Fred Magdoff is Emeritus Professor of Plant and Soil Science at the University of Vermont. His areas of interest include agriculture and food, environment, and the US economy. His research at UVM was on ecologically sound ways to improve soil fertility, especially focusing on the critical role of soil organic matter. He is the co-author of the third edition of Building Crops for Better Soil: Sustainable Soil Management and What Every Environmentalist Needs to Know About Capitalism, and other books on agriculture and on the US economy. He has published numerous articles on environmental issues, including on ecological agriculture, production and use of biofuels, ecological civilization, population and global resource depletion, and the environmental and social problems of capitalist agriculture. He holds a PhD from Cornell University.