 Our next presenter is Kano Banchaw, who is originally from Ethiopia. He's been living in the States for about 17 years, I think, and got involved with Big River Farms. He did a research project there on a plant that has grown in Ethiopia, just to see if it would grow well in our climate here and supply. We have a significant population in Minnesota from Ethiopia. Thank you very much, Martin, for the introduction. So as you just said, my name is Kano Banchaw, and I'm originally from Ethiopia, a country that is located on the Horn of Africa. It is a great pleasure indeed that I've been given this opportunity today to participate in this conference as a speaker. Since the year 2013, I have formed on a very small-scale plot at the Big River Farms of the Minnesota Food Association. Over a period of seven years, as Martin was saying, I grew a specialty crop known as anchoyte. Today, I'm going to talk about growing anchoyte under the Midwest climatic conditions. Next slide, please. Anchoyte is a tropical crop. It is a root crop that is native to Ethiopia, my home country. Next slide, please. For those of you who might not be familiar with Ethiopia, as I said, it is located on the Horn of Africa, almost near to the Red Sea, or across the Saudi Arabia and Yemen Arab countries, about three degrees north of the equator. And anchoyte is grown in that green portion of the map. That region is known as Oromia region. And anchoyte is grown on the left side, on the western side of this region. Next slide, please. Next slide. Thank you. Anchoyte belongs to the Cucarbide family, like cucumbers and pumpkin or so. And internationally, it has got the scientific name, coxinium abyssinica. You might wonder that Ethiopia used to be called abyssinia. Not Ethiopia, it's formerly used to be called abyssinia. So the name abyssinica comes from that name. People eat the roots. It's a root crop, as I said, and also young birds of this plant. Next slide, please. The plant has got soft stems that can grow up to almost 35 feet long. This softer stem scrambles or grows on the ground, or can climb trees, houses, fences, and so on. Next slide, please. Next slide. As you can see here, also can climb trees like this. Please go to the next one. And the plant produces over-shaped, plant-sized, spotted white green, white spotted fruits, which turns red when it is ripe. Next one, please. Traditionally, this is a very popular root crop amongst Ethiopians. They like to consume anchiote, the roots, because people believe that it has a high nutritional value, especially a number of minerals, especially rich in calcium. Therefore, they think that it has got also medicine due to high calcium content. They think that it has medicinal value, which can heal various kinds of ailments, such as mending broken bones and dislocated joints. People also believe that if they consume juice prepared from the roots, it can treat sexually transmitted diseases like gonorrhea or other diseases like tuberculosis and tumors. Furthermore, they believe that the anchiote can enhance milk production of lactating mothers and make them strong and healthy. Next slide, please. OK. With that as a short introduction about the plant, I would now like to talk about my activity at the Big River Farms during the year 2019 only. Next slide, please. During the year 2019, I leased a very small plot of 1.5 acres from the Minnesota Food Association and used just about one acre to grow anchiote and the rest for other vegetable crops, as I listed here, like chard, kale, and so on. Next slide, please. So towards the end of April, starting towards the end of April, I started going the seedlings in the greenhouse using 50-cell trays with one seed per cell. And the seeds originated from my own harvest. Is this organic seeds? I harvested this at the Big River Farms during the year 2018. So I used my own seeds, organic seeds. I left the seedlings in the greenhouse for about one and a half months, or six weeks. Next slide, please. That's how I preserved my own seeds. Next slide, please. My field activities consisted of raising 40 raised beds. We prepared. Each bed was 250 feet long and 5 feet wide. They were covered, as you can see here, with plastic, mulch, and drip irrigation were installed. Next slide, please. I did a very elementary calculation of my acreage. As you can see here, each bed was 250 feet long and 5 feet wide. That makes me the area of 1,250 square feet, each bed. So the total of 40 raised beds had 50,000 square feet. I converted this to acres. As you know, one acre is equal to 3,560 square feet. That is almost exactly 1.1 acres, a very small plot, just a small garden, please. Next slide, please. And then I transferred my seedlings into the field and planted in two rows per bed with one foot apart between adjacent plants. Therefore, one bed alone, one bed with two rows, were planted with 500 plants. Therefore, my total seedlings planted for over 40 beds, almost 20,000 seedlings were planted. Next slide, please. I used them during transplanting the seedlings. I used the water wheel transplanter, which was hooked to a tractor. And the water wheel transplanter pokes holes into the soil. It has got these metal spikes you see there. And it also delivers water and fertilizer whenever needed. And then the two individuals sit at the back and then insert the seedling into the holes. That's why it has been transplanted. Next slide, please. My usual field activities was I watered. I irrigated my plants about three days per week or as needed. And I did also about two, three days per week reading. And every time I was at the farm, I went around and looked and controlled as there has been or observed as a disease. My plants were infected or eaten by insects and other pests. Next slide, please. Observation over the many years I've been at the farm for seven years. I observed that I'm very competitive under the Minnesota climatic conditions. I grew very fast and covered the field. It's just suppressed weeds. So it is very competitive in a plant. Next slide, please. Observation over the years from year 2013 through 2019 shows that the root leaves and fruits were not really attacked by pests or disease except that I encountered problems with nematodes boring into the roots during late August or beginning September. And also I observed that some attacked by Japanese visitors which were eating the leaves. Next slide, please. Hanchote, one can harvest Hanchote within about four months of planting. Here I would like to emphasize that I did not have any machinery for digging or harvesting. So I dug out the 20,000 roots by hand physically using a fork. Hanchote has got many roots and hairs. I also did the trimming and cleaning physically. I couldn't use potato digests because potato digests were cutting my roots. Next slide, please. So that's how it looks with dugout. As you can see, a lot of roots, secondary roots and root hairs. I have to do this by hand, trim this and trim it by hand. Almost 20,000, over 20,000 roots. Next slide, please. So when it is cleaned, it looks like this. Next slide, please. In marketing, I packed the batches of five pounds to sell it to the European communities which live here in the Twin Cities as well as also ship them to other European communities in other states. And I advertised my product through a word or mouse. Next slide, please. I was trying to estimate my harvest. So I said I had about 20,000 plants. I said, suppose I lose 20,000, maybe they're too small, I've been eaten or damaged or so. If I lose 2,000, I'm left with about 18,000 to be sold. And I know from previous observations that six Hanchote roots will weigh one pound. Therefore, from this, I said from one point, about one acre of land, you can harvest 3,000 pounds of Hanchote. Next slide, please. Why did I start growing Hanchote with a tropical crop coming from Africa here in Minnesota? Well, as I said before, this is a big demand by European communities, which are almost now 100,000 Europeans living in the state of Minnesota. This state is known as a small Ethiopia. So it is a big demand. So growing this crop and making it available for my community is, I've got many social values and also economic values. Next slide, please. This project is supported by NCRSER, the seven agricultural grants which Martin was talking about. Next slide. Therefore, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to NCRSER for funding this project. I'm very grateful indeed. And also to NCRSER staff, to whom I turn it at, whenever I encounter problems, technical or other problems, they were kind to me, so helpful. Thank you. Thank you. And also to Ms. Mollie Shost, the manager of the Big General Farms, who prepared my farms and they've been giving me, to whom I turn, to get really good advice. And also to other film members of the Minnesota Food Association who are very kind to me and they're helping me all the time. Thank you very much. All right, Connell, thank you. We do have a couple of questions that have come in. Connell, and so the first one for you is, here's the first one. Do you have to let the fruit ferment before saving the seeds? Do you have to let the fruit ferment? No, I live the right, the fruits stay, maybe in my garage like this, and then it rots by itself. Okay. And then I can just go into and open this and then take out the seeds, not fermentation. Did you continue to save your own seed? And if so, did you find the seed adapting to our growing season? Yes, very much indeed. Even what happened is, you know, I showed you the root size. In Ethiopia, they are very small, but under the Minnesota climate condition, I think they liked the crop legs, the soil type, and also the abundance of rain and water, and it became very, very big. I don't realize the fruit roots I harvested, so it is really acclimatizing to know. Then one more question. How can I get some Henshote seeds to try in New England? If you're asking me, I'm not saving my seeds, but if there is a department of agriculture which controls the importation of seeds and crops from outside, from outside the United States, I think if they get the grant or permission to import seeds, they can maybe get it from Ethiopia. So actually there was another question. Is there another name for Henshote? Somebody is looking for information and can't find it. Is it a literature or is it written with an A? With an A, Henshote. Instead of H. So in fact, the real name is written with an H, not with an A. If you go to the website and look for it, you'll find it is written in Henshote without H. Okay. That's why. I'd just like to emphasize that, if I've got time, the introduction of Henshote to maybe to be American consumers would be rational because those of you who have been to Ethiopian restaurants and eaten Ethiopian food, you might know that there is a flat bridge served by Ethiopian restaurants made from grass called Tef, T-E-F-F. The seeds were brought to the United States about 50 years ago by a Peace Corps volunteer who now might be about 80 years old. He still lives in Idaho and he started to produce seeds and now the seeds are sold everywhere by the consumer Ethiopians and now that individual might, I think, has become a multimillionaire just by growing Ethiopian crop. So that's very encouraging. So, Kano, we've had another question and this is people want to know where they can get seed. Would a person, would there be, how would a person go about getting seed from Ethiopia for Henshote? I could help that person to get in connection with relatives and friends of mine back home and, as I said, you might know, Martin, about the process of importing seeds or any animal product from outside the United States, especially from Africa. It goes through a long process, inspection, quarantine, what not. So, getting it might be easy, just somebody might put it in a package and mail it to that individual, but that individual will not get it directly. It should be inspected and should be put in a quarantine before that individual can receive it. This is due to the probability that these kinds of plants might carry diseases or insects or what not. So, otherwise it might be easy to get it purchased in Ethiopia. It looks like somebody put a link in the chat that might be for the seeds and then somebody also put in the Q&A box that the seed can be ordered from the U.S. National Germ Plasm website.