POET’S CORNER
Let Them Eat Oatcake! a future food fantasia by Chris Powici
Click here to read Chrisi’s new poem about what to expect on your dinner plate in years to come. You can also hear Chris read his poem on the recording.
Kelp Chains by Sophie Cooke
Click here to read Sophie’s new poem about our relationship with nature and what we take from it. You can also hear Sophie read her poem on the recording.
Winners of The Gordon Schools poetry competition about food
Food Bank Bag by Connie Muiry, age 14
Summer Berries by Lillian Guijit, age 13
Special mention: Hunger by Freyja Ramsey . Making Curry with Dad by Lucy Facenkova, age 11
Click on each poem to read.
seda land - bioproducts
What are bioproducts?
Bioproducts (materials from nature – often termed the bioeconomy) play a key role in our everyday lives. Our foods, clothes, building materials, furniture, books, fuels, medicines, cosmetics, and millions of other ‘things’ that we value all come from nature. However, because of ever increasing demand, and bearing in mind there is a limit to how much the world can produce, the linear (take-make-use-dispose) economy has pushed us well beyond our worlds capacity. Climate change, habitat destruction, biodiversity loss, food insecurity, poverty, and many of the other key issues we now face, have all been driven by linear thinking.
It’s time for positive and inclusive change - A time to reimagine. Sustainable is attainable and regeneration is possible, but we need start working with nature instead of against it, and that’s where the circular bioeconomy can help.
A circular bioeconomy will support and advance sustainable production of renewable resources from land, sea, and air, also including avoidable and unavoidable food wastes and their conversion into high value low impact feeds, foods, fibres, bio-based products, safe plastics, natural fertilisers, and bio-energy, as well as the related public goods. Effectively, we can close the loop, we can make sure the materials we take from nature are returned to nature, and if we get it right, these processes and products can enable environmental, ecological, and economic benefits at all societal scales.
Given that Scotland is a food and drink nation, and our natural capital is second to none, we are ideally placed as a nation to support and advance the circular bioeconomy. Together, we can reimagine.
If this is of interest to you, if you want to find out more about these processes, products, and services, and most importantly, what you can do to be part of the solution, please join SEDA and guests as we explore natural solutions to manmade problems.
OTHER PRODUCTS
CelluComp is a material science company producing Curran® - a nano-fibre product made from agri-food waste streams from root crop. As a mechanical enhancer with thickening properties, this product can be used to improve properties in many different products, such as paints and coatings and concrete.
Living Water is a pioneering design company applying ecological principles to solve contaminated water and waste problems and to transform it into a resource, such as compost, using a combination of natural processes.
Videos
If we are to transition our agriculture to be based in systems (or integrated) thinking, rather than segregated, reductionist monoculture, one good example of systems-based thinking in practice is a biodiverse ‘forest garden’. Martin Crawford of the UK’s Agroforestry Research Trust is one of the world’s best recognised practitioners. He gives us a tour of his garden in this video.
Contact SEDA Land if you would like your company listed here.
Useful links
The Future of Food: Sustainable protein strategies around the world
Prepared by: William Clark and Michael Lenaghan, June 2020
The Future of Food: New Lessons from the Latest Protein Strategies
Prepared by: William Clark, Zero Waste Scotland, August 2021
Accelerating the bioeconomy, Zero Waste Scotland
Report on the Biorefining Potential for Scotland, Zero Waste Scotland
Industrial Biotechnology Innovation Centre (IBioIC)
Interesting Scottish bioproduct companies
BUILDING MATERIALS
MAKAR is an ecological home builder, we use natural local materials together with advanced off-site manufacturing in an integrated whole-team approach.
IndiNature make natural fibre insulations that capture a net amount of carbon, and are made from local hemp crops and result in zero waste.
FOOD
BetaBugs is an insect genetics company developing and distributing black soldier fly breeds to the insect farming sector used as an alternative protein source in aquaculture, pork, and poultry feed.
Buck & Birch specialise in producing spirits and cocktails that use roots, shoots, petals and fruits foraged in wild around them.
Enough is food tech company that makes Abunda – a highly versatile mycoprotein that can be incorporated as a protein and fibre rich food ingredient.
Vertegrow Ltd. Produces fresh herbs and leafy greens indoors in vertical farms in a controlled environment without the use of pesticides.
Xanthella Ltd. designs and manufacturers photobioreactors to grow photosynthetic products on both lab and industrial scale.