Julian Cribb, award-winning journalist and author of The Coming Famine, will give the international keynote address to attendees at the International Foodservice Sustainability Symposium (IFSS), May 24-25, 2011 in Chicago, immediately following NRA Show 2011.The event is being supported by co-founding sponsors the National Restaurant Association Conserve: Solutions for Sustainability initiative and Kendall College.
The book, published late last summer, examines the confluence of a number of sustainability-related issues that are likely to come together over the next few decades to form a perfect storm that portends worldwide famine.Cribb addresses the usual culprits like fossil fuels, climate change and overfished oceans, but he also tackles what he calls “the two elephants in the kitchen” – population growth and overconsumption. He says the world is headed not just for peak oil, but also for peak population, water, arable land, and agricultural output.
Recently interviewed about his coming address at IFSS, Mr. Cribb said, “I’m very excited to speak to this audience because chefs and the foodservice industry decree the fashion of food. In creating food trends, they become the intellectual leaders of the world’s diet and hold the keys to persuading the population to eat more sustainably, a critical part of heading off the coming famine.”
“As soon as I picked up his book, I knew that Julian Cribb would be the perfect international keynoter for the International Foodservice Sustainability Symposium,” stated conference organizer Cindy Railing, principal of Railing & Associates. “While the facts are hair-raising, unlike many of its genre, The Coming Famine proposes solutions with actions that can be taken to head off what Mr. Cribb explains is the greatest challenge faced in the ten thousand years since agriculture began.”
The IFSS begins at 3:00 PM at Kendall College on May 24, immediately after the close of NRA Show 2011, and it will conclude late the next afternoon, allowing everyone to return home well ahead of the Memorial Day weekend. The schedule is condensed but it’s jam-packed with programming. For more information go to www.ifssymposium.org. Attendance is limited to 150 people, so register soon.
Posted on 04/10/11 by Allison