In his book, Per Pinstrup-Andersen synthesizes almost 70 years of work on food systems, from a 14-year old farmworker in Denmark to World Food Prize Laureate, Director General of the world’s foremost food policy research institute and Professor of Food and Nutrition Policy and Economics in the United States. With the overriding goal of improving food security, nutrition, and human and environmental health, he assesses the impact of more evidence generated by food policy analysis – including his own – and leaves the reader with the question of whether lack of evidence is the most binding constraint for developing sustainable food systems that assure a healthy diet for all. Was he and other food policy analysts merely actors in a game rigged by the existing power structure that purposefully fails to use the existing evidence to improve the livelihood of the disadvantaged?