The future of food and energy – Mike Joy

As an ecologist Mike sees the world in an interconnected systems way. This view allows for the awareness and acceptance that civilisation is facing peak everything, and climate change is but one of a raft of existential crises that are symptoms overshoot. The crises are the manifestation of hitting planetary boundaries, or biophysical limits to growth we were warned about in the 1970s. The burgeoning human population and levels of consumption has far exceeded the ability of the planet to sustain it long-term through. This overshoot was enabled using fossil energy, in the case of food much of it through synthetic nitrogen, which allowed us, albeit temporarily to eat the past. This transition was arrogantly labelled the ‘green revolution’ and talked up as a great human achievement but, it was one-off subsidy from the past. This legacy is, however, close to its end as the ‘easy energy pickings’ diminish.
To be able to feed the burgeoning population without fossil fuels and keep greenhouse gas emissions at a safe level will require a drastic reduction in consumption. Thus, degrowth is inescapable our choice is whether we do it in a managed way or have it forced upon us.

Mike Joy BSc, MSc (1st class hons), PhD in Ecology is a Senior researcher at the Institute for Governance and Policy Studies at Victoria University, Wellington.  He researches ecological modelling, bioassessment, environmental science, environmental policy, and energy futures.

Mike has published many papers in scientific journals, many international as well as articles and op-eds for newspapers and magazines. He has authored many reports for Regional Councils and ministry for the environment and has developed several bioassessment tools and associated software.

Mike is an outspoken advocate for environmental protection in New Zealand and has received a number of awards including an Ecology in Action award from the NZ ecological Society, an Old Blue award from Forest and Bird, he received the Tertiary Education Union NZ Award of Excellence for Academic Freedom and contribution to Public Education, the 2013 Charles Fleming Award for environmental work from the Royal Society of New Zealand, in 2015 the Morgan Foundation inaugural River Voice Award and in 2017 the inaugural NZ Universities Critic and Conscience award.