Book

Food Fight: From Plunder and Profit to People and Planet

Published on 19 April 2025

Stuart Gillespie – a veteran of four decades at the frontline of global food policy – exposes how malnutrition is enmeshed with other crises and what we can all do to turn things around.

Food is life but our food system is killing us. Designed in a different century for a different purpose – to mass-produce cheap calories to prevent famine – it’s now generating obesity, ill-health and driving the climate crisis. We need to transform it into a system that can nourish all eight billion of us and the planet we live on.

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In Food Fight, Stuart Gillespie reveals how the system we once relied upon for global nutrition has warped into the very thing making us sick. From its origins in colonial plunder through to the last few decades of neoliberalism, the system now lies in the tight grip of a handful of powerful transnationals who are playing for profit at any cost – aided by governments who let them get away with it. With his eye trained on the future and on solutions within our grasp, Gillespie also celebrates the impact of success stories from around the world, driven by remarkable citizens, social movements, policy makers and politicians. These case studies offer hope that, by organising and learning, we can build a better food future for ourselves and for our children.

Both unflinching exposé and revolutionary call to arms, Food Fight maps a way towards a new system that gives us hope for a future of global health and justice.

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Reviews

‘Scholarly, literate and deeply moving, this isn’t just a good read, it’s an essential reference for anyone hoping to understand the food system, why it’s broken and how we might imagine fixing it’
Chris Van Tulleken author of Ultra Processed People.

 

Cite this publication

Gillespie, S. (2025) Food Fight: From Plunder to Profit to People and Planet, Edinburgh: Canongate Books

Authors

Stuart Gillespie

Honorary Associate

Publication details

isbn
9781837260430

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About this publication

Programmes and centres
Food Equity Centre

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