Food Lab Talk

Janet Ranganathan is the Managing Director and Executive Vice President for Strategy, Learning and Results at World Resources Institute (WRI), a global research organization that addresses the urgent sustainability challenges related to food, forests, water, climate, energy, cities and the ocean. She leads the development and execution of WRI’s five-year strategy and oversees WRI’s Research Integrity, Managing for Results, and Data Lab teams. 

Janet Ranganathan: “One of the most important lessons I've learned is you can't do anything on your own. You have to do everything together through partnerships and collaborations. You know, if you wanna go far, take many people with you, but don't expect to get there too fast. If you wanna go fast, go alone, but don't expect to get very far. So true.”

00:25 Intro to Janet
01:21 30 years of changemaking
02:02 WRI’s method for impact: Count it. Change it. Scale it. 
03:48 Feeding people, addressing climate, protecting land
05:54 Produce, protect, reduce, restore
07:03 A production and consumption problem
07:52 Education to enable change
09:44 Empowering food companies 
12:06 Overview of the Shift Wheel 
15:32 How the Cool Food Pledge put the Shift Wheel into practice 
17:50 From outputs to outcomes to impact
20:40 How WRI connects food and climate change
21:44 Establishing collaborative partnerships for long term success
23:12 Design and act for impact
25:02 Learning from the past to inform the future
27:15 Urgency as a motivator
28:22 Takeaways for changemakers 

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*The views expressed by the guests in this podcast don't necessarily represent the host’s views, nor those of his employer.

What is Food Lab Talk?

A better food system starts with one thing: vision. Food Lab Talk gives global food system changemakers a platform to articulate their vision for the future of food.

The series features interviews with inspiring individuals who are working on the frontlines of many of our most pressing food issues: reducing food loss and waste, enhancing food system transparency, facilitating shifts toward more balanced plant-forward diets, enabling informed individual choices for sustainable lifestyles, and accelerating the transition to a circular food economy. 

Join Google’s Michiel Bakker to meet the leaders taking bold action and answering what each of us can do to create a better food system for us all.