(upbeat music) - Change, especially rapid change, always has two aspects, a upside and a downside, winners and losers.

And, the more you're ready for the change, do not letting it blindside you, the more apt you are, to be one of the winners.

(upbeat music) I work on food markets in developing countries, which is mainly in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

And that involves looking at food supply chains.

How food goes from farms through wholesale markets and logistics firms and retailers to consumers.

(upbeat music) To really understand a society at any given stage, it's very important to put yourself into their shoes.

I was at the generation where my mother, she gave me some hop cards and she said, mama's little helper, here, just hit these up.

And I saw then, from the eyes of the people that are undergoing change.

Sometimes things that later we can criticize, getting processed foods and, you know, where you don't have to spend 42 hours a week cooking, look pretty good.

(upbeat music) The normal mentality of the countries that I've been working in in the past 20, 30 years, they are in the stage where they want to get affordable food.

Supermarkets, fast food, a lot of times, these changes are really hard on those that aren't prepared.

You come to a certain point where you're in a second generation of problems.

There's nutritional problems, there's pollution.

And so, a lot of my work was to show how rapidly things were changing, where they were going to help governments to prepare people for the changes.

(upbeat music) I feel like the developing countries can pursue that with efficiencies and things that we research and learn from the mistakes of the richer countries to try to make it more sustainable.

(upbeat music) Everybody knows that Michigan State is among the leading internationally oriented agriculture and food universities in the world.

And so, that's a real calling card that also gives me the pleasure and the linkages and the network and the family of Michigan State University.

I'm excited about the life I've lived during this field research and thank you very much.

(upbeat music)