“ Putting all the data together is a hell of a job” With the ENHANCE project, Saskia de Pee and Melissa Koenen aim to create a healthy diet for healthy people on a healthy planet. But what such a diet entails may vary by region. CV
Saskia de Pee (1967) is team lead systems analysis and science for nutrition at the World Food Programme. She received her PhD in 1996 from the then Agricultural University of Wageningen.
12 | New Scientist | Special Zero Hunger Lab
Text: Eline Kraaijenvanger Photos: Bram Belloni
A
round the world, some 811 million people are going hungry. Fortunately, you notice little of this on the Tilburg University campus. AH-to-go and Starbucks shine right next to the building that houses the Zero Hunger Lab. There, on the sixth floor, people are working hard to find solutions to eliminate the hunger problem. With this idealistic goal in mind, PhD student Melissa Koenen delves into numbers
and algorithms on a daily basis. She is working on the ENHANCE project, a unique collaboration between the Zero Hunger Lab, Capgemini, Johns Hopkins University in the United States of America, and the World Food Programme. Saskia de Pee is team lead systems analysis and science for food and nutrition, and heads the ENHANCE project. ENHANCE focuses on ‘healthy diets for healthy people on a healthy planet’. Quite a few conditions in one sentence. Saskia de Pee: “These days we talk about
sustainable healthy diets, or foods that are
