Tag: agtech

Dan Barber – AI-Powered natural breeding: The End of GMOs, Gene Editing, and CRISPR?

An overdue check-in conversation with Dan Barber,  chef, co-owner of Blue Hill restaurants and co-founder of Row 7 Seeds, where we dive into the fascinating world of seeds and how breeding is evolving with the explosion of AI and other technologies. No, we don’t need GMOs, CRISPR, or other risky blunt instruments. We discuss the implosion of the fake meat hype, which was at its peak when we last spoke four years ago, why insane umami flavor and potentially self-nitrogen-fixing tomatoes are revolutionary. This is a deep conversation about bread and wheat—and why breeding wheat specifically for whole meal flour is so important, where Row 7 Seeds, his seed company, is headed and why they’re launching a CPG brand using pressure-cooked vegetables (because processing isn’t a dirty word).

When your vegetables come from incredible seeds and are grown in healthy soils, you don’t need unhealthy additives. We kick things off with mouthwatering winter spinach and dive into a long conversation about the role of technology in food and agriculture. No, we shouldn’t go back to the past. No, we’re not Luddites. In fact, Dan is incredibly bullish on the role of AI in natural breeding—perhaps the best of both worlds, enabling faster breeding for local conditions rather than global crops that lack flavor, nutrients, and rely on excessive chemicals.

Get ready for a firehose of stories on food, seeds, soil, and culture!

Eric Smith – Commoditization is the root cause of all ecological destruction and human health impacts

A conversation with Eric Smith, CEO and co-founder of Edacious, who is building a technology platform for differentiating quality of food. Eric and Koen talk about measuring quality and how to turn around objectively one of the most complex systems ever, from one driven by chemicals to one driven by biology, with abundance as an outcome. The solution, according to Eric, is radical transparency.

Ichsani Wheeler and Lenka Danilovic – How to make water our friend again thanks to hippies with satellites and indigenous water management

A conversation with Ichsani Wheeler and Lenka Danilovic. Ichsani is a scientist, co-founder of OpenGeoHub and EnvirometriX, while Lenka is an hydrologist and intern at OpenGeoHub. In this conversation, we talk about the world of remote sensing, and we unpack what the eyes in the sky can help us learn about indigenous land and water management.

Zach Weiss – On a mission to train hundreds of thousands of people in key water restoration techniques

A check-in interview with Zach Weiss, founder of Elemental Ecosystems and Water Stories, about his mission to train hundreds of thousands of people in key water restoration techniques, institutions, how would Zach make the space investable and bankable, and much more.

Farmers’ Philosophy series! Koen van Seijen in conversation with Anne van Leeuwen, regenerative farmer and co-owner of Bodemzicht Farm

We can learn so much more from farmers than how to restore soil. Regeneration goes much further and deeper. In the second episode of the Farmers’ Philosophy series Koen van Seijen, host of the Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food podcast, talks with Anne van Leeuwen, regenerative farmer and co-owner of Bodemzicht Farm. A deep dive into the non-existence of nature-culture divide, getting back in touch with yourself, nutrient dense food as basic human right, community, minimum wage, true cost economy, and much more.

Connie Bowen – Instead of replacing farmworkers, let’s design agtech to help the ones doing the back breaking work in the field

A conversation with Connie Bowen, co-founder of Farmhand Ventures, a venture studio redesigning the future of work in agriculture, about the labour issue and building collaborative automation agtech.

Nicole Masters and Abby Rose on how tech can enable an army of creative thinking farmers

A conversation with Abby Rose, co-founder of Vidacycle Tech and co-host of Farmerama, and Nicole Masters, founder of Integrity Soils and writer of ‘For the Love of Soil’. They talk about the Soilmentor Regen Platform, empowering farmers, mindset shift, observation and critical thinking.

Knut Bentzen on how to scale virtual fencing, the true enabler of regeneration

The second in a series of interviews unpacking the potential of virtual fencing with the team of NoFence. This time Knut Bentzen, CEO of NoFence, we discuss the enormous potential of managed grazing of ruminants on food quality, protein production, soil carbon, water quality, animal welfare, etc.