From Tech to Table: Richard Munson and the Food & Ag Tech Revolution

Paul Shapiro: [00:00:00] Welcome to the business for good podcast to show where we spotlight companies, making money by making the world a better place. I'm your host, Paul Shapiro. And if you share a passion for using commerce to solve many of the world's most pressing problems, then this is the show for you. Welcome friends to the 86th episode of the business for good podcast as regular listeners of this show.

No, we typically feature entrepreneurs and innovators who are using the power of commerce to solve serious social problems. But every so often I will chat with folks who are writing about those entrepreneurs and innovators, even if they aren't the ones doing that work themselves as someone who also wrote a book about food tech entrepreneurs.

I tried to read any book that comes out on the topic, and that includes Richard Munson's new book tech to table. 25 innovators reimagining food. I've really enjoyed reading this book by someone who's far more well known for his deep dive biographies. But now he's written a book featuring dozens of entrepreneurs seeking to create a more sustainable food system, not by returning to 19th century agrarian [00:01:00] practices, but rather by embracing 21st century food and agriculture te.

I really enjoy the book for a lot of reasons, but especially because yes, he talks about entrepreneurs who are doing things near and dear to my heart, which is basically creating meat experiences without animals. But he also talks about other entrepreneurs who are doing really cool things to improve crop yields.

So we can farm fewer acres. He talks about. Great machines that can reduce some of the most undesirable agricultural labor practices, for example, on strawberry farms and more. So I got a lot out of reading it, even though I am somebody who is steeped in this particular topic. Now in this interview, we discussed everything from how new tech can just place old jobs.

Why some environmentalists don't seem that down with technology that could benefit the environment and what the future of food and ag may bring. It is a wide ranging conversation about a book with a wide range of topics. And I hope that you enjoy the conversation with Richard Munson as much as I did.

Dick welcome to the business for good podcast.

Richard Munson: Thank you very much. Appreciate the invitation. Hey, it's

Paul Shapiro: [00:02:00] really great to be talking with you. I was struck by your latest book because you've actually written a large number of books. You know, most people never guard around to writing one book, but it looks to me like you've written, I don't know, half a dozen books.

How, remind me, how, how many books have you actually written

Richard Munson: Dick? I think about half a dozen.

Paul Shapiro: Okay. All right. It's so many that you can't remember the exact numbers. , you know, you've written books, you know, you've written biographies of Nicola, Tesla, and Jacque KTO, and one book about federal spending and more, but your latest book is just about food tech.

So it seems, you know, pretty interesting. You're doing these biographies of people who had nothing to do with food tech. And now you're writing about food tech. So what.

Richard Munson: Well, I guess what they do have in common is that they're intrigued by innovation. I mean, Jacque Gusto invented the Aqua lung and did undersea photography, Nicola, Tesla, obviously, and quirky than he was, gave us the electric motor robots, remote control you name it.

So it was not a huge stretch to think about. What's going on in agriculture, [00:03:00] particularly because it's our, as you know, our largest worldwide industry, it's also, you know, coming from, in my perspective, from an environmental background, it also causes enormous, you know, environmental challenges. So I went in the search of who's doing innovative things in the food and, and farm sector.

Very cool.

Paul Shapiro: So for those of the listeners who are not familiar with your environmental cred, so before we get into talking about, we're gonna be talking about, just give us a sense of your background, because I know you worked for the environmental defense fund, like you are an environmentalist. So before we start talking about these food technologies that you think can do good for the world, what led to your passion for the environment and just give us a little bit of sense of what you've done in your career.

Well, the

Richard Munson: passion probably began when I was a freshman at the university of California, Santa Barbara, when an oil well sprung a, a gigantic leak and coated. Coast and birds with this gucky, you know, oil. And since then, I've been concerned about pollution. I've worked for groups like [00:04:00] environmental action.

That helps start the first earth day. I work on for solar lobby to advance renewable energy resources helps start a clean energy startup. And as you noted was recently in charge of the environmental defense funds Midwestern.

Paul Shapiro: Cool. So I wanna get into this maybe a little bit later in the conversation, Dick, but just to put a pin in here for right now, you point out in this book that environmentalists are not always so down with some of these food technologies, that could be good for the environment.

So just gonna put a quick hanger on that before we get into that. It's an interesting topic. And one that we've talked about. So we had, do you know Rob Berg who were at the book resetting the table? Have you seen his book? Yes. I have seen that. We had Rob on this show. And I loved his episode. I loved that conversation and frankly, I loved his book again called resetting the table.

We'll link to that in the show notes@businessforgoodpodcast.com so that people can go check that out if you haven't listened to that episode. But we also had on [00:05:00] another author named Melissa shilling who wrote a great book called quirky. I don't know if you've heard of that, but it's a book about, oh yeah.

Richard Munson: Have you read her book? I have not read her book, but I have certainly heard of it.

Paul Shapiro: Yes, it's really good. So, you know, she. Somewhat like you in that she writes about innovators. So her book quirky basically looks at like the all time, best innovators of all time. Meaning not one hit wonders, but people who like really came up with really amazing innovations, maybe in multiple fields or multiple different times.

So people like Elon Musk and people like Marie Kiri and others. And, you know, most of the time on this show, we have on people who are entrepreneurs, themselves, who are running businesses, but we often have authors like yourself or Rob Halberg and Melissa shilling on your book though, which I really enjoyed.

I read it. So just so that people can go out and get it, just to give the official plug here at the beginning, it's called tech to table 25 innovators reimagining. Your book is not really like these others. It's, it's more like dozens of short vignettes, who of like profiles of people [00:06:00] who are doing cool things in food tech, whether they are replacing meat by creating animal free meat experiences or their inventing technologies to cut pesticides or improved harvesting techniques and so on.

What was it that led you to want to do the book in that way? To have it be like these little short profiles, rather than going deep, like you did on Tesla or gust? I guess I

Richard Munson: believe that. Advances in all sorts of industries are going to take place as a result of individual actions. And I am fascinated by those unique individuals who are entrepreneurs, who are willing to take amazing risks to be able to advance what their vision is.

Doesn't say that, you know, entrepreneurs are necessarily the most beloved and friendly and people that you wanna sit down and have a beer with because they're sometimes, you know, obsessed and, and clearly focused on their end goal and willing to do anything to get there. But I think that's where their efforts, if given the freedom to find money and advance their [00:07:00] marketing and product.

I think that's where we have an opportunity to make some significant change. In this case, in the ag sector that will address some of the health and environmental challenges that we currently face and are haunting

Paul Shapiro: us. So what are those let's talk about that. Dick. What are some of these challenges that the people you write about are trying to solve what that are haunting us, as you say.

Well, I was

Richard Munson: surprised just by how vision oriented everybody was. It's not like they came from background that they were environmentalists. I mean, they were, you know, as you well know, some of the people that you highlighted, Josh Terick or Uma Valletta were, you know, either a huckster, if you will. A lawyer in one case and a doctor and the other who just had a vision that they wanted to, in their case address, you know, the horrible slaughter of animals and the health problems associated with meats.

And they just have come up with both plant and, you know, cultured meat approaches that offer. Tremendous opportunities [00:08:00] for trying to resolve some of the challenges that are presented by big ag and particularly big meat in particular.

Paul Shapiro: Why do you think that is? I mean, you wrote in the book and you note here that, you know, most of the founders in the food tech space don't come from food or ag, like it, it seems very abnormal that people who are all of a sudden, extremely passionate about.

Food tech and ag tech, but they have no background whatsoever in either one of those fields. So where are they coming from? You know, you mentioned that Josh trich was a lawyer. IDI was a cardiologist, but you got, you got dozens of folks in here nearly none of whom come from that background. So where are they coming from and why are they thinking, Hey, food tech is what I wanna do.

Richard Munson: Well, I think the opposite view is why are there not more innovators within the, what has been a very conservative farm and food? Look at reports of digitalization within various economic sectors and agriculture is at the very bottom. It is the least modernized sector. It is the sector that probably spends the least on research and development.

Part of [00:09:00] that is understandable because as a farmer, to be honest, you get one shot a year. To grow crops and you have to deal with the uncertainties associated with commodity prices and weather. And so you're cautious, very cautious to continue to do things that you've done in the past. I think what you're seeing now is what Eric Schmidt, who used to be the head of Google said is this confluence of technologies.

In his case, he was looking at three, you know, the advancement of sensors. In other words, our ability to capture enormous quantities of data that we never had before. We now have advanced computers that are able to process that data. And then we have advanced engineering or robots to provide the precision and power and efficiency that we've never had.

His view Schmitt's view is that these allow us to have a transformative impact upon a variety of sectors. And I think what we're seeing, at least what I saw was that these outsiders who were taking advantage of these. [00:10:00] The super evolution are finally coming to the agricultural sector, which has been so conservative.

And as a result, opening up opportunities that we never saw before.

Paul Shapiro: Yeah, it's pretty amazing. I mean, you write about these huge ag conglomerates like ADM and others who are not necessarily the ones who are coming up with the innovation, but they are investing in and acquiring those who are, and it's pretty fascinating to see how many of these tiny companies are that have a, a minuscule fraction of the resources that the agricultural giants have are coming up with innovations that all of a sudden are worth hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars to these ag giants.

Well, it's

Richard Munson: important to them. I mean, because the entrepreneurs are, you know, coming up with new ideas, I mean, their job is to advance, you know, something innovative, whereas big ag their job is to continue to squeeze out minor changes that increase the. Output and sales of their existing products. So it is a battle now, [00:11:00] I guess, one of the most intriguing questions, which I don't have the answer to is what's gonna happen in the future.

I mean, as you note, some of the big ad companies are buying up some of these entrepreneurs, but I was impressed by so many of the people that I interviewed the entrepreneurs who were saying, you know, I don't wanna get bought up by these guys. I'm gonna outcompete. Big heavy, slow moving oligopolies and, you know, make a fortune and do good at the same time.

Yeah. Maybe

Paul Shapiro: some of them feel that way. I know, you know, others have been quite happy to partner with those huge companies thinking that they can essentially scale faster or have greater access to distribution networks and so on. But it's interesting to see how there are different strategies that different people.

So I wanna get into one of the issues that you talk about Dick in the book, which is out of pesticides, because it's something that is near and dear to my heart. You write that in the United States alone, that pesticides that we spray on agricultural fields kill 70 million birds and billions of bees and other useful insects.[00:12:00]

Every single year. And that in just the past three decades alone earth has lost three quarters of all its flying insects. This is, you know, an unbelievable slaughter of wildlife here. You know, hunters don't kill anywhere near that number. You think about like all, all the animal welfare advocates who are so concerned about hunters yet spraying pesticides kills vastly more wildlife than hunters.

And the solution that you hear sometimes, and you point out that this is not really true is, oh, well going organic, but you know, organic does not mean no pesticides. It just means different kinds of pesticides. And you write that actually using certain types of genetically modified crops, like transgenic, BT corn, which repels insects with natural ingredients in inside of the corn and in the cotton has actually caused certain types of synthetic insecticides to.

No longer be used or to have fallen by manyfold since the last few decades. So if you could just chat briefly about this tension, because you know, there is this pervasive [00:13:00] myth. Rob Halberg talks about it in his book, resetting the table. Also that organic for some reason means no or less pesticide, which of course is not true.

But some of the innovators that you talk about are trying to reduce pesticides by doing exactly what many environmental groups argue against, which is putting more biotech into our food. So let's talk about that, Rob, you're an environmental se you also are in favor of using food tech to make the world a better place.

So what's

Richard Munson: up here. Well, you point out a key problem. I mean, the spraying of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides is not only killing the various animals and birds that you identified, but the beneficial microbes that as a result are shrinking the land's fertility. It's going down by what, a half a percent a year, which is just an unsustainable trend with profound.

You know, social, economic and political implications. So there is a real debate within the environmental community. And I think the ag community as to which is the best approach, I mean, the folks that advocate, you know, organic or [00:14:00] regenerative agriculture tend to be very skeptical of science. And that's not understandable reasons.

I mean, science did advanced DDT. They advanced margarine. I mean, some of these supposedly super advances turned out to not be so great. But at the same time, the effort to try and return to pre-industrial farming. Has presented its own problems in the sense that they're ignoring some of the advances that can in fact reduce the poisons that are going into our water and causing dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico or lake Erie.

You have it. So

Paul Shapiro: why, why do you think that is though Dick? I mean, you're describing the problem, but I'm wondering about what the origin is, because if you talk to folks in the environmental community and you and I are certainly in that community, our. If you ask 'em about climate change, they'll say, oh yeah.

Well, I follow the science, the preponderance of the science, the scientific consensus is that humans are warming the planet and it's gonna cause all these serious problems. But when you start looking at the science on, let's say genetic modification. [00:15:00] It also speaks very loudly that there isn't really much evidence that this is bad for human health.

And in fact, it can, in the cases that you've described actually dramatically cut the use of pesticides in agriculture. So why do you think it is that there are at least some environmentalists who seem to just have a knee jerk to anything that is associated with biotech and food?

Richard Munson: I wish I knew the answer and I say that as an environmentalist, but I think you're right.

That they tend to be. Skittish when it comes to new science. In part, as I mentioned, you know, you look at D D T, which was a supposedly new super cure for increasing output without causing any environmental problems. That clearly was a lie. And so there's some natural hesitation that said it doesn't make sense from a perspective from a community that supposedly is advancing science to.

Move policies that would reduce, you know, climate change. [00:16:00] They also have to be open to policies and technologies that have the potential for solving some of the environmental challenges, not only pesticides, but exposure to wind and rain, erosion, the clear cutting of forests, a whole variety of things that are, I think, major environmental problems that I think a lot of the, the key environmental groups have been reluctant to focus on.

You know, there have been some charges, you know, made that there, you know, the big meat and big ag have been quite effective in stomping down criticism. But I, I think it's just, it's a fear if you will. I think of making a bad choice on science that makes some environmental groups blind to the opportunities that science and technology and innovation are offer.

Paul Shapiro: Yeah. I mean, I, I don't have a, a diagnosis of why this is either. I suspect that what you're saying is probably true, but I also think there's just like a, a tendency [00:17:00] to think natural was better. It's like this naturalistic fallacy that if we could only go back to the good old days and that things would be much better and there tends to be like this desire to return to like a 19th century agrarian culture.

As opposed to moving forward into a 21st century type of agriculture with a wa more things like precision agriculture and, and fermentation and other types of biotech that can dramatically reduce humanity's footprint on the planet. One of the examples that you gave, which I had never even considered nor heard of was you talked about gene edited soybeans.

Which create an oil that can last three times longer for the frying life of conventional soybean oils, theoretically, meaning you could use one third, the number of soybeans. So you could farm one third less land to get the same amount of frying capacity, which was pretty riveting to me. And I didn't know about that.

I don't even know. Is that on the market yet? Are these, is this gene edited? So it'd be an oil on the market.

Richard Munson: Do you. It is on the market, but it's very new, but I think what it [00:18:00] does do is advance the question of which is the legitimate one. Can we just inherently trust new technologies, be it, this new kind of oil or any new technology.

And I think, you know, the clear answer has to be not necessarily, you know, as with anything, you sort of need to verify that they are in fact advancing sustainability and. You know, healthy foods in ways that are improvement over, over the current policy. So I don't want to suggest just because it's new, it's scientific, it's innovative, and that these are creative entrepreneurs that we should necessarily just fall down and trust them.

You're advocating more of a,

Paul Shapiro: Ronald Reagan with the union trust by verify policy.

Richard Munson: No one has ever accused me of that, but yes, there is that need, but I guess I would, you know, encounter that you can overdo it so that you don't wanna be blind to, or rejecting any possible new advancement that is out there.

But, you know, it's legitimate to, you know, [00:19:00] ask for verification, but I think it's painful to the environment itself. If you're not open to. New ways of tackling what are clear problems that exist today? It's

Paul Shapiro: interesting though, because I mean, you're saying we want verification and that seems very reasonable to me.

At the same time, you know, a lot of the advocates for organic or so-called natural agriculture just have almost like a religious, like faith that it is better. I mean, you write that by trucking, tons of compost and plowing regularly to keep weeds down that some organic farms burn farm more fossil fuels than do their conventional colleagues.

You also quit somebody saying there's no requirement that organic dairy farms have any lower climate footprint than convent. You talk about how a Harvard university report found that grass fed cattle, operations require more cattle, more pollution, more greenhouse gases, then do conventional feed, lot cattle.

So we're talking about verifying it's true. Like these new tech innovators, we should verify what they're saying and what the benefits of their products. But I, I do [00:20:00] think also as you are pointing out here, maybe there ought to be some verification for the, I would say quasi-religious beliefs. Regarding some of these organic practices that just sound more natural, but may not be better for the planet.

Richard Munson: I totally agree. I mean, verification goes in all sorts of different directions and must be, you know, sort of shared across the board, the, the last one that you pointed out, as far as, you know, people often point to grass fed meat as being the answer to so many of our problems, because it doesn't, you know, have these concentrated feed lots and.

You know, the problems is, you know, better than I do. But the reality is that it takes longer for the cattle to get up to what's called, I love this term slaughter weight. And as a result, they spend more time out in the open burping and their burps contain one heck of a lot of methane, which is, you know, greenhouse gas, 84 times more potent than, you know, carbon dioxide.

So you're. This is something that we should not [00:21:00] be taking on faith, but one of the lorries of science is that it not only gives us new perspectives, but it also enables us to test and evaluate and verify new advances.

Paul Shapiro: Exactly exactly. That that is certainly how I feel. I, I'm not a a blind believer in any new application of food tech.

There are some things, I mean, I was actually just reading about some of the efforts to create transgenic farm animals, who will, for example, put meat on faster, which could lead to really serious animal welfare problems. I think there are plenty of ways that we can use tech to do bad things. You know, you can use a knife to prepare a meal for somebody or to stab somebody.

There's lots of ways we can use food tech for both good and bad. I'm heartened to read about what many of the folks in your book are doing in order to try to use technology for good. And one of the things that you talk about in there for good, which I thought was pretty riveting, I also was not familiar with this was that you wrote about the work of strawberry picking and how labor intensive and backbreaking this work is.

You talk about [00:22:00] new technology where the strawberries are essentially robotically picked in. The robot can essentially ensure the steady stream of ripe berries and can harvest far faster than even large numbers of humans can. And they farm 24 7 that can go throughout the night. They're not worried about any of the problems that we have with the horrible labor practices that oftentimes are, are endured by strawberry pickers.

And so I'm wondering one, how common is this on strawberry farms today? And then. What you think about the impact? This has, I mean, obviously it can displace really unattractive jobs that a lot of people don't want to do, but it is replacing jobs and somebody would be willing to do it. So what's your view of this?

That is this actually doing good in the world because it's making strawberry picking more efficient or is it just one more way that we are cutting human labor out of our, our

Richard Munson: economy? Well, let me step back just for one second. And, and note that the [00:23:00] technology associated with this ability to pluck or you know, pick strawberries robotically, or, or pluck weeds robotically is just absolutely phenomenal.

I mean, we, in this case, you have companies that are taking hundreds of thousands of pictures of strawberry plants and decid. Which are the weeds, which are the plants, which are the strawberries that are ripe. Are they at the right particular time? And then having the ability through artificial intelligence to be able to note which are good ones and the time is right to do it.

And then in this case picking strawberries, but it's also the same thing with weeds of, you know, grabbing the weeds out without using, you know, backbreaking, labor or horrible herbicides. So yes, it reduces, there's no doubt. You have to sort of be honest that. Cut jobs. These however are jobs that the strawberry farm owners are suggesting that nobody wants to do, or they're having a harder and harder [00:24:00] time finding people to do what is backbreaking, you know, unbelievably hot, you know, work to do.

So do we wanna, you know, continue to. Outmoded systems that provide that type of intelligence or that type of employment. Some of the people that are doing the strawberry picking through robots are in fact, setting up schools whereby the people that have been, or the kids that have been. Had their parents picking the strawberries or plucking the weeds are trained as to how to monitor and update and service and maintain these robots as they go along.

So there are new jobs that are being created in the process. So this is the tough one that, you know, I think every new technology faces, yes, they will replace some jobs. Are they creating better jobs in return? In this case. I think the answer is yes, but it's legitimate part of [00:25:00] the debate as these technologies advance.

Paul Shapiro: I wonder about this. That's interesting that, you know, you still need people to run these machines, but presumably it's not gonna be the same migrant laborers who are, you know, are traveling up from Latin America for this. So it is jobs, but it it's different jobs. And, and probably fewer of them, it kind of reminds me of the debate with cultivated meat.

For example, there was an article in the wall street journal about how, when tobacco demand started decreasing, coincidentally hummus demand started really dramatically increasing in the United States. And so a lot of tobacco growers switched to chick be growing, and it's really easy to see how a tobacco grower switches to becoming a chick be grower.

It's harder to see how a cattle rancher switches to being a microbiologist. And in this case, like it's hard to see how like migrant laborers are going to switch to being the people who are basically monitoring the robots that are in the AI. That's going through the fields. And as, as somebody who lives in an area of Sacramento, California, where I see a lot of strawberry fields driving.[00:26:00]

It looks like horrible work to me. I mean, it's not surprising to me that Americans don't want to do it. I mean, it just looks extremely unpleasant to be doing it

Richard Munson: well, you're exactly right. I mean, there will be, I don't mean to hide the fact that there will be some jobs that will be displaced by new technologies.

I'm intrigued by one of the other profiles that I did in the book. Was this a company called bow farming? Which is totally redefining what a farm looks like, but they're building vertical warehouses within urban centers, usually abandoned warehouses that they take great pride in thinking that they are bringing new jobs of monitoring the sensors, the robots, and the precision equipment in these.

What look like Amazon fulfillment centers and providing jobs that are in disadvantaged areas that wouldn't have been there before. So employment is, is complicated. I don't mean to shy from it at all. There will be displacement. There will be new jobs

Paul Shapiro: being in this field. I hear this all the time about people who are [00:27:00] concerned about the destruction of certain types of labor that will occur from these technologies becoming main.

I, I don't remember hearing this though. When for example, streaming started becoming the norm of how we entertained ourselves. So instead of going to movie theaters or movie rental stores, like, but maybe there was like, were people talking about the coming destruction of blockbuster video jobs? What was gonna happen to all the people working at the thousands of, of rental stores?

When, you know, we started streaming on Netflix. I, I have a feeling people weren't shedding tears for those jobs as they're binge watching Netflix. I don't know. Do you remember people talking about that or like, I mean, I remember even when one hour photo came out, I was like, so psyched, you know, it was like 20, probably 22 years ago, or so I couldn't believe we were gonna get our photos.

Like in one hour I thought I was like really living in like a Jetson's future. And now of course, you know, we'd be outraged if it took one minute to get a photo and we don't really have a lot of Photoshops anymore at dark rooms. And the people who work there lost their jobs. So, I mean, I don't know, maybe I just wasn't [00:28:00] paying attention, but are you aware of, of people who were expressing concern about these new technologies of streaming and of digital photography, that they were gonna destroy jobs?

If

Richard Munson: so, I missed it. I mean, I do have fond memories of, you know, with my family, walking through blockbuster to pick out, you know, the weekends possible movie, you know, watching, but you know, when you deal with innovators and new technologies, Yes, you're giving up some things, but if the market accepts it, you're getting better products as a result streaming, I mean, I don't know, expert on streaming, but my goodness.

I mean, people, I will admit finding it to just be an amazing advance, you know, that provides us a service that we didn't have before. And I think what I'm suggesting in this book is simply. There's this confluence of technologies that are opening that are finally coming to the food and farm sectors that I think will open up opportunities that we really haven't thought about.

[00:29:00] And we need to be thinking innovation is critical if we're to redefine how we farm.

Paul Shapiro: I think one of the differences is between the two examples that we were just talking about digital photography and video stream. The benefit to the consumer is extremely obvious. The benefit to the consumer though, of having certain types of GM crops that are better for farmers, but not necessarily, you know, better for the consumer, at least obviously better for the consumer.

Yeah. They may be us expensive, but there's not like a clear benefit. That the person, while they're eating the product is enjoying, but that's changing because now, you know, for example, there's a genetically modified apple that doesn't brown, which is quite nice. You talked about mushrooms that don't brown in the book.

Like those are things that the consumer sees as an obvious benefit. So I think that by going from using food tech, that makes it better. Let's say for the farmer compared to food tech, that makes it better for the end consumer, they may be more eager to adopt those types of technologies. [00:30:00]

Richard Munson: The entrepreneurs, as you well know who are advancing plant-based or cell-based meats are suggesting that they're going to be more nutritious.

They're going to be more tasty. They're going to be more healthy in the sense that they're avoiding the fecal contamination that you know, exists in today's slaughter houses. So. I was intrigued by the entrepreneurs, particularly in the alternative protein space that are thinking that they don't, their goal is not to just match what the current big meat sector gives us, but to make something better that consumers will find more attractive and more beneficial.

Paul Shapiro: Right. So, you know, the quintessential example of this would be, you know, instead of making a burger that has the exact two nutritional profile of a conventional slaughter based burger. Which has a lot of saturated fat. Maybe you could bake a burger that actually has less saturated, fat and more omega-3 fatty acids, and therefore have burgers that instead of causing heart attacks, actually prevent.

That would be quite an [00:31:00] amazing innovation, but I like to think of in not just nutritional benefits, but even like really novel experiences that nobody's ever fantasized about. Like, if you consider, for example, you know, the time let's say after cows were domesticated, so people were drinking cows milk, but nobody had figured out how to make milk Curle and so you didn't have cheese.

And at that time, no one had ever dreamt of Guda or Brie or Swiss or cheddar, like it, cheese was a completely novel food. It was like the new food tech of that era. Now it's like essentially for a lot of people, a daily experience, one that they would not want to give up. And that frankly is kind of addictive for people is, is cheese consumption.

And what novel foods, what novel culinary experience is will animal cell culture, or even plant-based proteins or microbial fermentation. Open up for us, what experiences that we've never fantasized about will become equally pleasurable to us in the future. And so I I'm excited about that future, not just cuz I think it's better for the planet and better for animals and better for public [00:32:00] health, but it can be a lot more interesting ly speaking.

Totally

Richard Munson: agree. I mean, I think the approach has to be, not that we're just fixing problems, which we are, or, or these entrepreneurs are, but coming up with something that is better unique, gives us a whole new perspective on food. I mean, I have one chapter which, you know, talks about people that are developing 3d food printers.

There are some. You know, cooks in particular, including my wife , who might be listening in on this, who, you know, are sort of abor by the process of thinking that you would have a 3d printer to make your food and that it may turn out to be crazy, but it does suggest that the fresh thinking is advancing at a accelerated rate in the food and farm sector and may provide us.

With experiences as you note that we've really never thought about before.

Paul Shapiro: I'll tell you something. Dick, my wife, who is a [00:33:00] professional cookbook author, she loves cooking, but I'll tell you if she had an opportunity to, to try a 3d printed meal, she would be so down. She would love it. So , we'll have to get the two of them talking, but I, I think she would love that.

But yeah, I mean, you know, look, there's a lot of, there's a lot to be solved out there. I mean, as one stat that you cite in the book that I was like, totally blown away by you. Unhealthy diets now pose a greater risk to morbidity and mortality than unsafe sex, alcohol drug, and tobacco use all combin. Just think about that.

Like, think about like how much effort has gone into trying to do like educational campaigns about unsafe sex or alcohol or drug or tobacco use.

Richard Munson: Well, I even think about some, some threats that we hide for the most part and are not that advanced. Antibiotic use or the overuse of antibiotics, meat, and poultry production account for what 80% of us antibiotic use.

So we're using these to treating animals in [00:34:00] these, you know, factory farms for disease, but also largely to FATEN them up. What happens as a result is that infections or diseases become resistant to these antibiotics in, I think we're up to about one and a half million people a year. As a result of drug resistant illnesses.

And so we just can't, willy-nilly be throwing antibiotics out there because the end result is causing death for, you know, far too many people. Well,

Paul Shapiro: There are far too many preventable deaths that's for sure. And horrible diets are certainly a major culprit there. So let me just ask you then Dick you've written about these 25 innovators.

You've written about innovators before, like Tesla and, and Gusto. You must have thought a lot about what are the problems that should be solved, but is there anything that you wish there was more attention being focused on now? Is there any problem whether in food or otherwise that you wish that some innovator or some entre.

Would tackle this problem and start their own business. Doing that. As I look at these

Richard Munson: entrepreneurs, the one thing [00:35:00] that they really need, which I is somewhat surprising, cuz they're getting so much of it. I then just this last year, ag tech raised about 52 billion, which is a stunning number RA about 80% above what it was the previous year.

But I'm looking for more creativity on the financing side. How do we open. Ag tech innovation opportunity up to more people. And I was on your website and looking at your, you had one recent guest Elizabeth Alfano who has just recently launched an ETF that would allow individuals to, instead of selecting particular ag tech companies be able to buy sort of a, a grouping of such.

That I'm very intrigued by just opening up more opportunities for people to take advantage of and be part of what I think is in ag tech revolution. Well, that

Paul Shapiro: was a good episode with Elizabeth will share the link to it in the show notes for this [00:36:00] episode@businessforgoodpodcast.com. So if you didn't check it out, you can go back and listen to it.

But I really enjoyed learning about that too, is a really interesting topic that I didn't know much about prior to the episode, speaking of resources, like the ETF that Elizabeth is doing, Dick, let me ask you, are there any other resources for folks who might be inspired by your book, or maybe they haven't read your book yet, but they listen to this interview and they want to be, they are inspired and they wanna think, you know, what can I do?

What resources there are there out there that I should avail myself of so that I can do something good in the world too. Is there anything that you'd recommend?

Richard Munson: I'm intrigued. Just stories of innovators, because I think it provides both motivation and help to folks that are thinking about making that leap.

So I'm a writer and I'm sort of a biography writer. So I'm probably very biased towards profiles of innovators, but you know, Walter Isaacson's, you know, book on Steve jobs is just gives you an insight as to how he pulled it off. One of my favorites was a [00:37:00] book by Harold Evans that profiled, I think about 50 some odd folks that moved the innovation scale over two centuries from the steam engine to the search engine.

I think the book was called, they made America. So again, you're hearing my bias, but I think. The more entrepreneurs or people that have an, an intriguing idea can be motivated by examples to make the leap and to give it a try to go out there and raise that money. Do the marketing, do the science, you know, do these scaling up.

I think those stories have power to them.

Paul Shapiro: Yeah, for sure. And I, I can tell you, it has been very inspirational for me to read your book for that reason to just learn what other people were doing, because it, it provides fodder and even researching my own book, clean meat was had a similar effect on me because I started seeing that many of the people who were running successful companies and raising millions, if not tens of millions, of dollars of venture capital investment were people who just didn't have a lot of experience.

You know, you generally think of these people. Well, they [00:38:00] must have had some great experience that I don't have that they're doing this. You know, a lot of them didn't, a lot of them are less qualified than you, the listener are to start your own company. So I love reading stories about other people and what they're doing, because it is inspirational for me to realize what other mere mortals like myself are doing and that I, I could do something cool too.

So. Dick. I really appreciate it. Again. The book is tech to table 25 innovators, reimagining food, go out and get it anywhere that books are sold. And we really appreciate all of your scholarship here on both this and other topics. Dick and I, I really enjoyed reading this book and I'm planning on reading your biography of Tesla next.

Richard Munson: I appreciate the invitation many. Thanks greatly. Appreciate it.

Paul Shapiro: Thanks for listening. We hope you found use in this episode. If so, don't keep it to yourself. Please leave us a five star rating on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast. And as always, we hope you will be in the business of doing good.