Dan Charles

Scientists at four leading universities have seen their soybean experiments injured by a stealthy vandal: drifting fumes from a weedkiller called dicamba, now popular among farmers.

According to a new study of cocoa-producing cooperatives, Fair Trade certification boosts the income of small farmers, but those benefits aren't shared with their hired workers.

North Carolina's governor is promising to quickly cut greenhouse emissions but will need to convince Duke Energy, the state's dominant utility, to abandon coal and gas in favor of solar and wind.

Grocery stores are full of food with labels that appeal to a consumer's ideals, like organic, cage-free or Fair Trade. But there's often a gap between what they seem to promise and what they deliver.

The world's most widely used weed killer was once seen as one of the safest pesticides. Now it is blamed for causing cancer. Yet the scientific evidence remains disputed.

Crops that have had their DNA tweaked with new gene-editing tools are entering the food supply. But governments are struggling to figure out how — or even whether — to regulate them.

Some environmentalists say food production needs a fundamental reboot, with crops that stay rooted in the soil for years, like Kernza, a prairie grass. Even General Mills says it likes the idea.

In the long-running war between farmers and weeds, it's advantage, weeds. Scientists in Kansas have found examples of the dreaded pigweed that are immune to the newest weed-killing technologies.

Most beef cattle receive antibiotics in their feed to prevent liver abscesses while eating a high-energy diet. There's growing pressure on feedlots to stop this — and some have. But it's costly.

Some linguists are arguing that the advent of softer food thousands of years ago led to changes in biting patterns and, eventually, to more frequent use of sounds like "f" and "v" in human languages.

Stopping climate change won't just mean a halt to burning coal and gasoline. It will mean an end to cutting forests and mining the soil to grow more food. Fortunately, it is possible.

Stopping climate change will mean big changes for cities, where most people in the world live. To understand how we get there, we visit a city where you can see the seeds of a carbon-free world.

Let's imagine that we've ended global warming. Humans no longer are releasing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Here's what life is like in a zero-carbon world.

William Happer, a Princeton scientist who is doubtful of the dangers of climate change, appears to be leading a White House challenge to the government's conclusion that global warming is a threat.

Connecticut and California are considering statewide taxes on sugary drinks. New data from soda taxes in Berkeley and Philadelphia present a mixed picture of their effects on sugar consumption.

Satellite images show the amount of green vegetation on Earth increasing, despite deforestation. But some of the added greenery has a downside.

Some farmers say they're buying a popular new soybean seed partly because they're afraid of crop damage from herbicide drift. A new lawsuit claims the seed maker is violating antitrust laws.

The Food and Drug Administration is inspecting less food these days, thanks to the shutdown. And while that has raised questions about food safety, the food business is largely carrying on as usual.

Scientists have re-engineered photosynthesis, a foundation of life on Earth, creating genetically modified plants that grow faster and bigger. They hope it leads to bigger harvests of food.

We check in on some stories we did this year to find all kinds of updates.