Time stamped show notes:
[0:11] Introduction to Jason Green, founder of Edenworks
[1:02] How aquaponics are shifting the city
[1:13] Right now, cities are hubs of consumption
[1:40] 95% of leafy greens in the US comes from California
[2:03] Global food amount would be gone in 60 days if production stopped
[3:23] More calories available per person, less fresh food available
[3:52] Product now has less nutrition than it did 100 years ago
[5:02] Indoor agriculture is the idea that you create a controlled environment for plants to grow in and within that space you can grow all sorts of plants
[5:33] Aquaponics is an ecosystem of fish and plants. Fish waste becomes fertilizer
[6:46] Creating healthy ecosystems that can just run in perpetuity
[10:45] He is a bioengineer and used to create virtual reality systems for brain rehabilitation
[11:43] He decided he didn’t want to stay in Academia. He got frustrated with the slow pace of getting innovation to market
[12:35] He did a survey of what he thought the next big problems would be when he decided to leave academia
[13:10] Agriculture is one of the biggest contributors to climate change
[13:35] Alignment between beneficiary and creator
[15:15] Nothing happens unless there is an incentive to do so
[17:15] Model that would make food industry: profitable, sustainable, available
[17:26] Change in organic food market
[18:02] Jason’s business strategy was similar to Tesla’s: start with most different product
[20:15] His wife is a licensed dietitian. Advocates anything you do starts with diet.
[21:39] Food choices have more to do than food choices. Climate implications. Local ecosystem.
[23:25] Low hanging fruit for people who want to make an impact in the food space
[24:01] Focus on integrity and transparency when it comes to food.
[24:30] What is New York City trending towards in terms of food sources
[24:47] Local product and local seafood are the biggest two trends
[26:46] What will the future of food look like? Diets will be whole and fresh food, packaged food will decrease. Convenient ready to use formats
[28:18] Opinions on GMOs: not an expert on GMOs. Edenworks doesn’t use GMOs.
[29:13] Biggest risk of GMOs: choice. GMOs can change the soil, etc.
[29:40] People have the right to eat non GMO food.
[30:01] There are a lot of unknowns around GMOs, in terms of local ecosystem and health issues.
Three key points:
Last Question
Support Edenworks at Wholefoods Williamsburg (in NYC Wholefoods next year)