“and then, we’ll feed you.” i could sense a collective sigh of relief from the group of weary travelers when national geographic-lindblad expeditions naturalist tanya helmig uttered those words in the airport lobby. up before dawn and off by 6 am, our planet forward team flew from quito to guayaquil, then from guayaquil to baltra island, passing through several biosecurity checkpoints before finally arriving in ecuador’s enchanting galápagos islands. 

stepping off the plane felt otherworldly. maybe it was the dissonance of seeing the abundance of cacti in what i thought would be a tropical paradise, or maybe it was the inkling of realization that i — a small town girl from rural north carolina —  now stood in a place famous the world over for inspiring the theory of evolution. 

our smiling scottish-born guide gave a warm welcome to the gaggle of tourists and shared some logistical instructions, but it was all a blur until she said those magic words: “and then, we’ll feed you.” last night’s dinner was long ago and i, like many others, passed on breakfast in lieu of a later wake up call. she promised we were in for a treat that week, starting with a grand buffet lunch to welcome us onboard. but once we sat down to eat, i realized this wasn’t just another restaurant experience — it was a window into a complex food system that keeps the people in the galápagos fed.

a “bucket list trip” is how many (if not all) of the guests aboard the national geographic gemini expedition ship described their journey to the galápagos islands. our group of planet forward storyfest winners shared the experience with members from three generations of a midwest family celebrating the life of their beloved grandfather, a mother-daughter pair from northern california capping off a longer tour of ecuador, and a semi-retired arizona snowbird who was on the trip to better understand the experience she recommends to her travel clients.

some people were adventure enthusiasts signing up for all the adrenaline-pumping hikes and dives; others were savoring the opportunity to get up close and personal with wildlife from the convenience of the zodiac (a brand of rigid inflatable boats). bookending the breathtaking natural beauty of time spent exploring the islands was the comfort and attention to detail experienced aboard the gemini. 

this floating hotel provides shelter and transportation for up to 48 guests and 50 crew members at any given time. in addition to the private cabins, there’s an indoor dining room, outdoor dining patio, lounge area, pool deck, and library for guest perusal. as you might imagine, there’s way more space behind the scenes that keeps the gemini going.

most intriguing to me was the galley, where an expert culinary team preps, serves, and busses a world class meal — influenced by the local cuisine and catered to myriad dietary restrictions and preferences — three times a day. there were (seemingly) endless assortments of delicious and freshly made foodstuffs available for breakfast, lunch, and dinner delivered right to guests’ tables by the knowledgeable and courteous waitstaff. 

meal times were so elegantly choreographed that they belied the logistical challenge of feeding 100 people while floating more than 600 miles away from the nearest commercial food supplier. that distance matters because, according to a study by carolina sampedro and colleagues published in 2018, around 75% of all food consumed on the islands is imported from mainland ecuador, a share that could grow to 95% in the next decade without policy and infrastructure investments.

and tourists like myself (~270,000 people each year) account for more than 70% of the islands’ total economy, increasing the demand for fresh food in a place with limited agricultural land and strict conservation zoning. 

from farm to fork

as a food and agriculture researcher, i knew there was more complexity to the food service than meets the eye. i sought out a variety of crew members to learn more about our meals and agricultural development in the galápagos islands. 

my first stop was the hotel office, where hotel manager fernanda orellana walked me through how menus are designed and groceries are purchased, not just around guest expectations, but around the agricultural realities of the islands and the company’s commitment to sustainability.

fernanda, a bubbly and easygoing person, started her career as a hospitality student in guayaquil, ecuador’s biggest city and coastal hub, furthering a lifelong dream to live in the galápagos. a stint as a waitress on a cruise ship brought her to the islands a decade ago and she worked her way up the hierarchy of numerous tourism companies before beginning her current role aboard the gemini. 

as the hotel manager, fernanda manages the culinary team and approves all purchase orders, giving her great insight into the food system onboard. she described the company philosophy of local purchasing in the following way: “most of our products are purchased here in galápagos: the first option is always local farmers.

many companies bring food from guayaquil because it’s cheaper, but buying local food supports the economy here. some companies make a whole video campaign about buying one local product; lindblad doesn’t brag about it, but they really do it.” 

sourcing local ingredients also contributes to the goal of building a delicious and diverse menu that’s 100% ecuadorian. fernanda uses her interactions with guests to promote culinary curiosity. she said, “it’s good because guests get to explore the culture and tradition through food. ecuador has every kind of dish you can imagine. food has history, and i love sharing the stories behind how dishes came to be so people understand ecuador more fully.”

from seco de pollo (ecuadorian chicken stew) to pan de yuca (cheesy cassava bread) to locro de papa (potato and cheese soup), i for one walked away with a more expansive view of ecuador through its cultural foods.

next, i had an opportunity to speak with head chef victor bodero. my conversation with victor — nestled into a few moments of spare time before dinner service and interpreted by fernanda — started with his tenure on the gemini, covered his perspective on galápagos food systems as a local, and ended with innovative efforts to reduce food waste. 

victor was born in guayaquil and moved to santa cruz island at age seven. he worked his way from dishwasher to line cook to head chef on the vessel under previous management, and was happy to be continuing a world-class culinary experience with lindblad expeditions. responding to a prompt about the company’s commitment to local food sourcing, victor said, “buying directly from the people [on the islands] allows farmers and fishers to create new pathways to market and start upgrading [their operations] because they know they have a steady buyer.” 

for victor, it’s not just about getting quality produce straight from the galápagos; it’s also important to ensure as little food waste as possible. approximately one-third of all food produced globally is lost or wasted. wasted food isn’t just about lost meals, it means wasted water, land, energy, and fertilizer. 

one way lindblad expeditions and the gemini team reduce food waste is by asking guests to pre-register for dinner entrees. each afternoon, the team placed a sign-up sheet on the end of the bar with evening meal options. by indicating your preferences ahead of time (as opposed to ordering on the spot in the dining room), victor could tightly tailor the dinner service to only prepare what was requested.

“for example, if i have 10 guests pre-registered for the chicken and five unregistered, i’ll take out 15 portions of chicken in case the unregistered folks want some. that’s an improvement from prepping 45 portions (the full guest list), but it would be so much better if everyone pre-selected their entree,” he said. 

a fond farewell

having embarked on the gemini on a saturday, when the next saturday rolled around it was time to leave. the last meal was a tranquil mid-morning breakfast on the patio, a bittersweet time to get our fill and say goodbyes. peering over the guardrails, i caught a glimpse of a small, nondescript white boat that was cozied up beside the gemini.

i wasn’t quite sure what to make of it, but figured it out after a few minutes of curious observation: the crew members were exchanging loaded coolers for empty ones, bringing all sorts of meats and produce from the islands to replenish the galley for the next voyage.

the circularity of it all struck me with another thought, that the food service experience on the gemini was at once uber global and hyper local: we were international tourists eating ecuadorian meals sourced from — almost exclusively — the galápagos islands. more than 2,500 miles away from my own family farm, my once-in-a-lifetime adventure was powered by family farms in the galapagos. now, that’s something to chew on. 

editor’s note: lindblad expeditions, our planet forward storyfest competition partner, made these series possible by providing winners with an experiential learning opportunity aboard one of their ships. we thank lindblad expeditions for their support of our project.

“a dry year will scare you to death, but a wet year will kill you.”

my papa’s words, often repeated by my dad, sum up the precarious balance farmers must strike between praying for rain and hoping you don’t get too much. growing up in robeson county, north carolina — an area at the heart of the swampy homelands of the lumbee tribe — i saw how the weather could swing year-to-year between drought conditions and floods, with dry spells prompting pastors to call for rain from the pulpit and wet years keeping farmers sidelined out of their fields.

my people have lived here since time immemorial, relying on deep ancestral knowledge to cultivate the land, but the 2024 growing season was a bundle of extremes hardly seen before. 

the summer began with only 1 inch of rain in june, the second driest june on record since 1895. farmers watched their crops struggle at a critical point in the growing season, with some counties going weeks without a single drop of rain.

then, in july, nearly 8 inches of water fell, making it the 11th wettest july in 130 years. this was a relief for farmers, but the rollercoaster ride wasn’t over yet. august brought nearly 10 inches of precipitation from tropical storm debby, wreaking havoc on crops still in the field through flooding and severe winds. while north carolina’s staple commodity crops like corn, soybeans, cotton, and tobacco struggled, one crop thrived through it all: hemp.

the resiliency and adaptability of hemp

hemp isn’t common in robeson county; in fact, my first real exposure to the plant came by chance last summer, when my dad, eddie moore, a farmer with 35 years of experience, participated in a hemp research trial. he planted a few acres in a back field near the cow pasture as a test, and was pleasantly surprised with how resilient the plant was through a less than ideal season.

speaking to the challenges of the flash drought, moore said, “the seed is pretty tough. during the dry spell, some seeds didn’t have enough soil moisture to germinate when planted, but they laid there patiently and came up later. i saw that the plant was really stressed with the drought, but it suffered right through until the rains came.”

and when the rain kept coming, he saw the plant soldier through again. “then it got really wet, and the hemp didn’t like that. but, it wasn’t a total disaster because the stem — the part used for fiber — was already made and we were still able to harvest it,” he said.

hemp’s resiliency last summer stands in stark contrast to the wilted corn and parched soybeans on nearby plots. as climate change shifts seasonal weather patterns to the extremes in our homeland, lumbee farmers like my dad are on the hunt for alternative crops to keep the farm above water. could growing hemp be a viable way forward?

hemp is a fast-growing broadleaf plant often styled as a sustainability success story: it requires minimal inputs of fertilizer, pesticides and water to reach impressive yields; improving soil health and sequestering carbon; and restoring degraded ecosystems through phytoremediation (a process where plants absorb soil contaminants).

and, as my dad saw firsthand, hemp is shown to be very adaptable to the type of extreme weather north carolinians expect to face from climate change. while it’s easy to hear all that and get excited, experts say caution is warranted before casting hemp as a one-size-fits-all solution.

one solution of many

that’s how david suchoff, ph.d., assistant professor of alternative crops at nc state and lead researcher for my dad’s field trial, started our conversation in october: “i always tell folks to be very careful about selling hemp as a wonder crop. there’s no silver bullet to save us from climate change. it takes a system of solutions, of which hemp is a nice component.” 

in my dad’s case, he grew a particular variety of hemp whose fibers are useful for textiles. the focus on fiber was a strategic decision by suchoff, who knew farmers were wary of the boom and bust cycles associated with cbd hemp in previous years, and wanted to make sure that the next iteration of industrial hemp in nc had a more stable market.

to do that, suchoff built a research collaboration across the textile supply chain, connecting farmers to processors and textile engineers to end customers. why textiles? “just like agriculture, the textile industry is focusing on sustainability. textiles is a dirty industry from a number of aspects, from waste and water use to synthetics and microplastics. hemp fiber gives manufacturers a way to make the whole process more sustainable,” suchoff said. 

a more sustainable future is what motivated andre west, ph.d., associate professor and director of zies textiles extension at nc state, to focus on hemp fiber, too. my dad and i visited the nc state college of textiles in january where we toured a newly installed hemp fiber processing system meant to be a model for north carolina businesses interested in working with hemp blends.

west showed us around the production floor as he discussed ongoing work with the department of defense to design hemp uniforms for the u.s. military. he describes himself as a fashion designer at heart, but he has shifted his attention to raw material sourcing in the last decade. when asked why, west spoke with no hesitation: “this (being more sustainable to address climate change) is the most important thing in the world right now.” 

overcoming obstacles

if hemp is sustainable to grow and sustainable to use, then why isn’t it more widespread in the u.s.? pre-contact indigenous peoples throughout turtle island used native species of fiber hemp to create all manner of textiles, including ropes, nets, and clothing.

when europeans first arrived, they brought new strains of hemp with them and continued to use it for myriad purposes. but over time, a combination of factors — including the rise of cotton as a dominant cash crop, the proliferation of petroleum-based synthetic fibers, and the cultural stigmatization of psychoactive cannabis — led to a sharp decline in domestic hemp cultivation.

even though cotton is no longer as dominant and consumers are eager to shift away from synthetics, hemp production continues to be stymied by legacy government regulations that treat hemp much more strictly than other crops.

all three interviewees mentioned deregulation as a critical next step for greater hemp adoption. suchoff described the process in this way: “right now, under usda policy, hemp is hemp. it doesn’t matter if it’s cbd or grain or fiber. it’s all handled the same and a farmer has to get an fbi check to secure a license to grow it. then they have to get the crop tested for thc to make sure it’s under the legal limit, and that’s a lot of money.” 

the cost of regulation, high-quality seeds, and specialized equipment adds up quickly, creating a barrier to entry for farmers working with limited resources. the need for farmers to make a big initial investment for production is matched by high uncertainty among buyers in the market as they assess how willing consumers are to choose textiles made from hemp.

what’s next for hemp-growers in north carolina?

fiber hemp thrived in the drought-turned-deluge weather of north carolina last summer, but according to my dad, farmers need to know more than that before they start planting more acres. “what i’m interested in is finding out what the profit potential is. because ultimately, that’s what it’s all about. can we make money with this? can we survive growing it?” 

my dad’s question brings me back to my papa’s words. as lumbee people and a farming community, so much of our history is about figuring out how to survive as the world changes around us.

i can’t say for sure whether hemp will be a large part of our story, but i do know our people will find a way to survive. as my dad said, the success of hemp fiber depends not only on resilience in the field but also on its ability to offer a viable economic future for farmers.