World hunger: Can technology help feed the world?

Ending World Hunger by 2030 is one of the UN’s Key Sustainable Development Goals, announced in 2015. We’re now half way to the final milepost, but estimates still put the number of people in the world who are suffering from hunger and malnutrition at around 811 million, more than 9% of the world's population. So how can tech help? In this episode, we’ll be meeting some of the amazing people at the cutting edge of ending world hunger through the use of technology.

Daan Luining:
The way that we're doing it right now, doesn't seem to be able to sustain the grown population that we have on this planet.

Michael Bird:
Ending world hunger. It's been the subject of countless telethons and charity fundraisers, and rightly so. Estimates put the number of people in the world who are suffering from hunger and malnutrition, at the time of this episode, at around 811 million, more than 9% of the world's population. That's a staggering number. And it hasn't really changed a huge amount in recent years. Over the long term, patterns are promising. In the year 2000, 15% of the world was malnourished, but progress has slowed. In 2015, the UN announced a series of sustainable development goals or SDGs. One of those, the first in fact, was to eradicate world hunger by 2030. We're halfway to that 2030 mark and there's a lot of work to do.

Michael Bird:
But we are living in a time of huge opportunity. In this episode, we're going to be taking a look at how technology can help feed the world. From making farming more efficient, to giving small scale farmers in remote communities the chance to reach out to the world. The challenge is massive, but we're in a connected age where especially after the COVID-19 pandemic, there's a real drive to connect the world and not leave anyone behind.

Michael Bird:
You're listening to Technology Untangled. A show which looks at the rapid evolution of technology, and unravels the way it's changing our world. I'm your host, Michael Bird.

Michael Bird:
So first let's run through a few basic facts. Small farmers, herders, and fishermen produce about 70% of the global food supply. Unfortunately, these are the people who are most at risk from adverse weather, conflict, disease, global warming, water shortages, and the like. They're also less likely to be connected to the outside world via phone or internet, and also less likely to be educated to use what technology is available. There is more than enough food produced in the world to feed everyone on the planet. And for reference the minimum healthy intake is generally judged to be around 1800 calories of a mixed diet. So eat your veggies, drink your milk, or your substitute of choice.

Michael Bird:
The problem is we chuck a load of it away. In Europe and North America, approximately, get this, 30% of the food we buy goes in the bin. Staggering. Likewise, 15 to 30% of food produced by our farmers gets thrown away. Enough food is thrown away in the US every year to feed 300 million people. And enough food is thrown away in Europe to feed another 200 million people. Staggering. In Africa, there's generally less household waste, but more production waste, poor storage, lack of refrigeration, unreliable logistics, which means 25% of produce never reaches the market. Oh, and China throws away enough food to feed 200 million people. My goodness.

Michael Bird:
Anyway, you get the idea. So what's needed is a way of tying all of these strands together, to make sure supply meets demand. Prepare farmers in [inaudible 00:03:42] areas for adverse conditions, and get the food to where it needs to be. So that's what we're going to be looking at in this episode. And since we need an overview to solve all of these problems, we might as well take that literally and start with satellites. Why not?

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
My name's Mark Jarman. I'm the managing director of a consultancy called AgriTierra. I'm British, but based in Bogota, Columbia. And I'm a specialist in the use of data and technology from satellites, drones, IOT, for agriculture and food

Michael Bird:
Mark previously worked for the British company, Satellites Applications Catapult, which exists to build new technologies and links between space and business. But a move to South America to follow his heart has opened his eyes to the enormous opportunities for technology in agriculture in less developed parts of the world, and the importance of opening up that data to farmers at risk from climate change and other threats.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
Fundamentally, I moved to Columbia for love, and that meant I needed the opportunity to work out here. And given I've been working in LatAm agriculture for the last seven years and built really good networks and knowledge, actually I realized quickly I could harness that to create opportunities for British companies in this region. And been very fortunate that a lot of companies have been interested in working with me.

Michael Bird:
My vision of Columbia is that it's very like green and luscious. So lots of opportunities for agriculture, I suppose. And I guess probably the wider Latin America as well?

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
Massive. I mean, from a productivity increase perspective. The beef industry, they reckon the use of data technology, they could see a 20 fold increase in productivity. Cacao, and from a chocolate perspective, 10 times. And that's billions in revenue that could be made. The challenge actually is Columbia is really susceptible to climate change. And at the moment they're getting such significant rainfall that coffee production this year compared to last year is down 20%. And that creates opportunity because you need to support particularly these small holders that are producing all these products. How do you give them the information to help them farm in a way that is resilient to the climate pressures that they're facing? So it's great that it's luscious, it's green, it's great, you've got great productivity and potential, but it's also facing a lot of threats.

Michael Bird:
Satellite technology can play a huge part in helping farmers from agri giants to small holders, increase their outputs and play a greater role in global food production.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
The three types of satellites, there's earth observation satellites, which are your satellites that are imaging the earth and doing that now sub daily. And they come in sizes of kind of a loaf of bread all the way up to a double Decker bus, costing billions. You have navigation satellites. And those are the ones that enable us to travel between A and B. And from a farming perspective, our tractor to travel up and down a field in a straight line. And then you have the kind of connectivity satellites, which is our way of getting satellite broadband, getting internet to the rural economy.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
And I don't know if you've seen some of the big developments with Elon Musk and the UK government's investment in Oneweb, putting thousands of satellites into space to give broadband to everybody globally. And that's massive for agriculture, because most of our production is in very rural areas, which is the most poorly served from a connectivity perspective.

Michael Bird:
How can farmers make use of satellites? I mean, presumably there's a finite amount of satellites and I'm guessing they're owned by mostly governments. Maybe I've got that wrong. But presumably, farmer down the road, hasn't got his own satellite in the sky looking at his own field.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
So, I mean, if you think about space, there's two types of satellites, there's government institutional satellites, and then there's commercial private satellites. And these form big constellations. So historically, a government would launch a single satellite up into orbit, and you might be familiar with the Landsat program from NASA. And that would go around the earth and you'd get data maybe once a month. All of a sudden, over the last five years, you've got lots of commercial companies who are throwing up hundreds of satellites to form constellations.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
And that changes things, because all of a sudden you're getting data literally every day. And from a farmer perspective, yes, that they're not likely to have their own satellite. Although, corporates are now thinking about having their own constellation. But it gives them the potential to get information and then they can use that for their variety of needs. And that will vary on the basis of what they produce, where their geographically located, and how big they are.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
So, a farmer in Lincolnshire farming a few thousand hectares of cereals could be using satellite data, imaging data for nitrogen application and optimizing his big sprayer behind a tractor to do that. If you are here in Columbia farming cacao, you're probably a small holder, three hectares, almost super low income subsistence farming. You don't have the mechanism to use the high end information. So your use of satellite data might be to do with weather. You need to irrigate and you might get a text message. So it's really dependent upon where you are geographically, how much capital you have, how much area you farm, as to how you might use the technology.

Michael Bird:
And that's key to note. When it comes to tackling world hunger, there are two sides to the coin. On one side, you've got the huge producers with plots of land the size of small towns. And on the other side, farmers growing simply to survive. One of the key factors in the UN Sustainable Development Goals is to democratize technology and allow the poorest to get the same benefits from data, satellites, connectivity, and the like, as large organizations which have money to spend.

Michael Bird:
One of the key driving forces behind making that happen is WEF, the World Economic Forum based out of Switzerland. They are, in their own words, the international organization for public private cooperation, and exists to "improve the state of the world by engaging business, political, academic, and other leaders of society to shape global, regional, and industry agendas." Isabelle Mauro is head of ICT Industries at the WEF, and heads up their mission to get more and more people around the world connected. I asked her why digital inclusion is so important.

Isabelle Mauro - World Economic Forum:
Put simply, it's really to connecting everyone to the internet and making sure that nobody's left behind. There's still 2.9 billion people that are offline around the world. So we really need to ensure that we bring them online, and we enable these services to improve their lives.

Michael Bird:
Because if they have access to digital communications, they will be able to access services that they may have not been able to access before?

Isabelle Mauro - World Economic Forum:
Well, I think as a bare minimum, for us living in the Western world, it seems obvious that everybody has a mobile phone. It is not. If you come from underserved or unserved regions in maybe in Africa, in Southeast Asia. But communities as well, in Europe and the US, as we saw with COVID. So, when we talk about inclusivity, I think one of the big element it's we often think about access, providing access to communications to people. But it's not just about that. I think 90% of the world potentially has access to a network.

Isabelle Mauro - World Economic Forum:
The coverage is there. The infrastructure is there. So that is not issue. The issue is to ensure that, once we have the accessibility resolved, you have to sort out the affordability to address the affordability of services and the usability. So making sure that it's affordable, making sure that people know how to access services that they otherwise wouldn't be able to access, simply because maybe they live in remote areas.

Michael Bird:
Getting remote communities connected is a big ask though. Let's be honest. There isn't a huge amount of profit to be made in getting modern telecoms technology out to the middle of nowhere. So how do we ensure that the money is well spent?

Isabelle Mauro - World Economic Forum:
There is not one fit all solution for everything. Every country, every region, will have different approaches to what suits best. What we need to look at is really how we continue to optimize the right mix of technologies across fixed, wireless, and across new non-terrestrial technologies. There are some satellites in some part of the world in unserved areas can be the solution. But the best is really a combination of all of this. So in an ideal world is having all the players really working together to make sure that they connect people in the best way possible and not purely just thinking of their own commercial incentives.

Michael Bird:
And here's where major organizations step in, because as well as funding sources for connectivity and improving sustainable agriculture, there's also the opportunity to make technology more accessible by making it cheaper. Over the last few years, there has been a huge drive by entrepreneurs, governments, and the private sector to be a bit more philanthropic with their outlook. And that's become increasingly important in recent years, as employees have started looking for employers with bold mission statements and commitments to international development and sustainability.

Michael Bird:
Besides, it never looks bad to be seen to be helping the world. Brian Tippens is the chief sustainability officer for Hewlett Packard Enterprise. And he's been working to bring the company's huge reach, leverage, and expertise in digital and communication technology to communities which often have little to know IT or communications infrastructure. I asked Brian why it's important for large organizations to try and make a difference in developing communities.

Brian Tippens - Head of sustainability, HPE:
One, it's about being tied to our purpose, advancing the way people live and work. And that's core to our values as a company. And many large organizations across the globe have similar initiatives. Very selfishly for corporations, it's on some level around making sure that there's a continuing need for the products and services that they offer. It's about elevating communities around the world. I think most important, it's around collaboration and cooperation. There's this kind of this old African proverb. I remember being at the headquarters of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle, Washington years ago, and seeing this proverb on a big banner in their lobby around, "If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together."

Brian Tippens - Head of sustainability, HPE:
It's around the fact that we can, through collaboration, achieve things that we couldn't do independently. And there's a responsibility for all corporations, where it used to be sort of driven purely by maximizing shareholder value. I think we all now appreciate that we have to meet a number of stakeholder needs, including investing in communities around the world to uplift communities out of poverty.

Michael Bird:
So I'm going to throw a very big question straight at you, if that's okay? So how can large organizations like HP, and I suppose others in our industry help end poverty and hunger worldwide?

Brian Tippens - Head of sustainability, HPE:
Well, I'd say it's around leveraging the power of each of our respective organizations. And we take that very seriously. And I think every corporation, every multinational, regardless of what their specific area of focus is, has something to offer towards those very lofty goals. I think at the end of the day, it's around open collaboration and cooperation in a way that sometimes corporations may not be accustomed to doing. I would say, in these lofty goals of ending poverty and world hunger, there can be no competition. There's a unique opportunity for us to partner to collaborate, to kind of add our own specific value towards these goals.

Michael Bird:
What sorts of things is HP doing?

Brian Tippens - Head of sustainability, HPE:
We do a lot of partnerships around leveraging our technology and our resources to be able to help with these issues of food scarcity. You know and your listeners know that we're facing kind of rising population across the globe and all the predictions are that we don't have the food supply to be able to meet that rising population. And we're facing hundreds of millions of folks that are facing issues of food scarcity today. And so we do a lot like partnership with Purdue University in the US to understand kind of how we leverage technology to be able to better predict food needs and crop yields. The science of agribusiness to be able to assist in that. Partnering with a number of collaborators around the world to understand how we could deal with those issues of food scarcity. And so I'd say it's an ongoing mission for us, and I'd say we're always open to sort of these new ideas, but we make a number of investments in this regard.

Michael Bird:
Now being head of sustainability at a global tech company, you won't be surprised to hear that Brian is a firm believer in the ability of tech to bring about change in the way the world provides its food, particularly in the area where agriculture and data intersect. One of the core partnerships HP has been building is with Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. Purdue is one of the world's leading agritech universities and has been working with HP to develop technologies to connect agricultural communities to the wider world, and the IOT.

Brian Tippens - Head of sustainability, HPE:
So much data is being generated, what we call "at the edge", and in terms of farming that could be with the farm devices, which are kind of almost like data centers and computers in and of themself. Gone are the day of kind of the manual tractor and the old manual devices. Now, the devices that are out there studying crop yields and kind of managing our fields and crop yields are almost like data centers in and of themselves. And so technology is a great way to understand all the data points that are being generated at the edge of farming, to understand how best to kind of increase yield, how best to fertilize our fields, how we want to maximize our productivity of farming, and to be able to make decisions in a really agile way. And so I'd say technology is a great enabler in being able to face these lofty goals of poverty eradication by 2030 and other such goals. I think technology plays a really critical role.

Michael Bird:
That's a vital part of the equation. The IOT and smart digital agriculture could be a game changer for food production and the livelihoods of farmers worldwide, if they can get access to the technology. But you can't connect your farm to the world without reliable internet. And satellite technology is a key part of that. Capability of sharing data from IOT sensors about water tables, or crop readiness across hundreds of acres or hundreds of miles of remote land, regardless of the existing communications infrastructure or topography. Things like hills and mountains, which really usually get in the way of traditional mobile and internet signals. And it's getting cheaper and easier to access, thanks to new technology and tech partnerships. So on the ground, what does that mean for the poorer farmers with low connectivity rates in remote parts of the world? Here's Mark Jarman.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
A really interesting example would be a company called Wild Technologies, which are utilizing satellite to connect sensors in fields. And they're doing some trials at the moment in different geographies, just purely to help farmers who have no connectivity, understand what's happening with the soils with humidity or temperature, et cetera. Just to help them then access simple text messages to help them with irrigation, for example. We don't need to deliver the most high end sophisticated solution all the time. Actually, some simple data that allows a farmer to spend less time or selectively put an input and save money, is massive for them. So turning that into something that actually a farmer can use that will benefit. And therefore, once you get companies who understand that link and some of them are very successful in doing that, you start to see how space can really add value to production.

Michael Bird:
And it is getting much more affordable, especially when local communities or cooperatives can club together to buy into data services.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
Space is kind of a backbone for the ag industry and from a current and future potential, because it's so much cheaper to process and utilize this data now that the cost of computational power from the likes of Amazon Web Services has changed the landscape dramatically. I mean, I remember trying to sell to end users 10 years ago, and I was focused on drone technologies, which everybody was fascinated by, because it was cool tech. But the cost was so high and the returns minimal, you suddenly had to kind of think, how do you make these business models work?

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
And that's what I'm seeing now with some of the successful companies, is their ability to work with end users to make this data accessible and to really provide the value, add actionable intel that customers are needing and being able to do that in a timely manner. Because if you think it's no good monitoring from a satellite on a Tuesday and not getting the data back to the farmer until the Saturday, I mean the world's changed a lot in that amount of time. And therefore, that has changed massive. You're getting data to customers almost in real time.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
Once you give that kind of connectivity to the rural economy, you create that kind of digital backbone, all of a sudden people can actually start to make better decisions, whether that's supplying chemicals or fertilizer, thinking about how they optimize their planting strategy and use equipment. And then from a supply chain perspective, all of a sudden you're getting data of what's happening in real time from a sourcing angle.

Michael Bird:
The possibilities are endless when it comes to making subsistence farming, smart farming. Not only are you giving farmers in remote communities the chance to get better connected, both literally and metaphorically to their land, but you are also giving them the opportunity to connect with the end user, to meet demand in a way that wasn't possible even five years ago,

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
There's a Scottish company called Trade In Space, and they're kind of pioneering the use of satellite data linked to Blockchain. They monitored from space, a number of coffee farmers here in south Columbia, and bought the coffee for a company in Scotland, remotely. Then linked that with a smart contract, through a Blockchain. Monitored that coffee then from Columbia, all the way to the UK, until it arrived in Edinburgh. And they're basically enabling then, a farmer here to have better access to international markets than having to go through the traditional routes, which ultimately is where the money is made. So they make a better profit.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
So from a food security perspective, you suddenly have opportunities to open up global supply chains and then link that to emerging technologies like Blockchain, where your ability to make smarter contracts, to provide credit, to remove some of the fraud because of digital signatures within that.

Michael Bird:
It's all very, very cool. And it's an area where big name players in the tech field are keen to share their expertise. As Brian Tippens explains in HPE's case, that's by working with local partners to use their expertise alongside HP's groundbreaking data analysis and storage solutions, particularly around edge computing and getting the right insights to the people who need them, wherever they are, along the chain.

Brian Tippens - Head of sustainability, HPE:
Whether it's through social media or autonomous cars, or our cell phones, or agricultural devices, there's this tremendous amount of data that's being created at the edge, more than has ever been created before. And I think we've done a good job as technologists, as technology companies, about understanding how to store that data. I say we've done less of a good job as industry of understanding how to utilize that data in a responsible way. Tons of information doesn't necessarily mean intelligence, and using that data for good and finding insights in that data.

Brian Tippens - Head of sustainability, HPE:
A lot of what we are doing is understanding how to understand all those data points in the area that we're talking about food insecurity, it could be about crop yields, or utilization of food, or how much water to be used on specific crops or fertilizer. It's all these data points. But taking those data points and making them actionable and using technologies like artificial intelligence to take in data feeds and kind of predict things we should be doing differently. It's around high performance compute to understand how to crunch that data and use it in real time for decision making. And so, we talk about age of insights, I'd say it's true in multiple industries. It's very much true in food production that we need to be able to take in that data and use it, not just for the sake of data, but to create insights that change the way we operate going forward.

Michael Bird:
But AI and data analysis is quite expensive, or at least out of the reach of subsistence farmers. So how can we encourage people to invest in the infrastructure, both big organizations, and governments, or end users? That's where the World Economic Forum steps in. They encourage organizations to work with governments to create funding models and products that make it financially viable to connect the unconnected. Here's Isabelle Mauro.

Isabelle Mauro - World Economic Forum:
If there are still nearly 3 billion people that are not connected, it's because from a business perspective, in some areas, there is no return on investment for the investors who are the telco operators, who are the industry. So we need to come up with business models, mechanisms that are really going to make sense, and they're going to be sustainable and are going to leave the time, if you want test, in order to create this resiliency that we need to create.

Isabelle Mauro - World Economic Forum:
So for instance, one of the first thing we did in 2020, we issued a guide for bond financing. There is really a proliferation, in particular, since COVID of bonds that are ESG Bonds. So you look at the governance, the environment, but inclusivity is one aspect that is really overlooked. And so our goal here was really to bring together experts that could provide guidance on how do you include inclusion in a bond, when you issue a green bond or an ESG bond, so that the money, the proceeds that you get from the bond, go specifically to fund digital inclusion projects, services, or infrastructure.

Michael Bird:
Incidentally, an ESG Bond is a promise by an investment fund or government, which issues bonds to invest them in environmental sustainability or governance projects.

Michael Bird:
So far, we've mostly talked about connectivity. It's a big part of the solution, but it doesn't tackle one of the big elephants in the room, or other one of the big cows. And that is that the planet loves meat. But meat is appalling for the planet, depending on which studies you look at. It can take up to 1500 liters of water to make one kilo of beef or 10 liters for every calorie. And in terms of the land it uses, it takes around 350 square meters of land to make one kilo of beef. And that's 1.7 times the average US house size and five times the average UK home size.

Michael Bird:
Wow, I really need to move to the US. That's land and water that could be used for far more efficient vegetables or for solar panels, or, and this is a mad idea, left for use by plants and animals we don't intend on eating. On the other hand, the world gets wealthier and diets improve. People want more variety and demand for meat skyrockets. So what can be done?

Daan Luining:
My name is that Daan Luining. I am the co-founder and CTO of Meatable. I have a background in cell molecular biology and tissue engineering, and I've specialized my career in the development and the commercialization of cultivated meat. I was once part of the team that made the very first laboratory grown hamburger, back in 2013. And then later found my other co-founder Mark Kotter who developed a unique, patented technology that we're now applying for the development, and the scale up, to create cost effective cultivated meats. So in this way, that people will never have to slaughter animals again, to have their stake and eat it too.

Michael Bird:
Meatable is a Netherlands based company at the cutting edge of lab grown or cultured meat. Essentially, it's real meat, but without any of the ethical or environmental quandaries, which sounds pretty intriguing. But why lab grown meat?

Daan Luining:
The way that we're doing it right now, doesn't seem to be able to sustain the grown population that we have on this planet. Cows produces a lot of methane, pig produce a lot of methane, also a lot of antibiotics and also not very resource efficient. That is not sustainable when you're seeing that more and more people are coming out of poverty, and now are looking for a diversification in their diet. And what you can see is a huge correlation with GDP and the amount of animal protein that people eat.

Daan Luining:
So they're not buying a car first, they're first diversifying their diet. So giving them an alternative that is literally the same stuff. Since we take cells from animal and then grow it into muscle and fat without all the negative side effects, I think we could provide a very good alternative. And I think that's where we will need to end up as a species that we'll be able to provide more than just either plants or animals. There need to be something in between where people can have more options.

Michael Bird:
It's a good point. Lifting people out of poverty is great. But that brings with a greater demand for products, including meat and dairy, which in turn increases demands on farmland, which could otherwise, and much more efficiently, be used to grow vegetables. So how does the product actually work?

Daan Luining:
You're taking a little bit of cells from an animal, and then you place it in a close environment protected from the outside world. So where you can keep the temperature constant, because basically you're removing the entire support system of the cells of the animal. You have to fulfill that with something else. So we have enclosed environment where it's protected from the elements. We give it all the warmth and all the nutrients and all the oxygen that it needs to start growing into more cells.

Daan Luining:
And then eventually, when we have enough of these cells, then we say, "Well, we want you to become the muscle of fat in the combination that we desire." So this also these open new avenues for developing better quality meats, maybe with higher protein or with less saturated fats. So in this way, you can maybe improve even what it means to have something like a piece of meat. So it really is just taking cells, feeding it all the nutrients that a normal cow would also eat, but then really broken down to the fundamental building blocks, because it doesn't have a digestive system anymore, to make more cells and then turn it into muscle and fat. That is, in a nutshell, basically how this process would work.

Michael Bird:
You rely on what are called pluripotent stem cells. What are these? And also, can you pronounce it for me, please?

Daan Luining:
I think you did a good job there. It's good. They are pluripotent stem cells. And pluripotent stem cells is a very special type of cell. So it's really early in its development. So it has a lot of potential and that's why called pluripotent, it really goes through the growth potential. But also the potential to turn into different types of cells. So really from this single cell, we can make muscle and fat. So you don't need to have separate cells, but you can really use just this one cell to make both of them. And I think that's what makes it so special. So you just need to take cells from an animal one time and never again, and then you can expand them and turn them into muscle and fat. And that is, I think, what's really special about these cells.

Michael Bird:
So just how close are we to so called lab grow meat, being available in supermarkets and shops around the world?

Daan Luining:
We've been doing a lot of R and D. So that's why also if people ask about cost, it's still pretty expensive, since we're in that stage. You can compare it maybe to when first semiconductors were developed. I think for five megabytes of storage, you had like an entire room filled with semiconductors to store that amount. And that's maybe a good analogy. So now we're going to more scale up trajectory. So, of course, with the economy of scale, price will drop over time. And this is basically the state that we are in right now. So really the transformation for going to a scale up and then starting to create products that consumers can try.

Michael Bird:
So when will I be able to go and have some lab grown meat? When will I be able to pot to my shops and buy some?

Daan Luining:
Probably around 2025, we think there will be capacity to produce enough that people can probably selective stores, would have a chance to encounter our product. So that it's just three years away. It's over in a heartbeat.

Michael Bird:
So lab grow meat isn't on the shelves just yet, but it isn't science fiction either. Being in these scale up phase is a great sign for cultured meat as a commercial product. It's something Mark Jarman is following closely. He sees technology such as lab grow meat as part of the solution, along with smarter land use, less waste, and potentially if cultured meat can be produced in urban environments, far lower food mills.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
I mean it's all part of a system. Yes, we want to increase productivity, but you might also argue that we have more than enough land to do that. And we actually just need to farm in a better way. You have opportunities, because of new innovations, to produce more locally. So vertical farming, producing in big warehouses. Non-traditional farming, in that sense is in a way of optimizing production, removing some of the waste issues. You've got a need, I think, to better optimize the supply chain from a sourcing and demand perspective.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
So when you hear that some broccoli farmers are planting 200% of the contract needs for a retailer. You think why are we doing that? Why does a farmer feel they have to literally plant such an excessive product at the start of a season to ensure they satisfy contracts? And then if there isn't the demand, well, it just gets plowed back into the soil. Because actually, they're not going to sell that product for the same price. They've agreed contracts. You suddenly realize there's subtle changes that have to go on in the food industry, and the food system to overcome these challenges that actually are politically based, are digital data based opportunities spheres, and are just pure behaviors that have just been going on for decades.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
And I think if I look at the system now, legislation's coming in that will force companies to produce and source in it in different ways. You've got the whole a net zero agenda and talk of farmers changing from producing crops to producing carbon, and literally just having wildflower meadows going for biodiversity because that's where pavements may go. So you sort of look at the system and go, how is our UK farming system going to look in 10 years time? And how's that going to impact globally?

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
So from a carbon credit perspective, I was talking to people here this week and they're terrified that big wealthy individuals and corporates are going to buy up huge sways of land for carbon offsets. And what does that do for production, here, for example?

Michael Bird:
So you mentioned vertical farming or farming in a warehouse. How does that work? And what does vertical farming mean?

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
So this is basically where you are, I mean growing products and let's say herbs, salads, et cetera, in huge kind of towers. So you might be using what we call hydroponics, that are growing in water based systems. And effectively, they're using lighting to simulate the sun. So they're providing the nutrients, these huge long baskets in huge rows, stacks. And basically it's all kind of much more of a circular economy based approach where things are recycled. You've got, water is being pumped across, various ways of doing it, but ultimately the moment's still in, it's got it in a hype stage. Lots of investment going in, but you do think about kind of the future and urban populations needing to get access to produce quickly.

Mark Jarman – CEO, AgriTierra:
It is going to be an area that will explode and become much more norm, and an opportunity for urban areas and to diversify. So you've got the challenge space with the pandemic and people not coming back and all this office space, you could envisage vertical farms taking over these buildings, producing food for local population. And that reduces the carbon impact, opportunities for lowering costs because you've got reduced labor, opportunity for reduced wastage because you can control conditions. So you haven't got, suddenly a frost hits and you lose all your crop. The challenge will be is what exactly can you produce in these systems versus the need for open field agriculture?

Michael Bird:
So top floor bakery, vertical salad farm, a quick stop off at the meat factory. There's no phrasing there which makes it not sound like a cheap nightclub. And by the time you get out of the lift, you've gotten the freshest burger you've ever eaten. That sounds cool. And along with more connected, smarter rural economy worldwide, it might just play a part in feeding our global population. Will we see an end to world hunger by 2030? Probably and unfortunately, not. But it's a lofty goal and technology is absolutely going to help it happen, eventually.

Michael Bird:
You have been listening to Technology Untangled. I'm your host, Michael Bird. And a huge thanks to Brian Tippens, Isabelle Mauro, Mark Jarman and Daan Luining. You can find more information on today's episode in the show notes. And this is the fourth episode in the third series of Technology Untangled. And in the next episode, if you liked this one, you'll like that one, we'll be looking at how technology can help end world poverty. So make sure you've hit subscribe on your podcasting app of choice so you do not miss out. And also you can catch up on the last two series, win-win.

Michael Bird:
Today's episode was written and produced by Sam Data and me, Michael Bird. Sound design and editing was by Alex Bennett, with production support from Harry Morton and Sophie Cutler. Technology Untangled is a Lower Street Production for Hewlett Packard Enterprise.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise