even vary amongst the human population. The ancestral health community can provide an important voice in the sustainability conversation by addressing these issues in order to determine the best suite of diets for both health and environment.

The amount and variety of meat we need to eat to be healthy is still heavily debated. It is certainly possible that even the best polyculture farming systems would require a lot more resources to create meat than plant-based foods, which would make it harder to defend unchecked meat-eating. However, it is important that we focus this discussion on a real choice between healthy options - such as farming systems that incorporate only chickens when growing produce versus ones that focus on grass and cows. Arguing about how grains should be eaten, as junk food or as CAFO beef, will not lead us to an ethical and sustainable food system.

As the last few slides show, there are many ways to get involved - as a consumer, a citizen, and a member of the world community.

Educating yourself is the first step to action. Here is a list of resources.

Acknowledgements: I first want to thank my collaborator, Tess McEnulty, for encouraging me to submit this abstract, helping me seek out all of the data and sources for the material we presented, and being patient when I had to run off to take care of the baby in the middle of our work sessions! I also want to thank Gidon Eshel for useful discussions about the sustainability of different diets. And, of course, I want to thank the Ancestral Health Society and the AHS2012 organizers for giving us the opportunity to present this material and for putting together another stellar symposium!

Dude, TMI. (Part Two)

After years of worsening GI problems (described in gory detail in Part One), I finally got back to normal by eliminating all forms of dairy and heavily restricting my intake of gluten, a protein found in wheat, barley, and rye. Alleviating my symptoms required me to go outside of conventional medicine, leaving their diagnosis of IBS behind. Actually fixing the problem and healing my body took an even larger leap out of the box and introduced me to the amazing field of naturopathic medicine.

From TMI to TIM.

I attended the Ancestral Health Symposium 2011 as a volunteer interviewer. I was assigned several speakers to work with, which meant that I sat in on talks I might not have otherwise. One such talk was entitled, “The Rainforest in Your Gut” by Tim Gerstmar, naturopathic doctor, and “Dr. BG”, pharmacist, blogger, and author. I honestly had no idea what this talk would be about. I certainly never thought it could change my life!

The rainforest in your gut.

AHS Slides_DrBG and Tim Gerstmar

View more PowerPoint from Ancestry

It turns out that we have a whole biome of critters living in our digestive systems. In fact, there are more bacteria in your gut than there are cells in your body! And that’s a good thing because these bacteria keep your gut in good working order. Poor diet, especially one rich in foods that irritate the gut, can disrupt the gut biome leading to all kinds of GI symptoms, nutrient malabsorption, food intolerance, and even a condition called leaky gut. That’s when the lining of your gut is perforated, allowing toxins to enter the bloodstream and wreak havoc throughout your body.

In the first half of the talk, Dr. BG described in detail the inner workings of the gut and the different pathways by which an unhealthy gut can cause a whole host of problems. Some specific health problems she mentioned, that aren’t necessarily ones you would associate with diet, included fibromyalgia, rosacea, congestive heart failure, hypothyroidism, asthma, infant colic, and autism. These conditions are very highly correlated with intestinal permeability (leaky gut). In addition, IBS, obesity, hypertension, Type 2 diabetes, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, and fatty liver disease can be caused by diet and treated through diet and gut rehab.

Dr. BG also described her own experiences with both her daughter and her niece. Her daughter had chronic constipation since birth and constantly complained of stomach pain. Her niece, Jillian, was born with mild autism. Both kids saw tremendous improvement by switching to a less-irritating Paleo diet (Dr. BG and her sister are writing a book on their experience with Jillian's autism and diet, but as of this writing, it has not been released.). However, as Dr. BG explained, not everyone can be cured by simply adopting a more ancestral diet. Some people require more aggressive treatment, which can include an even stricter diet, adding fermented foods, or taking probiotic supplements to help restore the gut. As she said, to rehab the gut, we need to “seal it, heal it, and deal with the consequences”.

After Dr. BG's part of the presentation, Tim Gerstmar took over (~29 minutes into the video; slide 21). Tim is a naturopathic doctor at Aspire Natural Health in Washington State. His specialty is GI health, and he blew my mind with his description of basically all of my symptoms and all the tests and treatments he routinely performs, which I’d never heard of before.

Gut dysbiosis, as Tim explained, is caused by either pathogens or imbalance in the gut and is connected to food intolerance, malabsorption, inflammation, and gut permeability. He listed 5 symptoms that suggest a person might have gut dysbiosis: significant health problems that may or may not be obviously related to diet, chronic gas or bloating, chronic heartburn, chronic constipation or diarrhea, and poo that contains blood, mucus, or undigested food. This list definitely got my attention as it contains pretty much every symptom I had been suffering from! Even the undigested food that hadn’t set off any red flags with my regular doctor. Sadly, as Tim said, many of these ailments are common, but common is not the same as normal.

Tim described the types of tests he runs and how they can both diagnose the specific problems in someone’s gut and also show how well the person would respond to certain treatments. There are five treatment categories, which are often used together depending on how sick a person is and in what ways: diet, herbal medications, prescription medications, gut healing formulas, probiotics, and “brain support”.

When it comes to diet, the recommendations are stricter depending on how much healing your gut needs. Bacteria and pathogens that cause gut dysbiosis feed on carbs, so sugars, grains, and most fruit are the first things to go. Then, because the gut is already messed up, other irritants should also be avoided, including dairy, soy, alcohol, and even legumes and nightshades (like tomatoes). In time, as the gut becomes better able to process these foods, they may be worked back into the diet.

Now, this may sound like a lot of restrictions, but there is still a whole world of food out there that you can eat on a gut-healing diet. Vegetables (other than nightshades), meat, fish, nuts, coconut, perhaps some fruit, and fermented foods are all great. The diet recommendations for gut-healing are very similar to those of the Paleo, Primal, and other ancestral diets, although you may need to be more restrictive. There are many resources available online if you want to test out a gut-healing diet on your own (like here and here). The length of the diet (weeks to months) and how restrictive you would need to be would depend on the level of gut dysbiosis and permeability that you have.

Herbal or prescription medications and gut-healing formulas can really help bring the gut back into working order, but for these, you should be working with a doctor. For example, Tim uses cultures (i.e. poo) to identify the ways in which a person’s gut is malfunctioning, and that helps him decide which types of medications to use.

The long and winding road… to recovery.

For me, cutting out dairy improved my daily GI health the most. Cutting out gluten also helped. At that point, I found that I didn’t have problems with nightshades or fruit. However, foods with anti-nutrients akin to gluten did give me problems. Some legumes, like kidney beans, split peas, and certain kinds of lentils cause me a good deal of irritation, and the supposed super-food quinoa is virtually indigestible! 

Tim also helped me start on a daily regiment of probiotics. I took a ¼ teaspoon of Ther-biotic Complete powder each day, mixed in with my morning nut butter. Because I saw such a vast improvement from changing my diet, and because I got pregnant shortly after the symposium, I decided not to pursue further treatment aside from the probiotics. Even though I am feeling so much better, I still plan to continue taking probiotics in addition to my reformed diet. Our bodies used to get these important bacteria from traditionally-prepared fermented foods and even from dirt! However, our modern sterilization and pasteurization techniques (which are definitely good for keeping us safe from some life-threatening pathogens) kill off a lot of the beneficial bacteria that our bodies need. That makes it much harder in a modern diet to keep up a healthy gut biome. Incorporating traditionally-prepared fermented foods like kim chee, sauerkraut, and (unpasteurized) yogurt into your daily menu is a great way to keep yourself healthy. For me, though, the probiotics offer a more practical solution.

Over the past nine months, I have had a remarkable recovery. I now know the real meaning of “regular”. And, I can even eat dairy again! I keep my intake low – some organic pastured butter on our homemade popcorn or some yogurt with nuts and berries – but I don’t have to panic if I find a little cheese on my salad or if there is butter baked into a treat. I don’t know what would happen if I ate a slice of pizza or a plate of lasagna. I’m guessing I would feel pretty crappy, but I doubt I would have the painful cramps, bleeding, or week-long diarrhea that had become commonplace in my life. The interesting thing is, I don’t really miss those foods. I didn’t change my diet solely to rehabilitate my gut. I also did it because I realized how little actual nutrition was getting on my plate and in my body. Focusing on vegetables and other nutrient-dense foods has helped me gain energy, feel happier, lose weight, and cure my gut dysbiosis. There is simply nothing a slice of pizza, a giant soda, or a bowl of cereal can offer me that can compete with that!

Unfortunately, our industrial food system and the vast marketing machine that goes along with it makes it seem like cheaper and faster is the way to go when it comes to food. They highlight the use of whole grains or antioxidants as though they can magically transform any food into something healthy. But true health comes from fresh produce, clean eggs, meat, and fish, nuts, coconut, traditionally-prepared legumes, and fermented foods. These foods are more expensive and harder to market, but they are the nutritional winners and the best foods for us humans to eat. A truly ethical food system would provide more of these foods and less of the processed foods that our bodies are simply not able to handle. You, the consumer, can help by demanding the types of foods that keep us healthy and rejecting nutritionally-poor, potentially irritating foods. If we want to be healthy, we have to fight for it.

A full belly; a happy body.

When I was told I had IBS, it was like being told I was a flawed human being. My digestive system simply didn’t work properly, and it never would. When I removed dairy and gluten, I improved my health and my life, but I still thought of my body as broken. I could reduce my symptoms with certain behaviors, but I would never be cured. Now, I know otherwise. I do have to make smart choices – focusing on healthy foods rather than irritating ones – but I can feel good every day and still indulge in a treat now and then. And most of the foods I restrict really don’t have much to offer me anyway.

If you are struggling with GI symptoms, autoimmune problems, metabolic disorder, or depression, please consider changing your diet and seeking out a gut-specialist. Most importantly, do not give up! Do not go on suffering in silence because you are embarrassed or because a doctor has told you nothing can be done. Even if you do have a condition that can’t be “fixed”, such as Celiac disease, you can feel better. You deserve to be healthy.



 A few more notes:

- Think you might have gut dysbiosis? Tim explains an easy, do-it-yourself test on slide 33: take ¼ to 1 teaspoon of inulin, a natural soluble fiber found in chicory root and other foods. If it gives you a lot of gas and bloating, you have tested positive.

- Probiotics are especially important when taking antibiotics, another useful tool of modern medicine that can unfortunately cause gut dysbiosis. Birth control pills and a daily aspirin regiment can also mess with the bacteria in your gut, so both speakers highly recommended taking probiotics if you are also taking either of these medications.

- If you are in the hunt for a gut-specialist, Tim Gerstmar at Aspire Natural Health may be just the person you are looking for!

- Pregnant or trying to conceive? Gut dysbiosis in mom can lead to greater sensitivity and even autoimmune problems in baby. If you have GI problems before/during pregnancy, seriously consider a change of diet and incorporating fermented foods or probiotics. If you already have kids, and they are experiencing GI issues or suffering from autism or other developmental problems, they may need a diet change. This isn’t intended to place blame or make anyone feel guilty; there isn’t a lot of focus in prenatal care on these issues. We all know to take folic acid to prevent spinal problems, but no one mentions the dangers of gut irritants. So don’t waste time feeling bad, just get the help you and your baby need!

- I had the opportunity to interview Tim and Dr. BG at the symposium, but the video of the interview has still yet to become available. Should it surface, I'll be sure to add a link!

John Durant: Zoos and the importance of natural habitats.

Most of the time, a talk about zoos is going to focus either on the plight of captive animals or how we human animals are trapped in societal zoos. Either way, they are generally pretty depressing. But John Durant is not most people; he's a self-proclaimed modern caveman and a somewhat reluctant champion of the caveman lifestyle, despite his appearance on The Colbert Report.

John's talk at the Ancestral Health Symposium began with the history of zoos and with the story of Jumbo, one of the most famous circus elephants ever. And yes, this part was a bit depressing. The first zoos treated animals like statues, separating them into stark, cement cages and removing them completely from the natural world. The animals did not thrive. Zoos became more sophisticated over time, but the priorities of the zoo designers were off. Habitats incorporated more elements of nature, but they were designed to be visually appealing to people rather than animals. As John put it, the purpose of zoos has changed from status symbols to entertainment to education to, finally, conservation. We have now learned that the key to keeping zoo animals healthy is to replicate as much of their natural environment as possible. The present state of zoos and attitudes toward zoo design follow this paradigm. For example, the depth of water features in penguin habitats are now determined based on the diving behavior of penguins observed in the wild. Studies of wild animals also inform the diets of animals in captivity.

It seems obvious, doesn't it? Any given species, from lions to turtles, evolved in a specific region under specific conditions. Each species found its own way to adapt to its environment and create a niche that would allow it to survive. Hence, animals have the best chance to live and reproduce in those natural environments to which they adapted throughout time. Even human animals.

We, too, perform best under the conditions to which our bodies and minds adapted over the whole of human history. To be clear, John is not advocating that we all go back to living in caves. There are quite a number of novel aspects of our habitat that are positive (flush toilets and antibiotics are two that come to mind). Rather, the idea is the same as with zoos – to the extent possible, replicate your natural environment to enable yourself to reach your full potential. John elaborated on this idea in our interview. Even in a modern world, we can get back in touch with our past by taking walks, eating a prehistoric diet, and sleeping in a dark quiet place, undisturbed by modern “advances” such as alarm clocks, nightlights, honking horns, or that red indicator light on the fire alarm. Visiting zoos, John pointed out, is a great way for us to reconnect with animals and nature in a way that is reminiscent of our paleolithic past. When it comes to exercise, be outside whenever possible. Preferably barefoot.

Barefoot? Yes, John is a big supporter of the barefoot and minimalist shoe movement. In fact, at the interview, he was wearing what looked like a flat piece of wood with a rope cord woven through it, wrapping around his toe and ankle. My flip flops would look like orthopedic support shoes next to these things. As John explained, our feet are designed for walking and running. Up until the very recent invention of shoes, our feet got us everywhere we needed to go, without arch support or motion control or custom orthotics. Our feet are incredibly sophisticated and instantly responsive. They are already the best running shoes we could ever have.

I think what makes people like John Durant is that he is genuine and humble. He lives like a caveman because it makes him healthy and happy, not so he can be famous or rich or sell you something. John practices what he preaches, and I think he's a lot more interested in living than preaching. Despite having been interviewed by Stephen Colbert, John actually seemed nervous to speak with me and worried about how he would do in the interview. John, if you are reading this, it was a pleasure.

But what does all this teach me about ethical eating? When I started this journey, I was most focused on the corn industry, especially the ways in which it contributes to environmental damage and the link between cheap corn feed and the development of confined animal feeding operations. CAFOs do a great deal of environmental damage in their own right. Plus, the animal waste has proven harmful to people in neighboring communities. And, for me, the absolutely appalling conditions these animals have to endure make any food produced in this way totally unpalatable.

As I have learned more about the important links between health and ancestral diets – both for humans and animals – our system looks more and more broken. Grain subsidies (corn, wheat, and soy) make novel, refined foods the cheapest and most abundant calories on the market. Combined with refined sugars, these foods appear to the be basis for Western diseases like diabetes, heart disease, obesity, cancer, Alzheimer's, and many autoimmune disorders. We are sick, and the animals we eat are sick.

I consider an ethical food system to be one that provides healthy food over many generations. To achieve this, we must reject diets based on refined grains, added sugars, and meat from unhealthy animals. One of the things I learned from John is that both animals and humans achieve healthfulness in the same way - by embracing our nature. We depend on animals as a food source; for us to be healthy, we need to keep them healthy too.

Below, you can watch John's interview and follow along with his slides. Eventually, the slides will be embedded, and I'll provide an updated link.

"Wild animals, zoos, and you: The influence of habitat on health" by John Durant

Wild Animals, Zoos, and You: The Influence of Habitat on Health (John Durant)

You can also listen to John's answers to my questions in this video (which may also be updated soon):

John Durant Interview at #AHS11 from Ancestry on Vimeo.

Get Real! A chance for real progress.

According to the chart below (from the USDA), 64% of the calories in the average American's diet comes in the form of flour & cereal grains, added fats & oils, and caloric sweeteners. That means nearly two-thirds of the average person's calories provide no nutrition that isn't added through fortification. Eating fresh fruits and vegetables could easily provide the fiber and nutrients added to cereal and other grain products; the sweetened beverages and vegetable oils are basically useless. This statistic highlights just how far our population is from a diet composed of real foods: minimally processed, nutrient-dense foods such as vegetables, fruit, nuts, legumes, and quality meat and seafood.


Part of the problem is that processed foods are cheap compared to whole, fresh foods because the ingredients are heavily subsidized. Unfortunately, the process by which we grow corn, wheat, and soy (and thus produce things like high fructose corn syrup and soybean oil) is highly unsustainable. Rampant water usage, dependence on fossil fuels to keep the machinery going, pesticide runoff contaminating water supplies, soil erosion and nutrient depletion, and loss of biodiversity all damage the environment in which we live. The uniformity of our cropping systems leaves us vulnerable to disease or pests, which could lead to a serious food crisis.

A whole market has been created to capitalize on our surplus of these cheap raw materials. High fructose corn syrup is in almost every processed product in the grocery store because it's a cheap sweetener; humans are hard-wired to crave sweet foods, so you are more likely to buy more bread (for example) if it's sweeter. The beef industry can produce vast quantities of cheap meat because it can fatten the cows on grains. Of course, to do this requires that the animals be confined in huge feeding operations and dosed with antibiotics because grains actually make cows sick. The animal waste from these CAFOs contaminates ground water, contributes heavily to greenhouse gas emissions, and is absolutely disgusting to be around. The abundant use of antibiotics is leading to resistant strains of viruses as these “super bugs” adapt. Factory farms rely on cheap grains to make cheap meat, which means that neither of these foods are sustainable in the long-term.

The Paleo community advocates a real food diet with some specific restrictions: no grains, no vegetable oils, no added sugars. Instead, people are encouraged to eat vegetables, pastured meats and eggs, seafood, nuts and nut butters, and some fruit. Legumes are a grey area, as is pastured dairy – people are advised to experiment with these foods to determine whether or not they can be tolerated. This isn't a temporary diet with pre-made bars and shakes you can get from the grocery store. You can't be convenience store Paleo; this is a lifestyle change. Many of the people I talked with at the Ancestral Health Symposium prepare most of their own food including snacks like jerky and trail mix. Many of them garden, can, and preserve food. And everyone I spoke to emphasized the need for carefully-sourced animal products. After all, these are people who are convinced that eating ancestrally is the key to optimal health – and that's true for animals as well as people.

These folks sound a lot like me. I may eat less meat and more lentils, but we all consider the current food system unsustainable and unhealthy. We all eat real food.

One of the reasons I was so excited for the AHS was the opportunity to speak with other real foodies about the challenges we face in reforming the food system – making it more sustainable, accessible, healthful, and secure. Strangely, I heard more about troubles with vegetarians than with grain subsidies. Why vegetarians? The Paleo community advocates an evolutionary approach to diet and health in which animal products play a significant role. Vegetarians, on the other hand, do not eat meat and often exclude seafood as well; vegans avoid all animal products including eggs, dairy, and even honey. The question of whether or not eating meat is ethical, sustainable, or even healthy has apparently caused quite a bit of friction between the two groups.

I think this argument is a big waste of time and a major missed opportunity for positive change. A real food vegetarian - one who focuses on fresh fruits and vegetables, adds nuts and nut butters, eats pastured eggs, and avoids processed crap - is eating a diet much closer to Paleo than the majority of Americans. More importantly, the policy changes that would help make a produce-dominated diet cheaper and more accessible than a grain-based diet (including grain-fed animal products) would benefit a real food vegetarian as much as someone on a Paleo diet. We should be allies in this fight against unhealthy processed food and polluting CAFOs that cause a great deal of animal suffering.

Of course, not every vegetarian or vegan eats real food. Many of them survive on cereal and pasta and drink soda. Just like most Americans who also eat meat. Whether you make Rice-a-roni with conventional ground beef or crumbled veggie burger, you are not eating a nutritionally-dense, healthy meal. The healthfulness of a fast-food cheeseburger, fries, and soda does not hinge on the all-beef patty. To put it simply, meat is not the central issue in terms of health.

When it comes to the environment, conventional meat (especially red meat) really is the worst thing you can eat. Meat production doesn't have to be that way though. Pasture-raised meat from integrated farms can actually be good for the environment. And, as I've said already, grain agriculture does a lot of damage all on its own. Creating a food system that is sustainable over the long-term does not hinge solely on meat but rather on producing and eating real food.

If you agree that (1) eating real food is the key to good health and (2) promoting a real food lifestyle is an important step in achieving a just and sustainable food system, then you are part of the real food movement, and I am here to recruit you. Eco-vegetarian, sustaileo, or whatever – you can be on my team any day.

So what do we need to do? Back in January, I attempted to map out issues relevant to sustainable food systems. Many of them are particularly relevant to the real food movement. They are:

1. Reforming farm subsidies.

This one should come as no surprise given my above rant about industrial agriculture. Subsidies that encourage farmers to grow as much corn, wheat, and soy as they possibly can has left us with vast monocultures, environmental damage, really poor farmers (seriously), and a surplus of junk calories that make us sick. It is also the foundation for the grain-feeding, CAFO system that contributes even more to our environmental problems and is really just cruel. Our food system will have to change eventually as the resources on which they rely become more scarce, but minimizing the pain of transitioning away from this system is an important challenge.

What we likely need is a transition subsidy program, similar to the tobacco buy-out, in which farmers can still collect payments without actually growing corn, wheat, or soy. After a prescribed amount of time (the tobacco buy-out lasted 10 years), all subsidies would end. Some farmers would stick with grains, but many others would switch to other types of foods because they can actually make more money. We could even go a step further and attempt to incentivize switching to integrated farming systems or offer additional programs to help farmers go in that direction. I know my libertarian readers won't like that idea as much (yes, I'm recruiting real food libertarians too!), but it's going to take some work to get the land back into growing shape, and we need at least some of the farmers to choose to stick around.

2. Enabling small farmers.

The food industry – from growers through to retailers, in both conventional and organic markets – has become increasingly concentrated (read more here). A few large companies control the vast majority of market share. These companies have the ability to affect legislation, either to stop new regulations that would dip into profits or to direct regulations to stifle small businesses that would compete for market share.

A recent example was the Food Safety Modernization Act, a bill to overhaul food handling regulations to help prevent the spread of food-borne illnesses. In its original form, the bill would have applied the same regulations to all farms regardless of size. Small-scale farmers and their advocates were against the bill because it would effectively put them out of business. Also, many regulations that seemed totally reasonable for a large-scale operation just didn't make sense for a small family farm. The big companies were quite happy with the bill until an amendment was proposed – the Tester-Hagen amendment – which excepted small farms that sold their goods locally and directly to consumers. With Big Food now against the bill, it nearly died. However, enough people expressed their support for the bill, in the form of calls and letters, that it eventually passed.

Fighting for small-scale/family farms is important. They provide food, yes, but they also provide a choice. You can actually go to a small farm and witness their growing practices and how they treat their animals. And with enough small farms, you can actually choose based on your own values. All the rules of economics, of market pressure and voting with your dollar, can work in this system because you have access to the information that would enable you to make a decision and (ideally) a variety of options that allows you to choose exactly what you want. If you want a polyculture farm that grows seasonal varieties and incorporates animals such that they can express their natural behaviors, you can go find that farm – IF we protect them.

3. Improving school lunches.

School lunches in the Unites States are generally awful. French fries count as vegetables, and foods like pizza, burgers, and chicken fingers are common offerings. These foods are heavily processed, provide little nutritional value, and do nothing to educate children as to where food comes from or that nutrition is important. However, there are now programs across the country connecting schools with local farms that can provide fresh produce for school lunches. In many schools with Farm to School programs, involvement with the farms goes beyond a well-stocked salad bar. The farm relationship is used as a teaching tool – a way to expose kids to food systems, nutrition, and even biology and ecology. Some schools even create their own gardens and can literally see the fruits of their labors served up in the cafeteria. Children today (and really all people) are bombarded by messages that they should eat things that taste good, that healthy food does not taste good, and that all calories are the same. A slice of pizza, with some potato chips and a soda, includes all the food groups and is so constantly available that it must be okay to eat, right? Wrong. We need to fight against these messages by connecting kids with the land, their food, and their bodies.

4. Making real food more accessible to the poor.

Nearly 1 in 4 Americans are helped by the government's Nutrition Assistance Program, which includes food stamps and WIC. That's a LOT of people. Allowing these benefits to be used at Farmers Markets gives people access to fresh produce that will help them lead healthier lives – a benefit to both our citizens and our future tax dollars. Both the WIC program and the benefit program for seniors now offer vouchers in addition to the regular benefit that can only be redeemed for fresh fruit, vegetables, or herbs at participating farmers markets. However, the federal benefit is capped at $30 per person per year. My husband and I spend that much at our local farm stand each week! State programs can build on the federal benefit, and many states now have programs that double federal benefits for produce and programs to get EBT card readers installed at more farmers markets. Strengthening these programs will help people get the nutrition they need, develop better health habits that they can use even after they have stopped relying on food stamps, and contributes to local economies.


There are already many organizations working on all of these issues. Until I can create a Real Food Political Action Committee for you all to join, the following organizations are good places to get involved. You can also go back to my Food Sustain-o-sphere post for more links in other areas.

National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition
NCAT Sustainable Agriculture Project
Understanding the Farm Bill: A Citizen's Guide to a Better Food System
Community Alliance for Family Farmers
USDA Farm to School Program
National Farm to School Network
The Edible Schoolyard Project

Of course, there are still going to be disagreements between those in the vegetarian camp and those who call themselves Paleo. The question of what constitutes a healthy diet is an important one that we should continue to research. In the meantime, though, we should not let our differences keep us from real progress. There are many ways in which we could improve our food system and deliver more real food to the public for the benefit of us all; the above are only a few of the issues ripe for collaboration. We may not all agree that Meatless Monday is a good idea, but we can probably all endorse Sodaless Saturday! So I say to you, Real Foodies, Unite!

AHS 2011 Photojournal.

They say a word is worth one millipicture (or something like that). Here's my 2.5 day symposium experience in pictures.


We kicked things off with a Paleo BBQ at event co-organizer Aaron Blaisdell's house. People kicked off their shoes - literally, there were at least 50 pairs of Vibram FiveFingers on the porch! Christian manned the grill, cooking up grass-fed steaks, wild boar bacon, and a whole salmon.

Early the next morning, it was off to the symposium where I met many Paleo celebrities. People were so friendly and gracious. Amazing!


Mark Sisson and I chatted about my interest in sustainability; he coined the phrase Sustaileo, which I will totally use in the future! My conversation with Robb Wolf started with "Hey, you know you ruined my life..." Seriously, once you read his book, you just can't keep doing the same wrong things you have always done! I met Denise at the welcome reception. She was the first person I actually recognized, and she was kind enough to help me put faces to the names I'd been hearing. Thanks, Denise!


Most of the interview team had never done interviews before. The first day had its ups and downs, but we eventually got into the swing of things. We managed to have at least one interviewer at every talk and interview all but five speakers. And it only took 16 hour days to accomplish!


We really could not have pulled this all off without the dedicated team of volunteers. These guys showed up early to set up, made sure the video cameras and audio support were going strong, and stuck around to clean up at the end of each day. Even though the interview team was technically also made up of volunteers, I felt like I really relied on everyone. I especially want to thank Tony for letting me rest on his shoulder - I really needed a nap!

This was a terrific experience, and I met so many great people. And remember, just say no to gluten!

The Woodstock of Evolutionary Medicine (Part One): 72 hours of awesome.

This past weekend, I spent three days on and around the campus of UCLA for the first (but hopefully not last) Ancestral Health Symposium – a gathering of researchers, teachers, bloggers, and enthusiasts who take an evolutionary biology approach to understanding the impact of nutrition and lifestyle on human health. Over 50 speakers presented talks and posters on topics such as the optimal human diet, fitness from an evolutionary stand-point, how to evaluate scientific “discoveries” presented in the media, the impact of a produce-based diet versus a grain-based diet, and specific biochemical pathways of disease.

I was lucky enough to attend the symposium as part of the interview team. Our dedicated journalists and camera crew managed to interview almost every speaker! It was a grueling few days – we started work at 7am and didn't head to dinner until 9pm – but every minute was worth it! In the coming weeks, all of the presentations will be posted online along with our interviews. I'll be sure to link to them as they become available. In the meantime, I'll give you an overview of what I learned at the symposium (this post) and the amazing presenters I was lucky enough to interview as part of a continuing series.

Here's a list of the people I interviewed:

• Mark Nathan Cohen, PhD – SUNY Plattsburgh (Anthropology)
• Staffan Lindeberg, MD, PhD – University of Lund, Sweden
• Don Matesz, MS
• Dr. BG, PharmD and blogger
• Tim Gerstmar, ND - Aspire Natural Health
• Nell Stephenson – Nutritionist and Ironman triathlete
• Matt Metzgar, PhD – University of North Caroline, Charlotte (Economics)
• John Durant - professional caveman
• Frank Forencich - fitness trainer
• James O'Keefe, MD

I also had the pleasure of meeting some of the big names in the Paleo diet community including Robb Wolf, Gary Taubes, Denise Minger, Mark Sisson, Tom Naughton, and co-organizer Adam Blaidsdell. What a welcoming and inspiring community!

The original human diet.

Before I get into all the information presented at the symposium, let me give you a brief overview of human health and how it has changed with time. I promise to provide more details and references when I get to the specific presenters, especially when I discuss doctor and medical researcher Staffan Lindeberg and anthropologist Mark Nathan Cohen. You can also read about their findings in the following places:

• Lindeberg's website
• Food and Western Disease, by S. Lindeberg
• Cohen's website
• Health and the Rise of Civilization, by M. Cohen

Agriculture is a relatively recent human invention. Before that, we were hunter-gatherers (HGs) who survived on a diet of mainly animal proteins and fats, vegetables, fruits, and nuts. The average life span of HGs (i.e. life expectancy) was only about 30 years, but that was mainly due to infant mortality, lack of modern medicine to treat infections and injuries, and a rather high likelihood of being eaten by a lion. Hunter-gatherer communities had many elderly people, and their skeletal remains indicate a lack of many diseases we attribute to old age in our modern society. Studies of the few remaining primitive communities have also shown a lack of the so-called “diseases of civilization” including diabetes and obesity, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, stroke, dementia and Alzheimer's, cancer, osteoporosis, and auto-immune disease. Within a primitive tribe in Papua New Guinea – the Kitavans – about 6% of the population is over age 65. These people are very healthy and those who survive to age 45 have similar life expectancy to people in modern societies.

Our ancestors were much healthier during their hunter-gatherer years than after making the switch to a grain-based agricultural diet. Post the advent of agriculture, humans lost several inches in height and began developing these new diseases that had not been present in their ancestors. Disease and death were not only due to the change in diet but also the changes in lifestyle. Agriculture required communities to settle, leading to higher population density and more communicable disease, and the potential for conquest. Life expectancy actually went down post-agriculture. In the 1800's, for example, the life expectancy in Ireland dropped to only about 20 years and was even lower for certain societal classes. Only in recent decades has life expectancy increased, mainly due to medical advances and a safer environment, and we have finally returned to our pre-agriculture size.

Understanding why agriculture led to poorer health outcomes than the hunter-gatherer lifestyle is the main goal of the ancestral health community. Of the many presentations and conversations I was involved in throughout the symposium, there were several points of agreement within the community.

What I learned on my summer vacation.

1. A modern day, grain-based, processed food diet is a major contributing factor in most of the diseases we attribute to old age or random chance, including (but not limited to) dementia and Alzheimer's, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, arthritis and other inflammation, cancer, osteoporosis, PCOS, IBS and other digestive problems, and auto-immune disorders like multiple sclerosis, Celiac disease, lupus, and fibromyalgia. Of course, diet is the main contributing factor to obesity, Type 2 diabetes, and other metabolic disorders. These diseases do not appear in modern day hunter-gatherer tribes, and to the extent that they can be diagnosed from skeletal remains, there is no evidence that our pre-agricultural ancestors suffered from any of these diseases.

2. A diet that includes only whole foods – vegetables, fruit, pasture-raised meat and eggs, seafood, and nuts – is the diet to which humans are best adapted. The optimal human diet does NOT include gluten (a protein found in wheat, barley, and rye), added sugars, vegetable oils (especially corn and soybean) and most dairy products. Beans, peanuts, and lentils should be minimized or avoided due to these plants' natural defenses against being eaten. Whether or not you eat meat, a grain-based diet is bad for you and for the environment.

3. Getting fat is not caused by eating fat. Breaking the body's natural processes for controlling appetite, absorbing nutrients, and storing/accessing energy in the form of fat is what causes people to gain weight and struggle to lose weight. Therefore, regulating your insulin response is a key factor in overall health and wellness.

4. The specific break-down of foods and macronutrients that lead to optimal health may depend on your heritage and current state of health. For example, someone who's ancestors hail from Sub-Saharan Africa may be better adapted to certain foods than the descendants of, say, Scandinavians. Also, a person with metabolic syndrome – obesity or Type 2 diabetes – may require a stricter diet in order to restore insulin sensitivity.

5. Whole grains are NOT healthy. There are no nutrients you can get from grains that you cannot get from vegetables or fruit, and gluten is toxic to humans.

6. Sugar used to be a scarce and precious commodity; now it is prolific. Whether in the form of high fructose corn syrup, table sugar, agave nectar, honey, refined grains, or alcohol, sugar is a dangerous substance that must not be over-consumed. Always eat your sugars with fiber, such as in the form of fruit. Do not eat fake sugars. Do not drink sugar.

7. If you have unexplained digestive problems (e.g. bloating, constipation, diarrhea, or heart burn), skin problems including acne or rosacea, auto-immune disorders, metabolic syndrome, or unexplained pain or stiffness, you should seriously consider changing your diet. Meeting with a holistic medical practitioner, especially one who specializes in nutrition and health, may help you with your recovery.

8. Ancestral health is a useful approach to studying human health and wellness. However, “because cavemen did it” should not be the only metric by which we determine the impact of any particular behavior. Scientific investigation into why certain ancestral behaviors were more beneficial than modern ones is essential to improving human health.

9. Lifestyle behaviors such as sleep, stress, and movement are important contributing factors in human health and well-being.

10. Poor people, especially those relying on food stamps, WIC, or other government services are ill-served by the USDA's nutritional advice to eat whole grains and low-fat meat and dairy. Also, adhering to a healthy ancestral diet may be out of reach for many people, due to cost, time to buy and prepare foods, limited access to unprocessed whole foods, and lack of nutritional and/or culinary knowledge.

Beyond these main conclusions, there are several issues still being debated within the ancestral health community such as:

• How much protein/meat/starch/fruit should people eat? Is there one set of guidelines that will work for everyone, or do people need to experiment to find an optimal diet?
• Conventional, low-fat dairy has been linked to auto-immune disorders and other health problems. Is raw/whole/pasture-raised/fermented dairy equally harmful?
• What are the key studies that need to be done to advance our understanding of nutrition, lifestyle, and human health?

There was a ton of information packed into only two days of talks, but there were a few topics that were absent or seemed under-developed. The only specific food I didn't hear much about was soy. Fermented soy was briefly mentioned as having positive health benefits, and soybean oil was definitely labeled as bad. Corn and soybeans dominate the vast monocrop industrial farms that demand scarce resources and pollute the environment, so there are solid ethical reasons for avoiding these products. However, I would have liked to hear more about the health impacts of different soy products such as edamame or tofu versus soy milk or soy lecithin.

The majority of the symposium focused on why/how certain behaviors contribute to better or poorer health and how to implement positive practices into modern life. Other than additional research, I didn't come away with a strong sense of what needs to be done to disseminate this information and help more people modify their diets and lifestyles. How can the ancestral health community connect with members of other communities (e.g. sustainable agriculture, global food and poverty, or policy advocacy groups) to achieve common goals such as moving away from grain-based agriculture or revising nutritional standards? What policy changes should the community be advocating for, and how do we mobilize people to make these changes?

If the goal is a healthy human population, in which an ancestral diet is widely accessible and sustainable, what are the steps needed to achieve that goal? If we prioritized polycultures, how many people could we feed a Paleo diet? Given that this is a blog about sustainable food systems, this last point is the one I want to focus on in the future. Although produce plays a big role in ancestral diets, most Paleo diet cookbooks and blogs advocate getting the majority of your calories from animal products. Of course, this has implications for sustainability because the volume of meat that can be produced in a sustainable and ethical manner may be limited. However, author and presenter Don Matesz suggested that humans may not need to eat quite as much meat as some Paleo proponents advocate and, furthermore, he thinks too much meat can also lead to health problems. I'll go into more detail later, but I was very encouraged by my discussions with Don. A diet in which meat and seafood are consumed only on a weekly basis rather than every day or at every meal may still be healthy insofar as you can get enough iron and B12 eating this way. Getting enough protein may require more eggs, seafood, or meat especially since beans and lentils can cause digestive problems and should be consumed only in moderation if at all. Even nuts and nut butters should probably be limited to a few servings per day. A low-meat diet with perhaps more ethical eggs and seafood, supplemented with some lentils and nuts, sounds like the best option for me.

If you are interested in learning more about a Paleo/ancestral diet, be sure to check back for more posts in this series and links to the presentation/interview videos. Also, check out the following websites:

• Mark's Daily Apple (Mark Sisson)
• The Paleo Solution (Robb Wolf)
• Primal Girl (Tara Grant)
• Raw Food SOS (Denise Minger)

For more on why sugar is especially bad for humans, watch Sugar: The Bitter Truth, by medical researcher and symposium presenter Robert Lustig.