Jeremiah Watkins

Jeremiah Watkins (standup, Stand Up On The Spot, Comedy Central) joins Esteban in the sauna and he can only be released if he cares about our farming and agriculture. Finally, we see if the nicest boy in comedy is someone who cares.

HOSTED BY Esteban Gast
DIRECTED BY Stoney Sharp
ASSISTANT DIRECTOR / EDITOR Connor Linnerooth
EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS Adam McKay, Staci Roberts-Steele, Anna Wenger, Jessie Bluedorn, Esteban Gast
GUEST Jeremiah Watkins
PRODUCER Stoney Sharp, Carl Fieler
ASSOCIATE PRODUCER Brittney Badduke
CONSULTING PRODUCER Elijah Zarlin
DP / CAMERA OPERATOR Connor Linnerooth 
SOUND Brandon Cruz
SET MEDIC Paul Joubran

SPECIAL THANKS to Big Oil for being so sneaky and evil that we had to make a show about their disinformation and lies.

FACTS, REFERENCES, AND MORE

WE’VE LOST A THIRD OF THE WORLD’S FARMABLE TOPSOIL IN THE LAST 150 YEARS, AND IT TAKES 500 YEARS TO MAKE ONE INCH BACK

• World Economic Forum — “Why Is the World Losing So Much Soil?“
• Columbia University Earth Institute — “Why Soil Matters“
• ScienceAlert — “The World Has Lost a Third of Its Farmable Land in the Last 40 Years.” Quotes Sheffield University biology professor Duncan Cameron: “This is catastrophic when you think that it takes about 500 years to form 2.5 cm of topsoil.”:
• Scientific American — “Only 60 Years of Farming Left If Soil Degradation Continues.”
• Our World in Data — “Do We Only Have 60 Harvests Left?” A careful fact-check noting the “60 harvests” claim is likely overstated, while confirming the underlying reality of soil degradation is real and serious

RISING TEMPERATURES MEAN 50% OF CURRENT COFFEE-GROWING LAND WILL BE UNUSABLE BY 2050

• Science — “Climate Change Could Slash Coffee Production.“
• World Coffee Research — peer-reviewed study confirming the 50% reduction in suitable Arabica land by 2050, with the biggest losses in hot, dry regions including parts of Brazil, India, and Central America
• NPR — “Change Is Brewing in the Coffee Industry. What Lies Ahead?“

LIVESTOCK PRODUCTION ACCOUNTS FOR ROUGHLY A THIRD OF ALL METHANE EMISSIONS

• FAO — “Livestock and Enteric Methane.” The UN Food and Agriculture Organization’s primary source on this: ruminant livestock account for roughly 30% of global anthropogenic methane emissions through enteric fermentation (cow burps and farts, essentially):
• PBS NewsHour — “Cow Burps Are a Major Contributor to Climate Change — Can Scientists Change That?“
• Earth.org — “How Do Cows Contribute to Global Warming?“ A genuinely accessible explainer that covers the full picture: how enteric fermentation works, what the global numbers are, how methane compares to CO2 in warming potential (84x more powerful over 20 years), and what solutions exist. Written for a general audience.
• The Guardian — “Avoiding Meat and Dairy Is the Single Biggest Way to Reduce Your Impact on Earth“ The most-shared piece on this entire topic — based on the landmark 2018 Science study by Poore and Nemecek. The headline itself has become one of the most cited climate facts in journalism.

SO MANY OTHER THINGS TO LEARN AND GET FIRED UP

Books:

• Growing a Revolution: Bringing Our Soil Back to Life by David R. Montgomery — I love this book and it’s very readable! 
• The End of Food by Paul Roberts — on the industrial food system’s structural fragility
• Regenesis: Feeding the World Without Devouring the Planet by George Monbiot — on how we might save farming without destroying everything else
• Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations by David R. Montgomery — the history of topsoil loss and agricultural collapse across human civilizations

Watch more:

• Kiss the Ground (2020) — on regenerative agriculture and soil health! This is THE doc to start with!
• Common Ground (2023) – a spiritual sequel to Kiss The Ground and we absolutely adore it. It came out recently and lots of resources and places to learn more there https://commongroundfilm.org/
• The Biggest Little Farm (2018) — on the painful, beautiful process of restoring degraded farmland, featuring real scenes of soil coming back to life
• Fantastic Fungi (2019) — on the underground ecosystem that makes topsoil possible, and what we lose when we destroy it