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Unveiling the Future of Food

Unveiling the Future of Food

Pioneers, Progress, and Possibilities

Aidan Weinmann
October 20, 2023

Hey - I hope you’re doing well.

In today’s newsletter, we’re going to unveil a key to your well-being: the food system.

The trouble is, the American food system is currently set up to fail.

It’s not only making us sick, but it’s also destroying the planet and depleting the nation’s valuable resources in the process…

Nearly 90% of American adults are grappling with metabolic issues, or the way our brains & bodies generate energy. These metabolic problems show up as alarming surges in conditions like Alzheimer’s, depression, attention disorders, heart disease, infertility, and many others.

But here’s the real kicker… these lifestyle-related health problems are only continuing to rise, courtesy of the modern industrialized food system. This system, coupled with the colossal $4 trillion healthcare industry, has almost no incentive to make things right.

So, here are questions that come to mind for me:

How can we create a food system that promotes accessibility, sustainability, and health for people & the planet?
As populations continue to rise, where will the food for the next three billion people come from?

Fortunately, there are visionary innovators out there, revolutionizing the way we think about food. And they're not just reimagining it; they're actively creating it.

In fact, many of them are joining together today & tomorrow for the Future Food Right Now Conference.

It’s entirely virtual, features nearly 30 speakers with a wide-range of health-based experience, and comes with a special $25 offer with the code: FUTUREFOOD50.

The best part? You’ll get access to all the recordings from the entire weekend, totaling over twenty hours of content, all focused on how to fix our food system.

Here’s what you can expect to learn:

How to tackle the food waste dilemma.
How to live more sustainably, and hydroponic gardening can help.
How regenerative organic farming can regenerate our soil.
How Regenerative Healthcare & a food as medicine approach can transform healthcare.
And so much more

Today, we’re going to explore two of these topics, Regenerative Healthcare and Hydroponic Gardening.

The reason behind this focus is simple - two individuals dear to my heart, Nadine Clopton (my partner), and FX Rouxel (my CEO), will be sharing their expertise on these subjects during this weekend’s conference.

Regenerative Agriculture is having a cultural moment thanks to the premiere of Common Ground, a Tribeca film that “connects Regenerative Farming, Politics, and Public Health.”

In short, Regenerative Agriculture is a sustainable approach to farming that seeks to improve soil health and mitigate climate change by emphasizing practices that work in harmony with natural ecosystems and reduce reliance on synthetic inputs.

The documentary is narrated by a star-filled group of actor-activists, such as Laura Dern, Jason Momoa, and Donald Glover, and from what I understand, it expands upon the decades of farming research from the Rodale Institute.

Founded in 1947 by J.I. Rodale, the Rodale Institute is a research non-profit that focuses on the philosophy: Health Soil = Healthy Food = Health People.

More specifically, Rodale investigates the unintended & overlooked repercussions of conventional, chemical-based farming. These include soil degradation, water pollution, reduced nutrient-density, the presence of toxic residues in our food supply, and subsequently, gut dysbiosis, which contributes to the metabolic issues we mentioned earlier.

After over 100 years of research, Rodale is putting the science behind the viability of a global food system rooted in regenerative organic agriculture.

I’ve had the privilege & blessing of learning about this movement firsthand, through the eyes and heart of my partner, Nadine Clopton.

At Rodale, she's building the Regenerative Healthcare program from the “soil up,” as she likes to say.

Last year, she organized the first-ever medical conference on a farm, where doctors, farmers, and medical practitioners got together to consider how working together could transform our healthcare system.

In her own words, “Regenerative healthcare is a vision for the future in which healthy farming practices inform a prevention-based approach to human health.

Rather than relying on toxic chemical inputs to solve agricultural issues and pharmaceutical intervention to cure disease, regenerative healthcare aims to prevent disease through an organic, whole-foods diet that starts on farms that work in harmony with nature.”

FX Rouxel is the founder & CEO of Gardyn, the hydroponic gardening start-up that I’ve been working at since June 2022.

In 2019, FX stepped away from a C-Suite position at a global consulting firm and set out on a mission to reimagine how we grow produce - making it sustainable for our planet and easily accessible so everyone can enjoy nutrient-rich foods with ease.

Grounded in that mission, he launched Gardyn, an AI-driven hydroponic farming technology that yields the same amount of produce as a 1,300 sq ft outdoor vegetable garden, while standing at just 2 square feet.

This approach is nothing short of revolutionary… the technology is pesticide & waste free, uses 95% less water than traditional farming practices, eliminates food waste, and makes a beautiful addition to any living space.

To date, the company has saved 33 million gallons of water and 380,000 pounds of pesticides, while growing over 2 million pounds of fresh produce.

I’m immensely grateful to have the opportunity to take part in and contribute to this meaningful cause.

During this weekend’s session, FX will share Gardyn’s origination story, as well as many of the reasons why hydroponic gardening will transform the way we produce and consume food in the world.

As he said himself during a statement for Gardyn’s partnership at the White House Conference of Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, “Gardyn’s mission has always been to help everyone have a healthy lifestyle, sustainably.

We believe in the urgent need to make healthy food easily accessible and affordable for everyone, everywhere. Food deserts should be no more in this new century. Educating kids early on about healthy habits and real food is the best way to build healthy habits as they grow into adults.”