He is a professor in the Department of Geography, Environment and Geomatics, and he serves as Director of the Arrell Food Institute at the University of Guelph.
His first book, Beef: The Untold Story of How Milk, Meat, and Muscle Shaped the World, was co-authored with journalist Andrew Rimas and first published in 2008.
His third book, Uncertain Harvest: The Future of Food on a Warming Planet, was co-authored with Ian Mosby and Sarah Rotz and published in 2020 by the University of Regina Press.
[6] His fourth book, Dinner on Mars: The Technologies That Will Feed the Red Planet and Transform Agriculture on Earth, was co-authored with Dr. Lenore Newman and published in 2022 by ECW Press.
He also created a card game about global food security, which won a gold medal at the International "Serious Play" conference.