Groundswell Regenerative Agriculture Festival: Looking at Food Security
Building on the insights from the food security and innovation panel at our annual conference, Trainee Christian Laroque attended the Groundswell to delve even deeper into the topics.
Groundswell Regenerative Agriculture Festival: Looking at Food Security
Now in its 8th year, the Groundswell Agricultural Festival has established itself as a pivotal platform for learning and discussing regenerative systems in agriculture. This article summarises two key events at Groundswell that focused on the critical issue of food security.
Event 1: Reducing Agricultural Dependency on Nitrates
Macroeconomic and geopolitical arguments paint a dire picture of the future of food security; the world’s reliance on nitrates for food production is unsustainable. It was reassuring to see innovative solutions being developed at Groundswell to address this pressing issue.
Joel Williams of Integrated Soils, in collaboration with Sea2Soil, presented a compelling vision for the future of agriculture. His talk on metabolic shortcutting, which optimises the metabolic pathways of plants and soil microbes, offers a promising solution to reduce reliance on nitrates and enhance nutrient use efficiency.
Efficiency was spoken about in terms of energy needed by the plant to absorb (uptake), then break down nitrates into amino acids to be converted into Tripeptides, Dipeptides, which convert into plant proteins (utilisation). In short, his solution enables plants to use their energy for growth and increasing food yields instead of breaking down nitrate molecules and reorganising them for use.
The practical benefits were also highlighted, from improved soil health to reduced pollution from soil runoff. However, the most compelling benefit was the lower carbon cost and carbon bonus derived from adopting metabolic shortcutting. I’m not a chemist or a biologist, but the numbers certainly don’t lie.
I’m a business graduate, and I can’t do this subject justice in the expert way that Joel managed to. Still, I can say that attending this talk sparked my curiosity to understand more. It would be interesting to explore the viability, scalability and likelihood of adoption of the solutions presented in his talk to understand the extent of their impact. If any of my network know about this subject area, please reach out as I’d be happy to learn from you.
Every significant change begins somewhere. While this talk might not be the catalyst for that one major change, it has the potential to inspire it. Even if it doesn’t, it could spark the ideas that lead to transformative action. It’s things like this that make Groundswell such an excellent platform for discussion and learning, and it’s why I’m grateful to MDS for providing me the opportunity to attend.
Find out more: https://www.instagram.com/integratedsoils
Event 2 Cultured Meat – Game Changer, Disruptor or a Load of Hot Air
The world’s population has increased by a third since the turn of the millennium and continues to climb, considerably increasing demand for edible protein. If protein supply cannot keep up with rising demand, prices will increase, causing people to buy less than they need to effectively nourish their bodies. However, there are some fantastic people already making headway to tackle this potential disaster.
One such means of tackling the problem is ‘cultured meat’, often referred to as lab-grown meat. A discussion was hosted at the Groundswell Regenerative Agriculture Festival to dig into this solution, focusing on what farmers think of cultured meat and the impact on farming as a business if it becomes part of our diets. The discussion was backed by the UK Research and Innovation public body and led by Dr Lisa Morgans (Senior Lecturer for animal health and welfare at the Royal Agricultural University) and Andrew Court (Mixed/livestock Farmer). It was based on a well-funded 2-year research study that identified the key issues farmers might have with this innovation.
Now that Singapore sells cultivated meat, farmers are seeing a reality where they might need to compete with scientists for their livelihoods. A simplistic argument could be made that farmers should adapt their produce to the market should this happen. However, Is it reasonable to expect a heritage farm to replace a significant revenue stream and propagator of their wider farming systems, especially mixed farms where livestock keeps the ground suitable for vegetable growth. Farming, aka food creation, is fundamental to survival, so it’s not good enough to say it’s just business. If it doesn’t work for farmers, it doesn’t work for any of us. But it just might work for everyone, and here is why…
- Cultured meat is comparable to minced meat, it cannot replace a quality cut of meat and is unlikely to dominate the market. This innovation is in its infancy so this nullifying dimension could change as the field matures.
- Cultured meat currently requires medical grade inputs that make it unable to compete on price with the meat industry. This might change, but…
- Cultured meat inputs include source cells and growth media that must come from somewhere. The only known scalable source is from animals (i.e. animal blood). If not supplied by fisheries, this blood comes from abattoirs by virtue of livestock farms.
Livestock farms are therefore well positioned to control and benefit from an integrated supply chain for the emerging cultured meat industry. Rather than competition or a catalyst for change in farming systems; farmers could regard cultured meat as an added value to the business they already conduct.
After listening to the experts of a well-backed 2-year deep dive into the business paradigm of cultured meat, I believe that (subject to economic viability) it will have a role in contributing to the growing global demand for protein. Although an opportunity for change, I’m confident that cultured meat will not disrupt but will instead add value to livestock farms.
If you want to know more about the 2-year study on which this discussion was based on click here.
