Internships

Paige Silverstein ’24

Major

Civil and Environmental Engineering

Project Title

Climate-resilient Food Systems

Presentation Link

View Paige's Presentation

Certificate(s): Applied and Computational Mathematics, French Language and Culture

I worked on developing an accessible systems mapping toolkit for the Environmental Defense Fund’s (EDF) Climate Resilient Food Systems team. Food systems refer to all the elements involved in bringing food from the land and sea onto people’s plates. The global food system produces 33% of the world’s emissions, and, though we are currently producing 1.5 times the global dietary needs, there are still around 750 million people around the globe that face hunger every day. For this reason, it is important to take a holistic approach to food challenges. Every food system is unique, and I hope the toolkit I developed will provide an easy-to-use tool that points people toward meaningful food system interventions and encourages community participation in the discussion of food system transformation. I also had the opportunity to support the team’s work to bring blue and aquatic food dialogue to high-level events such as the United Nations Ocean Conference. I learned so much and honed my research, writing, and communication skills through literature reviews, facilitating meetings, writing for a general audience, developing media cards and communication packets, and more. I am excited to continue my work with EDF throughout the fall.