Feeding a Changing World

Dinner As We Know it Is Hurting the Planet. But What If We Radically Rethink How We Make Food?

Farmers have grown food in roughly the same way for thousands of years: planting seeds and watching them grow; raising animals from birth to slaughter; hoping that nature provides them the right amounts of rain and sun.

Now, entrepreneurs say they have a better idea. Agriculture in its current form is bad for the planet, they say—fields for crops and animal grazing occupy land where trees could be planted, and farming sucks up vast amounts of increasingly precious water. Why not make food in a completely different way, maybe growing lettuce in skyscrapers and creating meat from cells in a petri dish?

More From TIME Magazine: