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.
-
Government investigators are trying to solve an agricultural whodunit: How did genetically engineered wheat that was never approved for sale end up in a farmer's field in Oregon? Some are raising the possibility of sabotage; others suspect simple human error. -
It doesn't take much effort to find bags of coffee with labels that promise social and environmental improvements. But each one of these certification programs promises something different for the farmer and the land — and every promise involves some compromises. -
Coffee is social stimulant, solitary pleasure, intellectual catalyst. It also connects us to far corners of the globe. From small specialty farms in Guatemala to large, industrial operations in Brazil and unexpected corners of the world, like Vietnam, the world's morning cup of joe makes quite a journey. -
Rumors abound of a major shakeup in the works for U.S. food aid programs. The U.S. would give aid groups money to buy food wherever they could get it cheapest and quickest, rather than shipping abroad commodities bought in the U.S. Already, groups that profit from the current system are mounting a fight. -
A rice enriched with beta-carotene promises to boost the health of poor children around the world. But critics say golden rice is also a clever PR move for a biotech industry driven by profits, not humanitarianism. -
When it comes to pollinating our favorite crops — from coffee to watermelon — honeybees can't do it alone. Wild bees in the field play a critical role in creating bumper crops, a massive new study reports. But these bees are disappearing, and scientists say the rise of crop monocultures is partly to blame. -
The Great Drought of 2012 dominated headlines this summer, but so far, it has not had a major impact on the prices of food on your holiday table, except the dairy products. That prime rib is more expensive for other reasons. -
The power is out for 20 percent of the people in West Virginia, but in Fayetteville, which overlooks the New River Gorge, residents are taking the early snows in stride. -
Scientists have discovered that the gene that makes tomatoes uniformly ripe and red also makes them less tasty. But it's going to take consumer education and a willingness to pay more before the industry makes a change. -
Villagers say they're getting a raw deal as companies rush to buy up African land to form mega-farms. Farmers complain they've been ousted from the land while promises to improve water systems and schools and replant uprooted crops are not being kept.
