Skip to main contentSkip to navigation
Print subscriptions
Newsletters
Sign in

Jessica Fu

Jessica Fu is a freelance reporter based in New York, focused on agriculture, policy and the environment

June 2024

  • a glass of soda with ice and a straw

    Unsweet
    Is aspartame bad for you? What we know about the sweetener’s health risks

    Some studies link the popular soda sweetener to higher cancer risk, but the links are weak and questions remain

March 2024

  • Girl eating bowl of Froot Loops

    School food fights
    California may ban some food dyes in school meals. Will other states follow?

    Consumer groups say it’s past time to rid food of unnecessary and potentially harmful chemicals

October 2023

  • People line up to enter a hydroponics shop in Washington DC that hosted a marijuana plant seed giveaway in 2017 to help consumers start home cultivation.

    Our unequal earth
    As more states legalize cannabis, the market for seeds is in full bloom

    The messy intersection of botany and the law contributes to the murky legal status of seeds used to grow THC-rich cannabis

May 2023

  • Anthony Meng stands on campus at Hamline University in Saint Paul, Minnesota on Monday, May 8th, 2023. Meng, a senior undergraduate student at Hamline, is a Food Access Student Coordinator at the Food Resource Center where students and staff can access free food. Meng is also involved with the student-led food justice organization, Feed Your Brain, which brings greater awareness about food insecurity on college campuses and increases food access for Hamline students.

    Our unequal earth
    ‘I can’t afford groceries’: why one-third of US college students don’t have enough to eat

    There are now around 800 food pantries on US college campuses, and demand is growing as pandemic-era resources end

April 2023

  • Montreal, Quebec, March 28th, 2023: Frantz André, a tireless volunteer advocate for refugees in Quebec, has spent his retirement and all his savings helping asylum seekers navigate their new home. Since the irregular border crossing at Roxham Road was closed, the calls for help have intensified. CREDIT: Nasuna Stuart-Ulin for The Guardian

    A quiet hero: how a Canadian retiree became an unexpected savior for asylum seekers

    Frantz André isn’t a lawyer – but he spends his days helping hundreds of people tackle the immigration system, free of charge

February 2023

  • Untitled Artwork 238

    Our unequal earth
    ‘Horrible timing’: pandemic food relief ends as inflation sends families scrambling

  • Illustration of a cow burping toxic gas and people wearing energy company logos picking up its manure

    Our unequal earth
    Brown gold: the great American manure rush begins

November 2022

  • Brett St Amand stands for a portrait with his dog and one of his cats in front of the horse trailer in which he lives in Georgetown, Kentucky.

    Our unequal earth
    The US struggle to pay for food: ‘No matter how well you budget, you will run out of something’

    Why have some US states opted out of nearly $4bn in emergency funds that would have helped their poorest residents?

September 2022

  • a woman sits at her kitchen table

    Our unequal earth
    ‘I felt like I failed’: inflation puts healthy food out of reach for millions of Americans

  • Sprinklers watering crops

    Our unequal earth
    It’s the thirstiest crop in the US south-west. Will the drought put alfalfa farmers out of business?

Explore more on these topics