Dan Charles
Dan Charles is NPR's food and agriculture correspondent.
Primarily responsible for covering farming and the food industry, Charles focuses on the stories of culture, business, and the science behind what arrives on your dinner plate.
This is his second time working for NPR; from 1993 to 1999, Charles was a technology correspondent at NPR. He returned in 2011.
During his time away from NPR, Charles was an independent writer and radio producer and occasionally filled in at NPR on the Science and National desks, and at Weekend Edition. Over the course of his career Charles has reported on software engineers in India, fertilizer use in China, dengue fever in Peru, alternative medicine in Germany, and efforts to turn around a troubled school in Washington, DC.
In 2009-2010, he taught journalism in Ukraine through the Fulbright program. He has been guest researcher at the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy at the University of Hamburg, Germany, and a Knight Science Journalism fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
From 1990 to 1993, Charles was a U.S. correspondent for New Scientist, a major British science magazine.
The author of two books, Charles wrote Master Mind: The Rise and Fall of Fritz Haber, The Nobel Laureate Who Launched the Age of Chemical Warfare (Ecco, 2005) and Lords of the Harvest: Biotech, Big Money, and the Future of Food (Perseus, 2001) about the making of genetically engineered crops.
Charles graduated magna cum laude from American University with a degree in economics and international affairs. After graduation Charles spent a year studying in Bonn, which was then part of West Germany, through the German Academic Exchange Service.
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As lawmakers revealed a spending bill to keep the government running, they also took the time to weigh in on school lunch, GM salmon, calorie postings on menus and meat labels. -
Producers of poultry, cattle and pigs continue to use more antibiotics, according to the latest government data. That's despite more pledges from food companies to sell meat raised without the drugs. -
Outbreaks of foodborne illness are ruining the holiday spirit for Chipotle. The latest cases erupted over the past few days among students at Boston College. -
The U.S. doesn't grow many vegetables indoors. We have California, Arizona and Latin America to supply us in winter instead. But entrepreneurs are betting on greenhouses to supply more fresh food. -
A warming climate is likely to disrupt global food production, which has Big Food companies worried. Some, like Mars, are becoming increasingly vocal advocates for action on greenhouse gas emissions. -
The Environmental Protection Agency wants to withdraw approval of a controversial herbicide made by Dow AgroSciences. The firm made conflicting claims to EPA and the Patent Office about the product. -
More than half of America's sweet potatoes were lifted by hand from the soil of North Carolina. It's some of the most back-breaking farm work to be found, and migrant laborers do most of it. -
In a long-awaited ruling, the agency said that a salmon created to grow faster is fit for human consumption. Environmental and food safety groups vow to fight the decision. -
The Food and Drug Administration's regulations contain some compromises and cover farmers who grow fresh produce, as well as importers. The agency has been working on the rules for five years. -
Glyphosate, or Roundup, is a widely used weedkiller and has been classified as a "probable carcinogen." But experts from the European Food Safety Agency now contend it probably doesn't cause cancer.
