Never Out of Season: How Having the Food We Want When We Want It Threatens Our Food Supply and Our Future

Dunn (The Man Who Touched His Own Heart), professor of applied ecology at NC State, cautions against monoculture in this cogent and optimistic examination of our food system, arguing that having whatever food we want whenever we want isn’t necessarily a good thing. Using the banana as an example, Dunn shows how the desire for consistency and uniformity in a particular product often ignores the larger picture. Once upon a time, there were all sorts of bananas, but in recent decades commercially available bananas have largely been the Cavendish variety. They are “all genetically identical” and susceptible to an evolved version of the pathogen that destroyed Gros Michel bananas before them. Dunn also looks back at the causes and effects of the Irish potato famine in the 1840s and the threats to African cassava crops during the 1970s. His discussions of Soviet botanist Nikolai Vavilov’s remarkable seed collection in the 1940s are inspiring, and he celebrates the work and commitment of the specialists tasked with guarding it during the WWII siege of Leningrad. That scientists and researchers continue to play significant roles in the fight for agricultural diversity and sustainability gives Dunn hope. Agent: Victoria Pryor, Arcadia Literary. (Mar.)