 So how can we take this growing food waste stream to enable more farms, whether soil farms or indoor farms, and I'll tell you shortly why we focus on indoor or soil-less farms, to be able to grow either less chemically-laden food and or ideally, in my personal opinion, organic certifiable food. The Nea Pina is my guest on this episode of Inside Ideas, brought to you by 1.5 Media and Innovators Magazine. Nea received her BS in Business Information Technology from Virginia Tech and studied briefly at Columbia University's Earth Institute. She has seven years of experience in the financial services industry and 10 years as a professional in the sustainability industry. Her experience is related to food waste, food systems, and sustainability have fueled her passion to increase our community's resilience, prosperity, and knowledge to help us live more concise and conscious lives. Nea's pioneering business model has earned her a Huffington Post Millennial Impact Grant, the American Express Emerging Innovator Award and a Miller Coors Urban Entrepreneur Grant among many other honors. After studying Environmental Conservation and Sustainability at Columbia University's Earth Institute and volunteering at various community urban farms, Nea launched ReNubble with a mission to redefine waste within urban communities. ReNubble quickly evolved into a social enterprise dedicated to changing wasteful habits around the world. Nea is a Savannah certified composting system technical associate and her experience related to food waste systems and policy have fueled her passion to increase our community's resilience, prosperity, and knowledge to help us live more conscious lives. Nea is so good to have you here on the podcast. Welcome. Thank you, Mark. Thanks for having me here with you. You're most welcome and I could go on about ReNubble but I really wanna hear it from you and we'll discuss that as we go throughout the show and how it started in 2011. But really I wanna start out and it's really due to the times that we're in like I do with most of my guests. How have you weathered this absolutely crazy two years and probably still carrying on some craziness of pandemics and mutations and Black Lives Matters and Asian racism and a crazy inauguration, droughts and floods and forest fires and climate change and major things in our industry going on around the food systems. And we've seen some awareness being raised through the UN Food Systems Summit and many things going on with an indigenous peoples and groups kind of raising awareness, good, bad and ugly around food systems. I really wanna know one first honestly, how did you and your family weather the storm? Were you okay? Did you make it through all right? And because you've been doing this a little while because you've been focused in sustainability you've been focused and leaning towards the ag industry and nutrient film technologies or organic matter for nutrients for plants, food that we grow. Has any of that proven to be a better model for life or giving you some resilience to weather this crazy time easier than the most and proven or anything else bubbled to the surface where you've had some aha moments and said, wow, I didn't realize that this would come but I'm prepared or some learning lessons you could share with us. Yeah, thanks for checking in with that question. We're headquartered in New York City. I'm calling from my apartment as I think with food systems you know better than I it's sometimes the resiliency of small numbers or perhaps more disparate concentration of where production is happening and where cultivation is happening sometimes regional food systems. You can see that resilience allows that smaller numbers can sometimes allow for more resilience and greater adaptation. And what I mean by that is, you know, thankfully I've never had COVID I've been a strong advocate for really making sure that I'm eating right to allow for a strong immune system and try to do that with our team as well. But just this week we had a COVID exposure and so I mentioned the small numbers because it allowed us to be quite more resourceful and resilient when the capital markets for example tightened up. So we had a bank loan of $500,000 on February 27th of 2020 essentially. And that was the kind of holy grail of allowing us to really move forward with the company. As a result, we had to completely revise and change our products. Our manufacturing model and you know I really give credit to the people that have chosen to work with me and for us because they allowed us to be creative and more resourceful with the resources that we had. So from a business perspective, it showed us that, you know if we invested in our people and really put their interest and their health and everything that allows them to do well at home and for at the office, there's without a question that they'll stay with you. We were able to overcome what I felt, you know a lot of businesses weren't able to be resilient on the financial side. With regards to the work that we do, you know COVID revealed a lot of vulnerabilities not only on the supply chain side but just also with food access and food production. And when you kind of look back at why I started Renewable which I'll kind of get to start that a little bit that journey, I buy technical training and not an agriculturalist, I am not a botanist I am not a plant pathologist. A lot of what I've learned to date has been self-directed and been fortunate to be surrounded by advisors and a team that do have those degrees and technical training. But the concept for Renewable started back in 2011. I went to school for information technology. I worked in financial services for roughly seven to eight years and it was the career that I had right before I went full time and started Renewable excuse me that made me see that I wanted to be a part of something larger. So what that meant was I was a team leader at New York Cares and that meant on Saturdays from 8 a.m. until 3 p.m. I was advising a project that allowed us to go to the school in Harlem called Thurgood Marshall and help these kids prepare for SATs to the best of my ability. My immediate personal observation was realizing that these kids based on what they're eating is really having an impact to what I felt was the information that they're retaining and their productivity. So, and that's directly tied to me seeing highly processed not normally nutritionally dense food or fresh options. And I myself as a vegetarian know how critical nutritional availability and access really has for how often I get sick, how much energy I have and how much longer of my days I'm able to sustain. So I started with that observation and then coupled by the fact that I saw at that time New York City was spending $77 million to export food waste to China, Pennsylvania and Virginia and knowing that that was only going to compound especially and they're reporting now that if the world global population is to increase to 10 billion people by 2050 they estimate that 84% will be located near urban metropolitan areas. So how can we take this growing food waste stream to enable more farms, whether soil farms or indoor farms and I'll tell you shortly why we focus on indoor or soil farms to be able to grow either less chemically related food and or ideally in my personal opinion organic certifiable food. And looking at how we can kind of create this circular loop there's a concept I forget by the theorist that came up with a concept called urban metabolism really evaluating from a systems perspective all the resources and inputs that that city consumes and then looking at ways to then minimize and ideally completely have a regenerative closed loop model so that the number of outputs as a result of the consumption and activities happening in that city is minimized as much as possible. So it's completely reiterating the concept of resource efficiency. And so that's really what started it. I didn't go full-time on renewable until 2015. So before then I was hustling a whole lot of consulting gigs dog walking on the side just really trying to figure out what was renewable at its core and what the long-term kind of evolution or potential could be by far, it has quite evolved from its initial business model but ultimately as we stand today, we're still a company that focuses on unrecoverable vegetative waste from food manufacturers, distributors and processors and are focused on using that as a mechanism to displace the use of mineral salts in our food systems and the need for basically inputs that we can reduce using biological methods that nature and plants are used to growing with and without incorporating any type of genetically modified practices or adulterations to the raw materials that we work with. I love that, I love that. And so there was quite a few learning lessons but there are also a few other ones because so I have a lot of friends in New York matter of fact, you know probably Green Bronx Machines, Stephen Ritz, South Bronx that he does in the classrooms and also in the community, a lot of hydroponics, a lot of these tower farms, tower gardens that he does and he's teaching the kids and they also need a different type of nutrient film technology or material to come in. They also need a substrate which is something that you guys provide and could provide to that but he's also flipped the switch on how schools feed their kids, a majority of people in New York a majority of people in the world get their food from school when they go to the college or high school or junior high school or elementary half of their food or more is at the school as required by cafeteria cantinas and it's really been kind of a weird system up until some recent movements in the past few years to kind of make a push and get educated and how we can get that control and grow our own food back. But I also know that during these two years of craziness and pandemic, there's been a rush on fresh food, there's been a rush on food period of preserved food, canned food, toilet paper was a crazy thing as well. And so we saw all sorts of new learning lessons how fragile our food systems are and you mentioned it so nicely and I'm not sure if we wanna dive into it this deep in the beginning but maybe more in the middle but the reality of how cities and communities and villages started was all based around the food source and now those in big cities are way outside of the city and that circular economy that you talk about or that circular system of going from agriculture and harvesting food and then taking that food waste back and putting it back on the farm as a fertilizer as a compost to get those nutrients back into the soil that's not happening. That's also could be another reason why agriculture says hey, we need some chemicals, fertilizers, whatever because our soils aren't getting that composting that those minerals put back in and cities are as you mentioned the number they're shipping it out to other countries and other places to process and take care of but why? Why aren't we keeping that in the cities? Why aren't we figuring out like you have ways to keep that there and keep it in the loop, keep it in the cycle so that we use it and I'm sure Paris, France is a big example. They do a lot of composting. So they have a system where they actually most of the food waste and compostable waste they keep in the city now whereas before they used to also ship it out and sell it and I know it's getting better around the world and even in New York but it's kind of a new concept we'll never thought of before. And so I would really like to know what were some of the other learning lessons to say wow, this is the right business model that I've chosen this is the right way of thinking I've chosen and now I'm fixing the food system in New York and setting an example and hopefully we'll expand but some of those learning lessons I'd like to hear more about and kind of go into more of this composting and how big of a issue the food waste is and some other things that you could learn. Yeah, absolutely and I can tease that out a bit further for us. So I think there's a large assumption. I mean, we experienced it with investors. I've had one investor say why don't you just go out and buy the produce, right? Food is so cheap and it's just crazy. That was back in 2000, I think 15 or 16. The level of understanding of the composting infrastructure that is so different based on region is wide. And so let me give an example of a food distributor that's local to let's say South Bronx not in the South Bronx but local to it they pay roughly $50,000 to have that food waste taken to a landfill in this case because the composting facility that is two hours away it has a higher what is called tipping fee, right? For the composting facility to turn that compost and accept it for processing. And whereas in upstate York where land is more plentiful for composting facilities and there's far more a number of those facilities the tipping fee is much less. And so you look at the economics of taking the food waste to a composting facility properly here in New York state. And if you were to look at that in Virginia the tipping fee in Virginia is roughly 30 the last time I checked 35 to $40 per ton whereas in New York I think it's upward of $65 per ton. And so there hasn't been a market force that has made food processors or let's just say food waste generators to not do the most economical method of getting rid of their food waste such as sending it to a landfill even though they know that there's a huge risk whether you think of costs or just operationally that landfills are soon reaching their capacity, right? And then missions that come from landfilling slash composting facility. Now taking that into consideration we try to create a business model that can be as close proximity to the source of the food waste generation as much as possible. We've never entertained to be quite honest with you partnering in a way of co-locating our process. Right now our facility in Rochester, New York is roughly 6,300 square feet. It has the ability to be an add-on operation or capability for a large food distributor or processor for example but it just adds complexities that we right now don't need to engage on. But what the other alerting lesson aside from composting infrastructure is understanding that the food waste generators there is also a large assumption that they what's to stop them for charging for the food waste? And a lot of times they don't want to get into the business of brokering food waste, right? Like it is a nuisance, it's taking up floor space they just want to get it out as reliably and consistently as possible. Sometimes farms don't provide that service in the most reliable consistent fashion as much as possible. So we are able to kind of add value to the food waste supplier in a way that doesn't require us to pay for the food waste as a raw material. And as a result of more heightened awareness around ESG and looking at that across the entire value chain for a lot of these food suppliers manufacturers, et cetera. They also see that it has a lot of positive aspects from a stakeholder engagement and investors and fill in the blank. So I think we were fortunate in creating a business model that is adaptive based on where the food waste is being generated and the scope and the size of it. We do limit the type of food waste vegetative waste the learning lesson there for, since we were in R&D for roughly seven, almost eight years is that incorporating things like post-consumer waste that have the animal byproducts and other things that make it a rampant environment for bacteria to thrive. It created a lot of complexities for us that need a highly controlled nutrient source for these indoor farms for those that grow in soil assistance. And so that was a learning lesson because we're not making as much impact by focusing on pre-consumed waste. There's a larger waste ring on the post-consumed but I personally believe that that waste stream is best suited for your traditional composting facility intended for soil. And hopefully there's markets that farmers can afford and maybe there needs to be some type of other profit-driven or other model that will allow a compost to return to the farm for nutrient replenishment especially given the loss of top soil around the country and around the world. So I think I'm recapping there the composting infrastructure was a huge learning lesson or the gaps of the infrastructure huge learning lesson for us. The second was the fact of the raw material and the variability of it really can be incredibly disruptive for our products and for indoor soilless farms. And then the third one is the fact that people really don't realize that yes, food waste is unfortunately in abundance especially around the US. People have seen our business model sometimes as a risk because there's like do you have security of all the food waste that you would need to scale? That's not a question or a doubt for us. So I think there's that assumption that there's risk in supply of food waste unfortunately that's not really a threat for us. No matter of fact, I think that worldwide that number especially in the past two years has gone up and what we're seeing some other examples and maybe we could compare notes with what you're seeing in New York and I know some of the numbers there as well would have been impacting. But there's always been this debate whether post-consumer, pre-consumer or post-farm where the most amount of waste is regardless of that the entire industry, agriculture, seafood, food and beverage industries waste today's dates 40% global is the average and it's not just that 40% it's actually an exponential waste it's actually 85% more and we can get into later why that's an exponential waste but because I'll give you one example here what we're seeing in Europe especially also because of Brexit but also because of the COVID and the lockdowns there haven't been as many migrant workers as many workers period and people at work to harvest the food that's grown on the farms during this time of the pandemic people were sick, they were in lockdown they weren't at work and also with the example with the Brexit they had between 400,000 and 600,000 migrant workers every year harvesting their food, processing their food those workers weren't there not only because of COVID but because of the Brexit because they voted them out and so now what they were doing is just telling that harvestable food back into the ground so not only did that aggregate for men turn into methane but it was a huge waste and finite resources and the time labor and everything where if they just did harvest they're even says yeah it will go to waste we can't process that we can do it but there's an organization like yours that could go pick it up or somehow put it into a compost put it into a nutrient film technology and into a nutrient for hydroponics for that and this is something where we might need to clarify so I've had a lot of podcasts but only one where we kind of got in the technical aspects of vertical farming and hydroponics and aerial ponics and that was with Henry Gordon Smith of agriculture and formerly the Association for Vertical Farming and that and he's a good friend of mine where we got into some details but we've kind of got to clarify so we're talking, you've talked about some things that it's really highly regulated not only from the EPA but those hydroponic systems that you're delivering whether it's substrate to or a nutrients to a liquid nutrient from these vegetables that you do has to be pathogen free it has to be organic it cannot have a mixture of animal things in there genetically modified stuff it has to be pathogen and really microbial free in that respect and so maybe I'd like you to go into a little bit more for those of us who don't know how that process works and why it needs to be that way and also one last thing that I'll throw in there is there's a lot of hydroponic and vertical farm systems in the world and especially popping up in New York so there's, you know, Gotham greens and their square roots and there's a bright agriculture and on and on we could go and name many other outfits that are there, sky farms, aero farms whoever's in New Jersey and the surrounding areas but there are open systems there's closed systems there's aquaponics there's hydroponics there's aereoponics there's aerial misting, aerial fogging so there's a lot of different terminology that we could talk into this industry that you're providing this solution for and substrates for but I'd like you to go a little bit deeper to kind of explain for those of us who don't know or don't have that knowledge about why it needs to be pathogen-free and why it's so complex and why we're throwing waste food waste that could be used as a nutrient right in the city to grow food in the city. Yeah, absolutely. And I can kind of walk you through, you know what has been the discoveries based on our science. So it's not, I wish I wish it were as simple as using the traditional heap composting method that most outdoor composting facilities use and perhaps taking the tea or the liquid effluent extract of that and using that as the hydroponic or organic hydroponic nutrient, right? It's a lot more technical and it's almost incorporating methods from biotechnology without using any type of bacteria I'm sorry, any type of enzymes, microbes that do incorporate genetically modified engineering or just are required to catalyze the conversion of organic compounds from food waste into what is a more ionic or plant-available format which is nitrogen in the form of nitrate and phosphorus in the form of phosphate, for example. So let me go from step one. We receive the raw materials and again, this is unrecoverable vegetative waste. So think of broccoli, carrots, peas. It's that similar mix every day because we verify with the third-party supplier in this case of food manufacturer that the food waste type is gonna be the same. This is the consistent volume that we can anticipate. So right now we're at production volumes of roughly 25 to 50 tons per week depending on the season. And so there's strong contamination protocols that we can to make sure that we have that involved to prevent any type of contamination or risk. And so once we receive it, it goes through, like you said, a pasteurization or pathogen kill step for us. So we coined that as sterilization. That means that we are compliant with US EPA 40 which is a CFR rule which essentially ensures that pathogen destruction within a controlled, monitored and documented process exist. So for us, the food waste is basically held in a fermentation tank or chamber, however you see it. It's subjected to 175 degrees Fahrenheit over a minimum of 30 minutes. And that's what allows us to de-nature pathogens. Now, granted, we do often get questions around, how do you 100% guarantee there's no herbicide or pesticides? And we know that by the process itself, it does guarantee a minimum of de-naturing but we are in compliance with USDA standards. So that is the minimum protocol that we ensure there. However, with herbicides especially, I have to be, we put this on our website or FAQ as well really transparent because that's how we operate. There are very persistent herbicidal compounds that's the right way to say it that are very hard to de-nature. And for that reason, we reference materials that show that we meet the minimum standard but it's hard to 100% guarantee that. And this is on a tangent but I do wanna mention that for that reason, I've not been an advocate of using wastewater or waste affluent from municipal waste water treatment plans as a source of nutrients. I know some of these indoor farms are looking at that as a way to reduce the dependency on mineral salts and reduce emissions. But I'm strongly opposed to that because when you look at forever chemicals and some of these more pharmaceutical compounds that require very sophisticated standalone process it's very hard to remove that. So I'm not in support of that. But coming back to our process. So once it's gone through a pathogen kill step we then basically our kind of secret sauce is how we biologically use a process to basically take the food waste and turn it into a water soluble format. All that means when someone says water soluble that means as soon as the plant receives that nutrient whether it's in powdered form or liquid our organic hydroponic nutrient product is in liquid the plant can immediately absorb it as nutrients. Whereas other organic amendments whether it's soil or for hydro some people use liquid backwater. Typically in a soil system you would have the very rich microbes that are already innate to that soil microbial area to break down the nutrients. And in a hydroponic system that may require sometimes seven to 10 days and the supplementation of additional microbes break them down those nutrients in the liquid backwater and turn it into a water soluble or plant available format. So we've reduced that. That means the farm does not need one additional product like microbes to make that happen. Two, they don't need a separate tank from their water reservoir to essentially ferment or degrade or break down those nutrients with those microbes so that it can finally be plant available. We've already done that hard work using what we call organic cycling science method to do that. And then essentially the products that is after it's gone through that process we package in both volume or in liquid containers for fulfillment. So to kind of make sure that I make sense of what I just said we're essentially reducing what is called mineralization or the breaking down of nutrients of organic compounds of minerals that can be sourced from food waste because we wanna source from this replenishable waste stream and make it plant available. And normally in a hydroponic system that's incredibly difficult which is why it took us this long to achieve that. Now you use the term in there and I wanna go a little bit deeper liquid back guano. Do you wanna explain that or should I help? Go for it. So the guano is really simply said that as shit. It's bird shit really. And that's the original guano for a long time ago as something that we used and began to run out of in our farms to help with fertilizer. And so we don't wanna get farming and agriculture believe it or not is not a natural thing. It is a science, it is a process and we don't wanna make it a chemical one or a pesticide one or herbicide one but we want to know that to germinate a seed to do composting whether you're doing it the way that you do it for your nutrient composition or you do it in a natural composting process it's still a process to do it. And so when you talked about heat and fermentation that you use in your process but not a lot of people know that there's an extreme amount of heat generated in normal manure composting normal composting piles that is extremely high and also kind of needed to get the right type of liquid in compost there that generates that nice dark soil and anybody who's done whether it's permaculture regenerative agriculture or regenerative organics or organics or just normal victory garden composting knows that there's certain things that you really wanna have and get into your, for a nice composting mix and there's absolutely some things that you wanna have far away from your composting pile to avoid those pathogens and those wrong things from getting in there to that really do no good for you as for consumption but also for your plants and your soils to heal those soils. And last year, wonderful film came out Kiss the Ground talking about healing our soils, capturing carbons importance of composting and many other things but I believe that there's a healthy mix between traditional agriculture, industrial agriculture, permaculture, regenerative agriculture, agroecology, agroforestry and the ones that don't belong in the mix for me is the traditional agriculture and industrial agriculture. They belong nowhere in the mix for me and human health for environmental health. The biggest way to stop human suffering and human health issues and to solve our environmental problems is to really fix our food systems. It is the world's oldest and longest and most successful economy that the world has ever seen. It's 12,000 years old and it's called an agrarian society, farming. That's the best economy. It's also had the biggest impact on our environment and on our human health especially when industrial agriculture, industrial farming got into the mix and we started to use as chemicals, pesticides, fertilizers, herbicides and then it became a fossil fuel and a chemical company business and had nothing to do with real good science and healthy science in my opinion. So I'm a little bit biased in that. And so I wanna give everybody the knowledge because of your seven years of experience of flushing out the bugs, so to say, learning lessons and figuring out how to do what you do and it sounds like you're doing it very well. It can be complex, but it's something that's so beautiful if it's done right and we do it that can really heal human health and in our environment. And so I commend you for that and I kinda wanted to just bring out those maybe things that I hear that I know from my listeners and people who they've maybe been in the banking industry like you or in the financial industry like you or come from the technology background like me or law and don't have that insight to that basic need of humanity. And so the past two years there's been this emerging trend with the UN food systems summit because of COVID in 2020 we had to postpone it to this year but that our food systems and the awareness are really rising to the surface because it's the only way we're gonna fix our global grand challenges, our human suffering, our poverty and our environmental problems. And so now everybody's talking about it. How can we not just feed a growing population but how can we do it to address the SDGs but also to address our environmental problems? And so I think we're on the right track and I believe also that that played a big part of why you've started renewable is because of the sustainability aspect because of the human health aspect because of the environmental aspect and I just wanna kind of hear what kind of impacts you have you described them in some of your products like in is it a way we grow also how you know eliminate certain amount of metric tons of CO2 and things. I would like to kind of hear how that journey happened and why you decided that and what was the aha moment where you said hey food is the key the way we do food as a key maybe even what pushed you to eat vegetarian or vegan as you do and what that transition and what your learning lessons have been and kind of the journey you've been on. It's interesting and I appreciate that Mark because I think sometimes podcasts can become repetitive and it may seem like the interviewer has this agenda and I'm just solely open to what are people not kind of seeing and hearing. So I never so we focused on indoor farms solely because it has always been challenging for them to incorporate biologicals and the main kind of invasive challenge that they experienced is if they were to use let's say compost tea which you and I can create from home from our own kitchen scrap waste cheap available granted it's a purchasable and highly volatile depending on the day that it's been sitting but we wanted to resolve the challenge for them first because we wanted to convert them more to using less mineral salts and the mineral salts contributes anywhere between 1.5 to 3% of the global greenhouse gas emissions and to do that not for every crop but with the indoor farming industry largely growing leafy greens, herbs, tomatoes as a predominant crop. We felt that if those crops were more favorable to supplement nutrient source from food waste then let's say potatoes or even other high nitrogen feeding crops that we are able to reach those nutrient levels required by the crop, right? So we are limited in our crop type that we can focus on or deliver impact for but the main thing is as a result of serving them we also realized that some of what that industry is focused on which is very niche even though I think they estimate the compounded annual growth rate of roughly 24% from here on out and they're estimating vertical farming to be an industry of 50 billion by 2030 don't quote me on the year is they are challenged by the wastewater that they have and often have to discharge depending on the crop that they're growing either every two weeks or every three months it really depends on their own nutrient protocols and kind of sanity, not sanity but safety and thank you. And their food waste that's on site at the farm as well. So think of your root trimmings your post harvest trimmings from just prepping it for retail or distribution. And so the same was voiced by our open field farms as well. So the whole goal is what we were listening and hearing is that they wanna take byproducts from production and use that to return value back to the farm. And we try to focus on turning that into bio stimulants because one thing that I'm excited by but we're still early on our research is how can we help these farms become more resilient to drought conditions, right? Are the inputs helping them adapt to water limited constraints? Are they adapting to being able to use less fertilizer or just hopefully no mineral salt fertilizer? And so the main lesson there kind of repeating the pattern what I'm trying to make sure we create as takeaways is that every farm has consistently voiced the interest in trying to become as much as possible as an environmental steward and trying to transition off chemicals and the dependency for large water sourcing because they recognize that water consumption is being limited. When you look in Central Valley, California, farms are willing to basically sell their unused water at $575 per acre of foot water, I'm sorry, of unused water at $575 per acre to water-starred landowners. And how can we help these farms require less of water as an input? Require less of ag chemicals as an input? Not only here in the US, but you also see that Africa and MENA and Singapore and elsewhere because my goal and vision has always been not only increasing the resource efficiency but also reducing dependence on imports in that way because there's more than enough what I believe and capabilities to source these nutrients from localized waste streams. It's just a lot of these farms go based on what is tried and true from generations of growing methods. And not that they're resistant to what we're doing, but it does take a lot of R&D and education on our end to show that we can provide comparable results to mineral salts or the latter. So I hope that gives you a little bit of insight. It absolutely does. You say you don't have the background but because you're a true entrepreneur and a business owner, you've become a solid expert in this area. But I wanna kind of give my listeners hope those who are looking to start up new urban ag business or new startup or something in the food systems that there is so many areas that can be looked in that are untapped and the market is enormous. It's the entire world eats. So I doubt that anybody's going to encroach or come in and take your share of the market away, but that you give hope to someone who might have been working at a bank or a financial institute or in tech or something else and said, this is not my calling. I'd like to try something else. I'd like to try something that connects me to nature connects me to how I can help communities inner city schools and communities to get them to food security and food sovereignty and to out of insecurity and out of unhealthy situations to be more resilient in the future. And that even though you've had seven, since 2011 and a lot of research and trials and experts on your team that you work with and get a lot of help with, that curve is something that anybody can make that anybody can get if the passion is there, if the willingness to see the need is there. And I guess I just want to, there was something in there that I really want to touch upon before we move on. And that was the composting and the food waste aspect of it that I think is such an unrealized potential and I want to address it in two ways. So I deal a lot with Africa and Ethiopia, the world food program in different areas around the world where they're producing food for Europe, they're producing food for the United States, they're producing legumes and other things. And what's happening is in a lot of areas, these products are reaching the border to the customs and because of the curve, the shape, the size or for some reason they're being denied to go on further to the end destination to be processed to be used in a lot of respects and Ethiopia stands out the most for me because of a couple of projects I've worked with on the world food program where that's been a big issue. And for them, it's easier to burn the product or just throw it in the landfill right at the customs than it is to ship it back to those farms that just harvest it, waste it all the water and everything to send it back where that is a huge waste. It's a huge composting issue, it's a huge resource that if we kept those within our borders in the areas where we were growing those and close the loop somehow or brought those loops into our cities somehow, we would have food sovereignty, we would have stability, we would have whole another streams of income because that is income. And so I wanna address that in a couple different respects because that goes to two areas. One, we've turned food into a commodity when you turn food into a commodity, it cheapens food. And when you cheapen food, you cheapen life. No way in heck, can it be the true cost or the true cost accounting of food to water it, grow it, harvest it, package it, transport it, have those emissions and then say, oh, we're just gonna throw it away before it hits anybody's stomach, plate, grocery store, processor, that's insanity. We're on a finite planet that just cannot exist. How do we stop that inefficiency, that waste, that bad business model? I mean, you would never tell Elon Musk, hey, you just produced that ugly cyber truck, now throw 40% of them away and then the rest you can start to sell. He'd say, boy, that's a bad business model, I would never do that. And he's very renewable and recyclable and wants to close the loop and doing great things as well, but that's just bad business. That doesn't make sense, that's insanity. But why have we been doing it in the agriculture industry and the food industry for so many decades, for so many centuries? It just doesn't make sense. And it's not getting better. We're wasting more land, we're wasting more resources. So that's one aspect. Maybe if you wanna address or speak to any of that, we can do that and then I'll talk to you about the second half of that and the second half of my question. Yeah, and I appreciate that, Mark, because you raised two really good points. So the first one is, you're right, there is this untapped human capital, especially in rural areas. And when you think about hydroponic and indoor farms, you relegate it often to urban areas, but we can take that same opportunity and disseminate it or distribute it in rural agriculture economies as well. Cause when you look at, and a colleague, I can't even take credit for this, but a colleague reminded me of, a lot of people that are trained and have worked for years because it's their family owned farms are some of the best agronomists, some of the best little scientists, the best farmers, right? They're gonna know how to operate an indoor farm than someone, me, that's kind of starting from scratch. This is not now, but years ago, right? So, you know, if we can reduce the entry barriers of the cost of the equipment and make it into almost an operating model that can be easily replicated, let's say within distressed properties that commercial or industrial just don't have the tenants anymore. That's something that we're really excited about and is a project that will be announcing late September, October, called the Glens Falls Urban Agricultural Pilot. And it's purely put together to see how we can replicate the vertical farming model in rural areas to increase the diversity of their crop type, increase their revenue stream and make it year round of growing throughout the U.S. But on the other side, those that are trying to see how they can also be a part of this, but don't really see that, maybe an existing business model or product type, they don't see an opportunity behind it. And you raise the idea of why are some of these farms just going about keeping the unharvested, let's say tomatoes, and then just telling that. You know, I've always thought, why haven't people considered composting as a service for these farms? So if they're talking about, and I don't know, do you know the latest on the topsoil depletion and how much that has been eroded? Yeah, I do kind of. So in 2015, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, UNFAO came out and said, we have 70 harvests left. And today's date, August 19th as we're recording this, 2021, we actually have 45 harvests left. And that is part of that soil depletion because of runoff, because of chemicals and pesticides and fertilizers, degradation, deforestation of those soils. We're looking at back to Roosevelt's time when we had the dust bowls in the United States where the soil was already depleted down. We're looking at times back in, and any of the civilizations that collapsed due to ecological or environmental collapse that we have just put so much strain on our soils through industrial agriculture that we have, and that's not 45 years, that's 45 harvests. And that depending on what pandemics and what runs on food and what kind of crops, cover crops we do or don't use in those systems, whether we're gonna get 45 or we're gonna have a lot less here in the next few years, of that production. But that's kind of the actual amount of soil is variable, but I don't know the latest numbers, but I do know that it's 45 left, which is pretty scary. And that's why I'm really pushing organic. That's why I'm pushing the whole hydroponic and aerial pondics, aquaponics, the different options out there not to take over agriculture, but as another tool in the toolbox to kind of supplement, especially in the urban and the rural and some rural, but in the urban areas in the cities where there's not a lot of farmland there and we can do that in different ways that work just as good, keeping those minerals and nutrients in a closed loop within the cities on how we do it. And also letting new farms that are emerging doing regenerative agroforestry or agroecology to regenerate, to kind of pause and get back up to speed if they're transitioning from industrial ag to a new form of agriculture, which hopefully will go on to cover crops and perennials and mixed uses because there's a couple of new books and thoughts that have been out there for a while, but they're really getting traction along with Kiss the Ground and the Rodale Institute and Allen Savory, the Holistic Land Management and how we integrate different farming and agriculture methods. And that is water for any farm from Mark Shepherd and also restoration agriculture from Mark Shepherd. And that is how do we do it anywhere in the world to fix our systems, to keep these food systems alive in areas where there might be flooding or in areas where there might be drought, how do we fix our farming systems and get them back to where we need to be to have the amounts of water that we need to have those things while we're doing what we're doing in cities, in urban setting. So I don't know if you have any more to say on that, but I wanted to get on the second point, but do you have any more that you wanted to say towards the soil or? No, the last thing I'll say, and all of what you said I'm in full agreement with is composting as a service on site at these farms, I think has a lot of value and I'm surprised we don't see more of those models operating. Similarly, biochar, a ton of research out there to show how biochar can help us convert more seamlessly to regenerative soils. Surprise, we don't see more of that as well. Yeah, and it also creates fabulous products. I mean, the use of biochar, the flavors, the sweetenings that happen out of the specific crops that are used with biochar, there's a big difference that you can really tell the difference in the mineral's nutrient value in those products that come out of it, especially compared to industrial agriculture where you're like, this doesn't have any taste. There's no minerals and nutrients in here. That's why are we eating this? The thing is, in a lot of respects, we're not eating it. First, carbs are eating it as ethanol. Second, animals are eating it. And so it's going through this really imbalanced process and the stuff that we do get to eat. I've tried to stop eating it years ago because it just, there's no taste. My taste buds have changed. Something's changed. I had that same conversation today with Peter Singer. The second part, the kind of iteration of this question that ties into the soil health and the different methods and this true cost that we have is really, there's a learning lesson that's been emerging more and more over the years and that it's really not about the products of the future and the brands of the future. It's how we produce anything that will have the biggest impact on human health and on our environment. What I mean by that to explain it, if I think you get it, but it is if we use good practices, no aromas, no flavorings, no preservatives, no pesticides, no chemicals, no fossil fuels, if we use renewable energy, recycled water, rainwater, ambient water harvesting, if we use good practices of our organic and regenerative organic nutrients and things that have been done in a way without harm or use of almost in some respects excessive use of finite resources, it's almost virtually impossible to produce a product that is bad for human health, bad for our environment and that is not loaded with coming from a healthy soil or from a hydroponic perspective coming from that it's almost beyond organic in the type of nutrients, the type of root growth and minerals and vitamins that can be found in that product. And there's an extra layer on that that I think most even in the association for vertical farming, even in the vertical farming hydroponic aquaponics area that is kind of fallen by the wayside that a lot of people are missing. And I don't know if you're doing it and I'm not calling you out on it or anything but I kind of wanna ask if you thought about that or how you're applying that in your processes or if you're using third party help to do that because you're a new startup or a new company that's kind of still growing to do it on your own but why aren't the arrow farms and the sky farms and the planties and the other big players the green Bronx machine why aren't they using renewable energy, recycled rain water? Why aren't they using non-finite resources to do their products in a different way because wouldn't that take the high cost of energy of land, water and this power out of the system to reduce your cost of good sold and increase your margins I guess on the products you're producing which is necessary in some respects to be competitive on a really crappy market of industrial food, industrial ag food that is selling ahead of lettuce for six cents or 16 cents or 60 cents, whatever it is that you say, okay, no, this is sustainable and organic or beyond organic type of a product and that's why it costs so much because it costs more energy because it's done here in the city or whatever reason but what if we took those other factors out of that and put them in our cost of good sold and the way we produced wouldn't that balance that to make it competitive on that but also bring it more towards the true cost of those products? And I really think that I think it ties into the first half of the question that we talked about and the true cost accounting and that and that's why I bring it up. I don't see a lot of people moving in that direction or do you and do you use those processes yourself and how do you feel about that? And is that just something in the future and we haven't hit the sweet spot to make that leap to where we need to be in the future? Yeah, that's a great question. And I think I'm just gonna assume here I think it comes down to the proximity to the renewable energy sources and I'm giving an example to that. And then secondly, the CAPEX involved with that. So how will capitalize are these farms to take on things like renewable solar energy? Not renewable, but solar energy in the form of panels. So the first example, which is integral greenhouse in it's a tomato farm in upstate New York very kind of integrated or uses a lot of Dutch based technologies. Well, what they were fortunate or able to take advantage of is a local anaerobic digester and that anaerobic digester was able to provide very passive heat that's an off heat or a waste source from the anaerobic digester and the greenhouse, I apologize. And this said that the greenhouse is able to take advantage of that waste heat from the anaerobic digester and use that to reduce their energy costs to keep the control temperature throughout the grow season. In the case of able to afford those these capital intensive improvements at harvest is a great example of that. I can't remember how much they've been funded by VC investment, but at least, at least a hundred. Yeah, it's a quite a bit like at least a hundred. I think it's about 150, if not 180 is quite a bit. So they've done a great job of being outfitted with solar panels. And I think they plan on replicating the model that they have in Kentucky with the additional strawberry and tomato and leafy green farms that they're now building out. So with those two in hand, if a farm has access to those things, then I see it as that's been their advantage. I know the shipping container farm model like freight farms tries to, not tries, but they've partnered with a renewable energy supplier, I think in the form of wind and maybe another source of renewable energy to basically give access to this renewable energy market to all of their freight farm shipping container operators. So really kind of creative to how to make this less capital intensive, capital intensive, but accessible. Now for us, we try to be as proactive as possible, even though we have a low energy intensive manufacturing model, what's interesting Mark is that our facility in Rochester, New York, they don't allow for us to be able to supply or source energy besides the main utility conglomerate in Rochester. So it's been a consideration for a long term because that's totally against our brand, right? If we're not able to have ownership of solar panels or if we want to source from geothermal, why are we here? Yeah, so I wish it were different. Unfortunately, we're committed to a five year lease, but that's where we're at. Yeah, and a lot of people are that way. And the same with the industry, our production industry of food and I tease a lot is really stuck in the dark ages and some processing facilities out there are still using very antiquated and outdated processes to produce the product, certain packaging things, certain binding materials, certain things that are needed in the processing of certain type of foods that require processing or heat treatment or different things in the process before it's given for consumption that are outdated and just older models that are not very efficient anymore. And that's also a big factor where that waste comes in that could be brought back to processing or through production, could be brought back to the farms, could be brought back to you in an urban location to handled in a different way. And I think in a lot of respects, we're close on the curve to seeing that bend and switch to a model. So we've seen the renewable industry just it's almost cheaper than fossil fuels at this point in different parts around the world. And that curve is really bent and the price point is right and it's there. But in the food industry, we've got a little bit more to go but I feel we're on the cusp. I feel that we're really getting close and there are some new models and new technologies out there that are really coming along that we're seeing cellular agriculture, precision fermentation, we're seeing the true acceptance of hydroponics, aquaponics and vertical farming or closed environmental agriculture and people beginning to understand that market were in some respects, it was kind of distant. They didn't understand it that really nurseries have been going on for a long time hanging gardens of Babylon the Netherlands and Belgium are very far advanced in this industry and it's not a new thing but now we're taking it up and making it more efficient and that it's something that really can be pushed forward in a lot of respects. I believe you guys have something like three or four products or am I wrong or do you have more than that? Yeah, no, there's three. We have the liquid organic hydroponic nutrient called a wave agro just has a 411 primarily used for leafy greens and herbs. And then we have for new tarot which is an alternative to rock wool. Essentially it allows plants to be grown in an alternative to soil. So rock wool looks something like this. It requires a lot of petroleum fuel to manufacture and is often expensive. So from a missions perspective it certainly doesn't help to be using that and it can't be composted. So we provide a hundred percent compostable alternative using solid solid biochar and we add our own kind of bio stimulants to the product. And then third is our onsite food waste recovery system. That system allows for farms to be able to be able to take their wastewater byproducts and their post-production products such as trimmings and turn that into bio stimulants for return back into the farm. That last system isn't commercially available. We're very selective with the farms that we work with right now given that it is early. We do have two pilots essentially starting this fall. And that's all I would imagine it's very personal specific type of systems that you work in the region, the location, the farm, the size, what's needed. So that's great. I love those. And I actually think that I see and I'm just getting to know enough about renewable to be dangerous through you thank goodness and the research I've done is but I see so much potential in the future for different type of products and things to emerge that are just as much needed in the arena. I've seen some emergence through other organizations. I deal with a lot of vertical farm companies and companies around the world just was on a call yesterday with the Philippines, which was amazing on some new things popping up there that are looking into using in their nutrient film technology some healthy microorganisms, some pro and prebiotic type of mixtures in there to get that natural gut health back in similar to what we see people taking supplements of pro and prebiotics into that process that there's some micro risa tablets that are beginning to be used to stimulate a better root growth and longer root growth or more mineral absorption and less water better water absorption, but in a different way some new technologies also that are film technologies that were actually tested in the deserts in Saudi Arabia and Dubai and in different areas growing broccoli in sand with a nutrient film technology that was on a drip system using 98% less water than traditional methods but because of this film technology that somehow allowed the absorption of the water better and they tested in the desert in the sand but it was actually meant for hydroponics systems so how they can use it and get some better systems in there so I see so much potential for this to grow and expand and some other options to come about. So I see plenty of opportunities for you I only have four questions left for you the next two are probably are yeah four questions five questions maybe five questions the next two are the hardest for you or a lot of my guests think they're hard and that is do you feel like you're a global citizen and how would you feel about the removal of borders, nations, walls, limitations of humanity one from another and what is your view or understanding of this and I wanna caveat that or kinda give you a prelude to that during this two years of this pandemic that we're going on and all the other crazy things that have happened there's been a extreme rise of nationalism and separation of humanity but during this time food was a global citizen COVID was a global citizen, air, water, climate change was a global citizen and even though we were on lockdown it's amazing how much food still traveled around the world and took the seats on the airplanes that were not full as a global citizen in some respects which was also crazy and so I just kinda wanna get your feelings on that would it change the world, would it make things different is that something that's possible and how do you think it would affect your life or your view if we went to something like that what are your feelings? Yeah, I'm multiracial, my grandmother is German my dad is Cape Verdean, I apologize my mother is German and black and my dad is Cape Verdean and I've always had the mindset of if I'm gonna create impact in the world or even here in New York City it needs to be relevant culturally and globally and I think I do this facetiously with renewable so it's not only focused on how we can make the impact here in the US where we're more well-resourced than elsewhere but replicated outside of the US where there's greater challenges on water and other natural resources. The second question around do I believe that we should remove all borders that is a hard question because I'm certainly one of equality and I wouldn't have it in me, the heart or the faith however you wanna coin it as to say that if we had resources here and watching a family in front of us that were over across the border or a neighboring border and watch their family go through a significant amount of trauma by simply saying that we wouldn't allow for them to cross the border I couldn't say no, right? However, I do think there's a lot of sensitivities to how things like migrant movement around the world should be managed. I had a great dinner with a friend yesterday and she was coming from, she's traveled widely as much as you and she was coming from Rwanda and just looking and she now kind of really wants to focus on migrant kind of just relationships and how to manage it from a policy as well as just like economic perspective. And I think that's a hard challenge and it's only going to be exacerbated as we continue to endure things like climate change and the shift of economies more local or higher, more closer in proximity to urban areas. And so I guess if I were to say in short order what my answer would be to that is I'm mixed. I believe in giving help to people because I'm a human at the end of the day and I'm very conscious in that way. However, I don't think you could just open the border completely and quickly without really properly planning because there's just so many different subcultures within subcultures within subcultures that you do introduce a lot of whether it's geopolitical risk or other things that require just a lot of planning and foresight to make sure that you're blending very different types of people in a either fixed area or a much larger area. Did I hit all those questions? You did, you absolutely did. And I want to be a little tough and go deeper. I want to stimulate a couple more things. So just recently in Germany and I'm glad to hear you have ties to Germany. So I also have ties to Germany. I have a fond heart for Germany, but I am American. Is we accepted a lot of climate refugees, a lot of conflict refugees from Syria and from other countries and still do probably one of the biggest countries to accept climate refugees and conflict refugees, especially here in Hamburg where I'm at, I think it was the state that accepted the most close to 30,000 just here in Hamburg alone. And it's done a fabulous job of integration. The problem is in 2017 in May, we had some flooding in Germany killed about 260 people and had about 800 million in insurance damages and those floods. But just in the past couple of weeks, Belgium, Germany, even London had some severe supercell storms flooding, had close to 1,000 people still missing more than 300 presumed dead already, 380 something already presumed dead and close to 20 billion in insurance damages and the number still rising. Now Germany has tons of climate refugees in its own country. So that's one aspect to think about before they were bitching and moaning about Syrian refugees or refugees coming in now because of climate change, some Germans are refugees now living in churches and in schools, their home is gone, it's flood, it's damaged, all their things are done. So they've kind of been forced to be a refugee or kind of displaced, which has to do with global citizenry and movement. But also the simple fact that we're all crew members of the spaceship Earth, we're all homo sapiens, we're, you know, we've all moved around that we all walked out of the planes of the savannas in Africa and moved around this Earth. And so now we're dividing ourselves amongst each other and I just don't see how the tie to what you do, you're recovering food waste that compost that used to be shipped around the world. You mentioned the numbers and the millions and how much was being shipped out. Why is it okay for our food to be global citizens or us to get our food from other places or to ship our waste to other places? But as human beings, that's not allowed. Oh, interesting. Maybe let me clarify. So I don't agree with food waste being handled globally across the world, right? Like I'm aware of the position of it should be a localized waste stream that should be handled locally and then distributed ideally within that region. We only have one facility right now but ideally as we scale, we can distribute that. And then that's the food waste side and then also for food production similarly, right? Because there's no reason why Singapore is importing 90% of their food. And so food as a system shouldn't be dealt with on a global perspective. And I think we're seeing the industry shift in such a way that they have become more of a domestic production and prioritizing that nationalistic perspective. My personal belief in that the treatment and handling of migrants and the displacement of people should be with the lens of a global citizen from how, just like, how should I say it? I'm a very humanistic person, very spiritual. And I just feel like if I have the resources I'm more than willing to distribute it, right? But what I do wanna clarify is that I am aware that you can't just open the floodgates and just allow for the, I guess the repopulation of taking one distribution, right? Just anywhere, I think it just needs to be a very kind of like proactive planning for that. So that, you know, you can minimize any type of conflict. I wanna make sure I answer your question. Do you mind me? Oh, you did. I think I've made it too complex. Oh, okay. It's okay, you've answered it perfectly and there is no right or wrong answer. And I don't, it's not meant to put you in a political or a tough situation. It's just sometimes the ethics or the things that we think about, we don't always think about that. It's okay for us to get our food from around the world from other countries or to have the environmental impact of the food that we get or the products, the cell phones, the computers or whatever that we get from China or other places that that environmental impact, that that land and resource use is in another country. But when it comes time for those other countries to come and visit us or to change the location where they live or when they're in need, that it's their problem. It was okay for us to get our resources there that is not part of the US or Germany or wherever. And this happens a lot with animal agriculture. Thankfully, you've kind of distanced yourself from that issue. But we don't look at it in those perspectives. We just kind of say, no, I'm an American, I'm a German or whatever and we don't see the bigger picture. The United Kingdom, the whole Brexit vote was basically around migrant workers based around food to keep them out because they felt they were taking jobs. Those jobs didn't get filled after the Brexit vote and it really put them in a conundrum and a precarious situation specifically around food because the United Kingdom still today even with a Brexit and lockdown, four times the land mass in size of the United Kingdom and actually even five times the land mass is used elsewhere around the world to produce food for the United Kingdom. So it's not okay for those migrant workers and food processors to be there because they're taking jobs and maybe even resources but it is okay to use those land and those resources around the world in other countries that they're also kind of saying, no, we don't wanna have nothing to do with you but we do wanna steal your resources. We do wanna different form of colonization or whatever manipulation or to leave the environmental impact in those countries but reap the benefit of those products that we get. And so that's kind of the stimulation not only for my listeners but for you and to get your thoughts and opinions on that on how we can fix that because I think that's a key of fixing human suffering and fixing environmental and ecological problems that we need to solve and that's what your business does. Yeah, and I'll give you one other great example. I was speaking with a friend yesterday and this is the one from Rwanda and she was telling me how the FAO would have funded projects where they would have a reserve of water to fund those specific farms and there was a limited number of how much their fertilizer they were allocated, the water, et cetera, right? And those projects were often ill managed because they didn't have someone on the ground to be there throughout the entire 12 months to really provide that support in a number of ways. So oftentimes they would fail but the problem was like, okay how do you have farm that isn't a FAO focused farm or pilot but suffering because they don't have access to the same water that the FAO projects have access to. So I agree, you know, if and the last thing I'll say is that if a country is providing resources or taking resources which is often the case especially in the US from other countries they need to do it with such this perspective of what are the ways that we're enriching without extracting and leaving externalities that they're ultimately gonna face because of operating and colonizing that area if you really wanna call it out. Yeah, and I think that was also kind of the tie-in to the second half of the question that I asked you as well where we talked about this through cost accounting or total environmental cost as percentage of EBITDA is because a lot of those environmental impacts are absorbed in other places and we don't pay the true cost. We didn't pay the environmental impact, the water, the harvest, the land, all those emissions that were created whether it's in China or Australia or somewhere else where those products were produced, Fiji water and then shipped to the US or to Europe or to wherever and that is a system that has a limit to growth that stops. There's a point where our world, our finite planet can't handle that anymore and so that's the interesting fact. I like, I want us to think about that because as we're in a time of talking about United Nations Food Systems Summit and global food reform and things like that, how can we truly come up with a system that is regenerative that works for forever? And that leads me to my last hardest question for you is the burning question WTF and no, it's not the swear word that everybody's probably been saying but it's what's the futures and I wanna be even more specific. I want your answer, your specific answer whether it's renewable or for you personally but what does a world that works for everyone look like for you and maybe what is the future? What is the futures, it's plural what everybody has a little bit different version and what is it for you? Yeah, I'll kind of answer it me personally and then me professionally with renewable. So personally for me, I think the future is helping farms and sharing the access to the technology and the research and the awareness of making these farms adaptable to drought and also increasing the nutritional value so that like we're having better access to food that isn't industrially grown. Professionally with the renewable hat on I see that done in a way that is distributed and more collaborative. So when I think of like manufacturing, right? You have manufacturing hubs, we have like business parks and oftentimes whether it's the access to the energy supply or the real estate they're done in such a way where it's kind of like a shared resource pool. So the cost is subsidized for all the other tenants and I kind of see that or maybe I would like to see that in agricultural economies. I'll give you a great example and I kind of just based on this incredible conversation from last night where one of them was so clear for me. So you have this great supplement which is Bobal powder from a great Bobal tree and the Germans have really kind of monetized that tree. So they've acquired this several thousands of acres of land and they take the tree, harvest what they need from it and then essentially pulverize it to turn into that Bobal powder that people like you and I pay too much for. And then, but the local Rwandians maybe out of ignorance, I hope I'm explaining that correctly don't have like would love to be able to also monetize that but they lack the equipment to pulverize it and provide the similar type of product to local African markets. And so, you know, why aren't there conversations, partnerships happening so that they can get access to that equipment, charge them for it. You can still monetize it, but it allows for these farms and these smallholder lifestyles to also be able to survive and thrive on a staple good that, you know, thankfully they're getting nutrition in the form of the seeds from the tree rather than pulverizing it into powder. So that type of collaboration because we've been so, you know it's been so patriarchal in the sense of like there's not any competition, you need to have fear and all this money and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. You know, I think consciously we are shifting to more of a system that is not that. And if we do allow for that isn't gonna be, you know the poverty that we're seeing because you don't have access to a piece of equipment that would have allowed your family to be able to still live in that same village and monetize a tree or a plentiful crop could be moringa for your survival. I love how you said that. So there's a couple of things in there I totally agree with and I love that it was just a recent conversation that you had. One, you're talking about local economies, local empowerment of people with production manufacturing equipment. And it's kind of almost like re-community, re-city because you're bringing manufacturing back, you're empowering the locals instead of someone from Germany or the United States coming in, the rich businesses coming in with their tools and manufacturing. Why don't we empower the locals with the knowledge and the tools to do that instead of us exploiting their crops. And so what you do is you not only empower the people and the majority of the farmers around the world are women and girls. And so, and maybe the landowners are male but those who do the work and really are the farmers and the laborers, the workers are women and girls. Let's empower them with education, the tools, the manufacturing, the equipment to do that. We're building local economies, we're strengthening the infrastructure, we're strengthening the community, we're educating them to get out and change that situation which then in turn stimulates the economy which then in turn feeds our communities better that which in turn takes better care of the environment is more sustainable. So I love that aspect as well. And we're really seeing this emergence of building community food webs keeping things more local. And I think it's different than nationalism. I think it's different than separating ourselves. I think as we take care of our families, our communities, our cities first and then the more abundance we have, the better it goes, the better that infrastructure is. Of course, we share with other cities and other countries and then as there's excess and get into a different type of a model that's more ecological economics so that we can have that biodiversity of different plant types and nutrition types because I love Thai food. I love food from Italy and Africa and food from Brazil. I love that diversity. And yeah, sometimes it has to be a luxury that you don't have it every day. It's a little rare, but that we need that back, but we also at the same time need to strengthen those local economies and those people to not say, oh, that's the Unilevers, the Monsantos or the buyers or the Bargills or whoever it is coming in and they're just taking over and we don't get anything back out of it. So thank you for that answer. And I love it. That was probably the best answer I've ever had to that question. The last three questions are for my listeners. They're kind of selfish for my listeners. If there was one message, you could depart my listeners as a sustainable takeaway that has the power to change their life. What would it be your message? And it can even be two messages. It doesn't have to be one. Yeah. I think, and I've been saying this for a while. I just think people really need to be conscious of what they're buying and consuming because they really don't realize that based supermarkets and wholesale food suppliers go based on projections. So if you're buying at a large amount each month, which really only eat perhaps 75% of that food that you purchased last month, you're always gonna create this residual waste because the markets are going based on your receipts. So try to be incredibly minimalistic, mindful of being creative with meal planning. But I see that as the lowest eating fruit for most people. What should young innovators in your field be thinking about if they're looking for ways to make a real impact? You know, I think about the two interns that were with us this summer. I think people just have to be a consumer in the sense of information. And the reason why I say that is because when I started thinking about renewable, I'm like an information hog. I love looking at where things are and then just seeing what kind of patterns are happening. And you can only really do that by just consuming a lot of information. So try to be less into my personal thought is like on the social media, depending on what social media, but really just having a very kind of macro level view because your life doesn't have to be linear. You can make the career and life that you want, but it really comes down to what you know. And it can only be possible if you really kind of take ownership of trying to know as much as possible and creating that ultimate job or career that you're hopeful won't. What have you experienced or learned in this professional journey of yours so far that you would have loved to know from the start? That's a good question. I wish that so agriculture and technology as an agriculture, especially for open field or soil, it's incredibly hard to get off the ground because you usually need three years and more. So that didn't really impede us, but I didn't realize that like, agriculture or ag tech, if you want to call it just has such a long timeframe to test, iterate and then fully say it's ready for commercialization. And so knowing that timeframe and how long, we would have a formulation, but then you can't go based on one crop cycle results. You need to grow for at least six months worth. And so I would have done things a little bit differently had I had that background. Nia, it's been a sure pleasure. Thank you so much for letting us all inside of your ideas and kind of who you are and renewable. And I really thank you. That's all I have. And I really hope that we can have some discussions again in the future because I know you guys are gonna go far and do a lot of wonderful things. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you for creating this platform for people to just like share because I really like the perspective and lens that you kind of raised the question. So I appreciate you. Thank you very much. Have a great evening. You too.