Farm.One

Need something light and fun for the end of the year? Tune into Episode 10 of the Farm.One podcast where Rob, Michael, and Ina play a game of trivia and Mad Gab for the final episode in 2020. 

Everyone takes turns asking each other trivia questions about food and the vertical farming industry. Test your knowledge and play along with us! We ended the episode with a good laugh playing Mad Gab food edition and an end of the year message from the team. 

Thank you to everyone who’s tuned into our podcast and supported our farm this year! We’re thankful for your support and we’re excited to continue growing in the new year. 

Read more about some of the facts shared on today’s trivia below: 

• Vertical farming attracts investment, Agri-View
• The real reason cheese is the most stolen crop of the world
• 4 Countries That Produce the Most Food
• Food Waste in America in 2020

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In Episode 9 of the Farm.One podcast, Jess Karol, Farm.One’s Technical Director, joins Rob and Michael for a discussion about water. 

California Water Futures Begin Trading Amid Fear of Scarcity. California’s the largest agricultural producer in the United States and the 5th largest economy in the world. Over half of the organic leafy greens in the US come from California and according to the California Almond Board, the state’s growers supply over 80% of the world’s almonds. Meanwhile, the state has been suffering from a drought from December 2011 to March of 2019. 

“The contracts, a first of their kind in the U.S., were announced in September as heat and wildfires ravaged the U.S. West Coast and as California was emerging from an eight-year drought. They are meant to serve both as a hedge for big water consumers, such as almond farmers and electric utilities, against water price fluctuations as well as a scarcity gauge for investors worldwide.”

The team breaks down the issues, the causes and the problems for agriculture, in what is an interconnected set of policy, business and environmental topics that define complexity.

In the second news story, the team discusses a story from Civil Eats: Is Farming with Reclaimed Water the Solution to a Drier Future? 

The story is about CoCo San Sustainable Farm, a small farm in Martinez, California, founded by Carolyn Phinney. Carolyn was able to acquire land from Contra Costa County that was being used as a dumping ground, “(t)he ground was so poor that even weeds struggled to grow there.” Located on “sanitary buffer land owned by the Central Contra Costa Sanitary District (CCCSD) and is adjacent to their water treatment plant. Phinney irrigates all her crops with reclaimed wastewater, which she says is nutrient rich, safe, free, and abundant.”

What is reclaimed water? Is the water safe? Can it support high yields? Is this a viable and sustainable solution for urban farms across the country?

For more information about today’s stories: 

California Water Futures Begin Trading Amid Fear of Scarcity, Bloomberg

Is Farming with Reclaimed Water the Solution to a Drier Future?, Civil Eats

CoCo San Sustainable Farm in Martinez, California.

Climate as a contributing factor in the demise of Angkor, Cambodia

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Chef, restaurateur, TV personality, activist and graduate of the California Culinary Academy, Russell Jackson has a story to tell. 

Welcome to Episode 8 of the Farm.One podcast. Kicking things off, Rob, Jess and Michael talk about GMOs. Is there really a problem?

Rob then sits down for an extended conversation with Russell about his career as a chef (he’s been cooking for other people for over 40 years), his vocal and monetary support of urban farming (he’s an investor in Farm.One), food deserts and changing the food system, the crazy level of drama that is Los Angeles (his hometown), making his way through the culinary Mecca of the Bay Area, his principles and what he’s trying to express in his restaurants, businesses and cooking and how important his community of friends have been in his success.. 

Known to some for his appearances on the Food Network’s Iron Chef and The Next Food Network Star, Russell was born and raised in Los Angeles and eventually made his way to graduate top of his class at the California Culinary Academy in 1990. After returning to LA to open a restaurant, Russell made his way back to San Francisco. Through the highs and lows of working at some of California’s best restaurants, he opened Lafitte to great fanfare in San Francisco, only to close it a few years later. 

Russell found himself in New York City and opened his latest restaurant in Harlem last year. In his telling, Reverence is more than just a restaurant. It’s a story, an exchange of ideas, an expression of him. The culmination of all his experiences at age 57 and his message to the world about what he’s learned is important. 

Learn more about Russell’s restaurant, Reverence: https://reverence.nyc/

Instagram: @reverencenyc and @chefrjackson

Independent Restaurant Coalition: https://www.saverestaurants.com/

Article: Stop Arguing Over GMOs, Scientific American, Dr Sarah Garland, Dec. 14, 2020 - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/stop-arguing-over-gmo-crops/ 

Wondering what it's like to have an urban farm in Chicago? Episode 6 is here! More importantly, we welcome our first gusts on the podcast, Alicia Nesbary-Moore and Barry Howard, the leaders over at Herban Produce. They are an urban farm over in the windy city. On this episode, we dive into their story and experience with urban farming in another city, and we share a BIG announcement about a new farm location.

For our news segment, Rob, Michael, and Ina talk all things Re-Nuble. New York-based Re-Nuble announced that the company has raised $1.1M in Seed funding. Founded by Tinia Pina, the company turns food waste into a way to grow more food. The company’s technology ‘upcycles’ organic compounds from unrecoverable vegetable food waste, generating water-soluble, organic, hydroponic nutrients for soilless farms.

The company calls its solution Organic Cycling Science (OSC). The system extracts viable, soluble nutrients in food waste and places it back into the food system for continuous reuse until a small percentage of its solids have no longer any residual value. By doing so, the company aims to create a closed loop system through an organic nutrient supply chain that is a carbon negative process done at scale, making it competitive to less sustainable commercial-level options.

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To read more about some of the topics that were discussed, check out the links below:

Herban Produce

https://www.herbanproduce.com/

Food waste to indoor farming input: Re-Nuble raises $1.1m seed funding

https://agfundernews.com/food-waste-to-indoor-farming-input-re-nuble-raises-1-1m-seed-funding.html

Want to hear our thoughts about the direction of the vertical farming industry? On this week’s Farm.One podcast, Rob and Michael sit in The Industry Corner and talk about global impact investing in food and ag tech, more entrants into the plant-based food sector, land ownership, and farming.

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Astanor Ventures announced a new $325M Global Impact Fund that will focus on new venture investments in food and ag tech across Europe and North America. This adds to investments Astanor has been making since 2017 in more than 20 European and U.S. startups that are working to accelerate regenerative agriculture, innovate food production techniques and farming, as well as promote food culture and the enjoyment of food. We talk about what this means for innovation in the sector, why there’s so much interest from venture investors, the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals and the opportunities for entrepreneurs.

Driven by sustainability goals, IKEA announced that the company has set a target to make 50 percent of its restaurant meals plant-based by 2025 as part of a new set of sustainability commitments. The Swedish furniture company also plans to transition 80 percent of its packaged meals to be plant-based to give its 680M customers more sustainable options.

Meanwhile, British retailer M&S (Marks & Spencer) will be opening an Innovation Hub to house its new “specialist team” focused on developing food solutions, including plant-based proteins and plastic-free packaging materials.

Rob and Michael dig into initiatives from large retailers that are driven by sustainability goals and the potential impact on consumers and why M&S’s innovation hub that sits outside of their existing business is a good idea for large companies.

Finally, Rob and Michael close the podcast with the Guardian’s article, “1% of farms operate 70% of world's farmland,” which is based on a study by the International Land Coalition about land ownership and farming. We talk about the rise of monoculture agriculture, inequality, environmental degradation and opportunities to address this through innovation.

To read more about some of the topics discussed on this week’s podcast, check out the links below:

Astanor

Astanor Ventures Launches 325m Impact Fund Aimed at FoodTech and AgTech Startups

UN Sustainable Development Goals

Ikea to make 50 percent of food menu plant-based by 2025

M&S Launches Innovation Hub to Develop Plant Based Foods & Plastic-Free Packaging Solutions

1% of farms operate 70% of world's farmland

Land Coalition: Uneven Ground

Episode 4 of the Farm.One podcast. On this week’s podcast Rob and Michael are solo (Ina’s away but returns next week!) 

As usual, we kick off the episode with this week’s farm share bag (more details here). Rob goes through the items in each box (we have shiso!) and also talks about his journey in using new ingredients and flavors in his home cooking. 

In this week’s news segment we talk about what it takes to build a successful vertical farm, our experience building Farm.One and what independent farmers should think about and work on if they want to get into the industry. 

We start the discussion off with a story in Vertical Farm Daily: Success factors for scaling vertical farming operations, which was a recap of a panel discussion at the Asia-Pacific Agri-Food Innovation Summit (https://agrifoodinnovation.com/) held online from Nov 18-20. Rob and Michael talk about success factors, product market fit, local markets and how one size fits all doesn’t work. 

The second story is from The Spoon - Report: $8.37B Invested in Food Tech During First Three Quarters of 2020. We drill down into where the investments have gone, the opportunities for independent farmers and where innovation is going to continue to come from. 

Send us any questions you may have if you’d like to learn more about any of these topics or if you have any questions you’d like us to address on future podcasts!

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Episode three of the Farm.One Podcast! Rob, Michael, and Ina chat with Farm.One's Technical Director, Jess Karol about vertical farming, sustainability and our planet. We talk through what's featured in this week's farm share, like Rau Ram, Rambo Radish and more. We share our thoughts on plant based meats and the plastic crisis. What do you think?

Sign up for the Farm.One Farm Share http://farm.one

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