EHL’s Frank Veraart is the winner of the Sophie Coe Prize 2023 for food history with his article: Frank Veraart, “Catalysing Socio-Ecological Change: The Extraction and Processing of Edible Oils, 1910–1940,” Global Environment 15 (2022): 370–397.
The paper presents the entangled history of the innovation of oil hardening and resource exploitation in the global south. It shows the dramatic effects this had on changing social structures even evoking a revolt against the colonial rule in Congo, how it spurred monocrop plantations in Indonesia and Africa, while simultaneously causing the near extinction of whales in the Antarctic.
The judges wrote “that they would never look at palm oil and other products the same way again” The full judges report can be read here: https://sophiecoeprize.wordpress.com/judges-report-2023/
We congratulate Frank with this Prize!