Fresh Take: Covid-19 Has Pushed Americans Back To Grandma’s Kitchen, How To Attend A Food Trade Show, And The Future Of Restaurants In Russia

Fresh Take: Covid-19 Has Pushed Americans Back To Grandma’s Kitchen, How To Attend A Food Trade Show, And The Future Of Restaurants In Russia

Click on the conversation bubble to join the conversation Thousands of entrepreneurs, investors, buyers and distributors across the food industry are already packed inside the Anaheim Convention Center for the big return of Natural Products Expo West after a two-year hiatus. I'm one of them. I'll be scouring the floor today for brands with fresh concepts and, I'll be honest, snippets of hot tea. Probably above all else, I'll be on the lookout for greenwashing. There are too many claims on labels without actual validation and verification, and as food systems consultant Alison Grantham told me, if a brand hasn't aligned its corporate sustainability goals with the United Nations' recommendations, then what's even the point? According to the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, in the next eight years, emissions must collectively be cut in half. Feeble promises and fake standards will only hurt us all in the end. "We have so much greenwashing, especially in food. It happens constantly, and people talk about foods as if they are solutions," Grantham says. "Really, it's marketing. Is it going to scale? What we need is to move the baseline." A lot has changed since the last major Expo West in