Our 2015 Photo Story

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Let’s do this story!

We’ve come to the end of another year! This time around we had some ups and downs. And we think it best to give you the highlights of our blog, our web series and our colleagues, as we wish you and yours all the best for the season and happy and prosperous New year!

Do ensure this photo story!

We started the year with our usual tech topics such as robotic farming, renewable energies and bringing old techniques back into modern production. It truly is astonishing what exists out there in the world both simple and complex technologies and sciences which make agriculture interesting to us youth. But behind all of this are people…young people!

Growing out TFF community – Photo courtesy Thought for Food

In came the Thought for Food Challenge and summit where we met some of the greatest and most enthusiastic young minds in food and agriculture today. The event was truly motivating having been introduced and are still in contact with finalist teams and other participants.

Tech4agri: the podcast that failed…but it will return!

Then came a bright shining light and complete failure….well it depends on how you look at it. Tech4agri launched its very own podcast. We got some great feedback from you, our followers but reality hit, in that we just could not keep it up. When delivering our stories we want great quality and interesting content. While the podcast was great we found it difficult to find the type of content we needed while simultaneously handling our other projects. It lasted three episodes but it’s not dead it will return!

Tech4agri Team

As an entrepreneur, failure is ever present. So Tech4agri regrouped and focused on what was needed to get its long planned web series off the ground! We finally got our team together! Meet our team again!

Agri journalists of Tech4agri

We started our work in  agri journalism and got great feedback with our mini documentary Agripeople! #Motivation

LOS ANGELES, CA – SEPTEMBER 25: The 2015 Online News Association Conference at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel on September 25, 2015 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Daniel Petty/for ONA)

Again we were #winners having earned a fellowship to the Online News Association conference for 2015 held in Los Angeles. We were humbled to be selected as one of the best early career young digital journalists for the event. #mindblown at all the tech we learned of that can be used for journalism!

Waste not want not: Reworking waste

Have you thought about what you will do with waste that is generated from running your operations? Sometimes the cost of production to bring one’s precious product or service into reality is quite high. It’s almost as if this cost causes physical pain, enough to wince sharply.

Many corporations have turned this around turning waste into by products or filtering this waste into another system entirely which results in greater profit. Did you know that cornflakes began as cooked wheat that had gone stale but was then toasted? Golden Ray a popular butter substitute for many Caribbean dishes is actually a by product of butter itself!

Recycling food waste has been around for quite some time but it is now a major trend in global innovation.

Science is the key.

Bio Bean is an award winning green energy company that has industrialised the process of recycling waste coffee grounds into advanced biofuels. This is a startling innovation! Think about it.

Coffee is the world’s most consumed drink.

Some believe they cannot even function without it. As a result the coffee market is huge for all sorts of products coming out of this one crop. Therefore the amount of remnant coffee grounds is staggering. Now this has all changed with bio bean; waste repursposed.

Hey Readers!

A lot has been going on with Tech4agri.  As you may remember late last year we did a survey for our upcoming projects which you responded to and give great positive feedback. So we are working hard on getting these projects together!

Fortunately we were able to launch Tech4agri: the Podcast last February but we unfortunately did not get another episode out..until now! Introducing out first episode: Thought4Food!

Firstly, apologies in advance for the poor audio in some parts. We’re new to podcasting and just jumped right in so we are learning by doing.

This episode focuses on the threat of world hunger which many are unaware of. Our population will become significantly larger than it is now in just a few years.

Nothing but inspiration: #tffsummit

#TFFSummit Top Left: The women that change the world, Top Right: Winners Team Innovision, Bottom Left: Runner up Team FoPo, Bottom Right: winners of the special prize and runner up, Team Aahaar. Photos Courtesy Thought for Food

And the winners are…

Team Innovision! You can see the shock and amazement on their faces having won the 2014 Thought for Food Challenge. Surprise was in store as there was not one, but two runner ups each winning a prize, Team FoPo and Team Aahar. The latter team took home an extra prize provided by The Kirchner Group Food Fellows making them double winners! Congratulations all around! During the event Tech4agri live tweeted and by the end of the finalists’ pitches, no one know who would be the winner. The judges needed extra time in fact to give an answer. Only then do you see how they came to their decision. Each team winning had a direct and immediate impact in reducing food waste by the billions of dollars in addition to measured social impact

Humble thoughts on winning strategies

Team Innovision developed a solar-powered micro-climate chamber for small scale farmers that increases shelf life of fruits and vegetables using an evaporation cooling system. What clearly stood out was the invention’s low cost as an affordable substitute for refrigeration to reduce food loss in developing countries, the overall contribution to food security and its potential to remove the use of a poisonous fruit and vegetable preservative used in their home country.

The Thought for Food Summit – Truly Motivating!

Wow! This is all I had to say about the Thought for Food Global Summit! Truly a different experience. Each aspect of the competition leading up to the Summit, held, 20- 22 September in Berlin, was geared towards young people. 97% of the attendees were all under 35 years. Emphasis was placed on idea sharing, thinking outside of the box, starting a movement, networking  and much more all geared the need towards uprooting the status quo (#uprootthestatusquo) as it relates to hunger, obesity, global food systems and food security. Attendees were able to meet with and learn immensely from experts and real world practitioners in agriculture, innovation, entrepreneurship, venture capital, public policy, and food science of the future.

(Click the picture link to the left for the #TFFChallenge Overview)

“Thought For Food inspires new ideas and bold approaches to tackle the world’s food issues. This is a wake up call. The world’s food system needs changing, and business as usual won’t cut it. We need new thinking, inspired solutions and urgent action to make a difference. That’s why we have created Thought for Food.”

In just two days, myself and other team members have learned so much. Our minds have literally been opened in terms of thinking not only about food issues but our personal approach to the situation. Not to mention the sheer number of  dedicated, young people, entrepreneurs, researchers and travelers from all around the world looking to make a difference in one way or other.

Photos by Tobias Jaeger – Thought for Food Challenge Organizing Team and Luke Smith of Lukesmithtv