Efita Newsletter 1076, dated August 14, 2023

Bpifrance Partners with the French Agriculture Ministry to Boost AgriTech Startups

In a significant move under the France 2030 plan, Bpifrance has teamed up again with the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Sovereignty to launch a 12-month program. This initiative will support 14 agroecology enterprises in refining their business models and setting them on a sustainable growth trajectory, considering the challenges of ecological and energy transition.
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The 14 companies participating in the Accélérateur Agroécologie include:

1. Abelio: A leader in decision-making tools for large-scale farming, aiming to expand its service range and accelerate hardware and software development. Website
2. Agriloops: Designed a circular economy-based farm model to produce prawns closer to consumers.
3. Agri-obtentions: An independent company focused on creating and valuing varietal innovations. Website
4. Doriane: Facilitates the digitization of research and experimentation in agronomy.
5. Elicir: Produces plant extract-based biostimulants to boost plant defense mechanisms.
6. Geochanvre: Manufactures a 100% natural material of local hemp fibers for agriculture, landscaping, packaging, and construction sectors.
7. Green Impulse: A startup developing biocontrol agents and biostimulants for agriculture and the food industry.
8. Hiphen: Designs systems and services for digital plant measurement.
9. Jurion: Manufactures fertilizers and biostimulants.
10. Multifolia: Produces and develops bio-based, bioactive products from sainfoin.
11. Mycea: Creates mushroom-based bio-solutions for agriculture.
12. Oligoplus: A biotech startup manufacturing and selling microorganisms to enhance plants’ nitrogen fixation efficiency.
13. Sabi Agri: Designs and manufactures electric tractors and robots.
14. VIF Systems: Designs and installs equipment of varying sizes for hydroponic plant growth in controlled environments to de-risk plant production.
See igrownews.com

How did we see the future yesterday??
See the incredible collection developed by Alain Fraval

How to Get a Voice-Controlled Version of ChatGPT on Android, With VoiceGPT, by Cheryl Vaughn, Jun 30, 2023

If you're an Android smartphone user looking for a powerful chatbot assistant that provides advanced features and can also work hands-free, look no further than VoiceGPT.

The app allows you to control ChatGPT via voice commands. Not only can you record your query with voice input, but you can also use it to perform a variety of tasks within the ChatGPT interface, even when you're on the go. Let's take a closer look at how you can set up and use VoiceGPT on your Android device.
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See makeuseof.com

Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing farming, especially amid labor shortage, by AGDAILY, June 12, 2023

Some say the world is at a new frontier — artificial intelligence’s technological frontier. And while self-driving Teslas seem a bit overkill for farms, cutting-edge technology in agriculture is revolutionizing how farmers produce food.
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One thing is for certain, ag automation is going to continue to grow. And with continued technological advances and automation, the agricultural workforce and how farmers grow food will continue to change.
See agdaily.com

Paysans dans un paysage / Peasants in a landscape, 1640, par Louis Le Nain (1593-1648), Washington, National Gallery of Art

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Paysans dans un paysage (détail) / Peasants in a landscape (detail), 1640, par Louis Le Nain (1593-1648), Washington, National Gallery of Art (détail)

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Tech Hub LIVE 2023

>> 5 Key Takeaways from Tech Hub LIVE 2023
According to the numbers, the 2023 version of Tech Hub LIVE was a great success. Over the course of the three-day event, more than 700 attendees were on hand to visit with more than 70 exhibitors and attend almost a dozen educational sessions.

>> Farmer Feedback: Tech Hub LIVE Panel Weighs In on Data Management, Ag Tech Adoption
Tech Hub LIVE attendees heard from some farmers in the field about topics such as autonomy, data management, and implementing climate-smart agriculture (CSA).

>> CropLife Ag Tech Awards of Excellence Presented at 2023 Tech Hub LIVE
Tech Hub LIVE 2023 honored four industry leaders this week with the CropLife Ag Tech Awards of Excellence, part of the Global Ag Tech Initiative. The awards program sheds light on some of the most important people and programs that have helped agriculture realize the full benefits of technology to improve agronomy, efficiency, and stewardship in crop production.

> Tech Hub LIVE: Empowering AgTech Innovation and Networking
A key recurring theme throughout the conference was the essential role of ag retailers in facilitating the adoption of new technologies among farmers. Attendees learned that farmers and retailers seek solutions that prioritize convenience, interoperability, and trust in well-established companies.
See techhublive.com

futurefarming.com

> Demonstration showcases the skills of new in-row weeders
A recent demonstration in The Netherlands showcased the capabilities of five smart in-row weeders.

> Agro Innovation Lab starts Seed Innovation Challenge
We are interested in all innovations that can be applied in the areas of revolutionizing seed production. Take the chance and present your innovation to a wide range of industry stakeholders and win prices such as € 10.000,- POC-Money.
Apply now!

> Drones: ‘Get a professional opinion when buying a drone’
Farmers who want to purchase an application drone, should inform themselves well.

> Sustainable agriculture: McKinsey & Company: sustainable agriculture at a crossroads
McKinsey & Company released new research revealing that sustainable agriculture practices offer a return on investment (ROI).

> Electric tractor: Swedish institute built tractor Drever 120 with battery swap system
The electric autonomous agriculture machine Drever 120 was shown during the Borgeby Fältdagar in Sweden.

> Acquisition: Tesla might acquire startup Wiferion
Tesla is rumored to buy Freiburg-based startup Wiferion.

> Special focus: What’s new in our Ag-drone buying guide 2023/2024?

> Drones: What’s new in our Ag-drone buying guide 2023/2024?
Future Farming introduces an impressive range of new application drones in its drone catalogue this year.

> Investment: Source.ag receives investment to support growers with AI
Source.ag, AI provider for greenhouse growers, announced the successful completion of its Series A extension financing.

> Crowdfunding: UK Electrical weed control firm RootWave to open crowdfunding
eWeeding pioneer RootWave is set to launch its first eWeeder within agriculture via private investment complemented by crowdfunding.

> Isobus-errors and this might solve it – Isobus-test part 3
We have tested seven different tractors brands on how they work with Isobus and prescription maps. Along the way, we had some struggles and error. This is the third article on the topic of testing Isobus.

> Powdery mildew: UV and robot technology prevent powdery mildew in horticulture
CleanLight’s UV technology with Antobot’s autonomous robot platform allows UV-C to effectively prevent powdery mildew.

> Drying grain: Radio waves to dry grain by Dry Max Solutions
Dry Max Solutions uses radio waves (generated by electricity) to dry grain at room temperature.

> Advertorial: Join us at #WorldAgriTech in London on September 26-27!
Bringing together 900+ growers, agribusiness leaders, startups and investors under one roof at the InterContinental, London, The O2 to discuss innovation and financing for nature positive, resilient agriculture and food systems. Expect start-up discovery in an all-new start-up arena, partnerships & investment opportunities, and plenty of C-Suite networking.
Use Future Farming’s exclusive discount code FARMFRIEND to save £459 on your ticket! (offer available until August 10)

> Driverless tractors: Trimble’s new Path Planning Tech: paving the way to driverless tractors
Trimble has recently introduced Path Planning Technology. In an exclusive interview, Future Farming delves into the benefits and practical gains.

> VDI conference: VDI conference: is the time ripe for automation and robotics?
For the fourth edition of the VDI conference, some 40 international specialists on automation and robotics in agriculture gathered in Düsseldorf.

> Building a carbon market – an innovative farm business
Although carbon markets are talked about a lot in agriculture, there is still work to be done to fully realize them so that farmers rightfully gain another revenue stream as they continually capture carbon in their soils. A project at Hebert Grain Ventures in Canada.

> GPS-Technology: German dealer delivers gps-technology ready to go
Getting the most out of your gps-technology is not that evident. The features and possibilities are almost endless and that can result in inefficient use and even frustrations.

> Small robots: Small Robots’ first commercial sale to centre for robotics and AI
Small Robot Company announced its first commercial sale to the National Robotarium in Edinburgh, Scotland.

> SprayHub: Lemken SprayHub front tank with section control and liquid fertilizer injection functionality
With the integration of the innovative SprayKit, farmers can now experience improved efficiency and substantial chemical savings during hoeing and row spraying.

> Herbicide alternative: ‘The technology is exciting, it provides an alternative to herbicides’
The XPower from AGXTEND produce a high voltage current that is applied directly to plants via a series of electrodes in an applicator unit.

> Field robots: Swedish Ekobot WEAI Works on New Platform
The weed control robot, Swedish Ekobot WEAI, demonstrated its weed control capabilities in an onion crop during a Dutch field demonstration. The robot showcased several improvements as it progresses towards a completely new model set for release in 2025.

> Tackling weeds integrally, these are the options
Keeping crops free of weeds without the use of herbicides is becoming increasingly difficult. Weed control will require a more integrated approach in the future. In other words, a combination of chemistry with mechanical weed control.

> Harvest robot: EBC leads Seed Round into Raspberry picking Robot developer
Elbow Beach Capital has committed £1.5m to an ongoing £2m+ fundraise.

> Terminal: Cemis 1200 simplifies the management of reference tracks and tramlines
Claas has added new functions and features to its Cemis 1200 Universal Terminal.

> Climate change: Assimila and CottonConnect address health issues caused by climate change
CottonConnect and Assimila, supported by the European Space Agency’s EO Science for Society Programme, have set up Combat Against Climate Change on Cotton Communities, known as C5.

> Expanded API: Expandend API now available for the Trimble Agriculture Cloud
Trimble announced the release of its flexible API for the Trimble Agriculture Cloud.

> Environment: Who wants to work in a robotised and digitalised environment?
In the coming decades, employees will work in an environment that is increasingly robotised, mechanized and digitalised.

> Harvest: Mitigating losses during harvest by using AI-based software
US Company Farmwave has created AI based software that monitors harvest loss autonomously without stopping.

> Cybersecurity: Is ag adapting to changing cyber threats?
High profile cyber-attacks against agriculture and food businesses have generated significant concern and media coverage in recent years.

> Measuring grass: Partnership announce technology that enables farmers to measure grass from space
Aspia Space and Origin Digital have developed a new AI solution that uses ClearSky imagery to estimate grass height.

> Pest detection: Pest and disease detection capability added to robotic platform
Arugga AI Farming has signed a commercial collaboration agreement with ViewNetic.

See futurefarming.com

La charrette / The cart, par Louis Le Nain (1593-1648), musée du Louvre

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La visite à la grand-mère / The visit to the grandmother (~1645-1650), par Louis Le Nain (1593-1648), Saint-Pétersbourg, musée de l'Ermitage

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Global ag tech initiative

> Ag Technology Helping Crop Yields Grow Despite Climate Change
Here are the most prominent technologies making strides in agriculture and saving farms by protecting yields and profit margins.

> Tech Hub LIVE Keynote Presentation: How NASA Is Supporting a Revolution in Ag Tech
Dr. Alyssa K. Whitcraft, Executive Director of NASA Acres and Deputy Director of NASA Harvest, discussed NASA’s role in helping build ag tech is for the public good.

> Voices of Women in Ag Tech: Ambassador Profile on Kathleen Glass
We bring you exclusive insights from our inspirational ambassadors and other women leading the way forward in ag tech.

> Platform Ecosystems: Enabling Agriculture to Invert the Firm
The benefits of collaborating through data have become too valuable to ignore, says contributor Reinder Prins.

> Intelinair, Eiwa Form Research Collaboration, Distribution Agreement
Eiwa will license drone analytic technology of corn and soybean fields from Intelinair on Eiwa Vault’s analytics library.

> Venture Capital Takes Risk in Ag Technology So Farmers Don’t Have To
Having innovations vetted, shepherded, and mentored by proven leaders with deep hands-on ag expertise helps shield farmers from that risk.

> Voices of Women in Ag Tech: Ambassador Profile on Amy Asmus
We bring you exclusive insights from our inspirational ambassadors and other women leading the way forward in ag tech.

> Ever.Ag’s New Campaign Showcases How They Simplify the Intricacies of Modern Agriculture
The agricultural tech company tapped VSA Partners to make this complex story clear.

> Women in Ag Tech Ambassadors: 'Sky's the Limit' for New Initiative
Women in Ag Tech Ambassadors Aurea Rivera and Carolyne Vowell share why they are so excited about the future of the program.

> Agrivoltaics: Pairing Regenerative Farming and Solar Energy Production to Improve Urban Resilience
To improve regional food systems in Inland Southern California, FFAR is awarding Pitzer College a $1.8 million investment in agrivoltaics research.

> Voices of Women in Ag Tech: Ambassador Profile on Jaymie Forrest
We bring you exclusive insights from our inspirational ambassadors and other women leading the way forward in ag tech.

> Tech Company Honeywell Collaborates With Fruit Farmer Moleda To Sustainably Grow Produce
Honeywell’s process controls enable Moleda to offer a pesticide-free solution for growing plants for consumption.

See globalagtechinitiative.com

La France moins bien notée que les USA (A-) / France (A-) rated lower than the USA

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Villes vivables / City Liveability Index

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Retour sur la fabrication des batteries / Battery laggard

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Notre dépendance à l'uranium / Radioactive dependency

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Début d'immigration au Japon ? Resident Foreigners in Japan

05 - 14/08/2023

Agfundernews.com

> FDA food traceability architect Frank Yiannas joins IoT company Wiliot to tackle ‘the Achilles heel’ of the food industry, by Jennifer Marston

> Data snapshot: India farmtech investment ‘relatively strong’ despite a harsh fundraising environment, by Jennifer Marston

> Cover crop usage steady but still ‘only a fraction’ of total acreage in the US, says Purdue’s latest farmer survey, By Jennifer Marston

> Corporate-startup collaboration is vital for the growth of Latin American agrifoodtech, say GLOCAL panelists, By Andrés Engler

See agfundernews.com

Less struggle, more compromises?

In this article from The Guardian, a centre-left British newspaper, it is about Brexit that as a Frenchman, I deeply regret.

Today, Brexit is not questioned by our British friends despite deplorable economic results. That is not the main thing: Brexit is first and foremost a divisive and polarizing project, giving a simplistic answer to a whole series of complicated questions. In this sense it is a toxic project because it is binary.

The problem is that we cannot do without divisions, formerly "secular" against "clerical", "conservative" against "progressive"... In agriculture today, there are many divisions: the need to produce more and better to feed the world, animal welfare, pesticides, GMOs, meat production, water reserves, possibility of fixing carbon in the fields… give rise to endless discussions.

It seems to me that on all agricultural and agri-food or environmental issues (and not only), we should try to get out of the polarization of opinions which is encouraged by extremists and which will lead us to no good.

Can you change a Brexit state of mind? By Tim Adams, 13 Aug 2023

If departing the EU has failed to deliver, why is the UK still so divided? Seven years on, we ask behavioural psychologists if cognitive dissonance can be overcome.
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Hughes’s book came out in 2019 at the height of “no deal is better than a bad deal” insanity. If he were to add to it now, he suggests, it would be as a textbook case of “polarisation theory” and the ways in which the three-word sloganeering of “Brexit means Brexit” and “get Brexit done” has been repurposed to provide the illusion of simplicity to other very complex issues – “stop the boats” etc. The primary division of Brexit has extended into “clusters of interwoven views” on the climate crisis, vaccination and immigration, feeding everything into the same blunt binary.

One result of that, he suggests, is that Brexit has become a classic example of toxicity. “If there is something especially scandalous in our own lives or traumatic, we will try not to mention it. It just brings too much up. People talk about the ‘Ming vase strategy’ for Labour and Brexit [the idea that they must not smash their precious majority]. The political logic is that this event was still so painful for people that you could lose half the electorate as a result of one soundbite.”

If there is a way through this, he suggests, it is to break down the myths of us and them. “Brexit was obviously never the single will of the people, but also the will of leavers and the will of remainers are very far from homogenous. Politicians need to find ways of foregrounding the diversity of views that people had and have, even if some of them might be very ugly. They need to show the illusion of simple polarisation.”

Preventing this, he says, is the fact that Brexit has brought into the political mainstream “all the reasoning errors that people make”. Polarity acts against nuance, and undermines the middle ground. “Both sides start to look at the other as somehow irretrievably deranged. And when you pathologise the other side, there’s no point in reaching out to them.” As a result, he suggests, “People who have the opportunity to address political challenges are no longer seeking to control the divisions in society, they are trying to maximise them for their own ends.”

Does he see an end to that polarity?

“It would require politicians and commentators to take some of the heat out of the arguments,” he says. “That might take a generation, or it might be one of these cyclical trends.” For the time being, our Brexity brains are it seems here to stay.
See theguardian.com

Le puits / The well, 1641, par Louis Le Nain (1593-1648), Collection particulière

As the Climate Crisis Escalates, Here Are 18 Food and Ag Solutions

Climate change is here, and the news is dire. We share our recent stories of the many food system innovators finding ways to mitigate damage, increase resilience, and adapt to our ever-changing realities.

his summer, the world experienced the hottest week on record, with seven consecutive days of off-the-charts temperatures, and many places are experiencing other extremes, including deadly floods, droughts, and wildfires. These severe conditions have a tremendous impact on our food system, affecting everything from crop yields to working conditions on farms.

While agriculture is a major contributor to climate change, it can also play a significant role in mitigating the impacts—and we at Civil Eats make a concerted effort to focus on solutions in our coverage. So far this year, we have shared numerous stories of creative thinkers across the food system pursuing efforts to reduce damage, increase resilience, and adapt to the new and ever-changing realities.
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See civileats.com

Ghana Census of Agriculture: 5 Key Insights, Challenges, and Recommendations to Boost Agricultural Growth, by K. Afrane Okese, July 29, 2023

The Ghana Census of Agriculture (GCA), conducted by the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) in 2017/18, shed light on the state of agriculture in the country. Despite being an essential sector for the nation’s economy, the report reveals that agriculture in Ghana is primarily rural and lacks innovation and modernization. Let’s delve into the key insights backed by figures from the report to understand the challenges facing Ghana’s agricultural sector and explore some recommendations for its growth and development.
See nobowa.com

A new HIV drug is coming to Africa – it could be game-changing, By Verity Bowman, 5 July 2023

Experts believe a new long-lasting version of PrEP has the potential to dramatically change the course of the HIV epidemic in Africa.
See telegraph.co

Combien d'heures de travail vous permettent d'acheter... How many hours of works it take to earn...

Moins de vin et de bière, plus de cocktails / Switching from beer and wine to spirits

Combien de millionaires avez-vous en plus ou en moins ? / Have you more or less millionaires ?

Mega-fires force us to change how we fight

Today’s mega-fires are so intense that they can render standard firefighting useless: leaping across firebreaks, creating heat too intense to approach and vapourizing water dropped from above before it can curb the flames. “It’s like spitting on a campfire,” says wildland-fire researcher Mike Flannigan. Wildfire specialists are changing their focus to prevention, mitigation and preparedness. But in a warming world, “there’s no technofix, no silver bullet or vaccine”, says Flannigan. “We’re in for the long haul. Dante’s circles of hell — we’re probably on level four and we’ve got a way to go.”
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Portugal, Spain, Italy and Greece may see fewer forest fires in future, because their increasingly arid climates will limit the growth of vegetation. Trees will not have enough water and enough time between fires to regrow to their former height. Land will transition to scrub. “The real problem,” says Fernandes, “will be in regions like southern France, or Germany or Poland, because they have biomass. And that biomass will dry out.”

With a placid lake and a few kegs of beer, the fire camp in Poland seemed like a benign setting. But the weather was hot and dry, and already the fire was not conforming to humans’ plans. In one exercise, after the instructor lit the ground deliberately, a group failed to dig a sufficiently rigorous firebreak and the burning spread deep into the soil. Volunteers were putting out the fire late into the night.

The next day, we spoke about how firefighters can become overconfident when they fight fires in the landscapes they know best. We spoke of the risks from damaged trees falling. We marvelled at videos of wildfires and prescribed burns. It struck me that the men and women at the camp were thankfully in for the long haul. Around us, the pine canopies were green. But we all knew that the future was orange.
See ft.com

We Will Never Run Out of Resources. The supply of minerals is theoretically finite, but human knowledge and creativity are limitless. By By Marian L. Tupy and David Deutsch

The world’s population has increased eightfold since 1800, and standards of living have never been higher. Despite increases in consumption, and contrary to the prophecies of generations of Malthusians, the world hasn’t run out of a single metal or mineral. In fact, resources have generally grown cheaper relative to income over the past two centuries. Even on the largest cosmic scale, resources may well be limitless.
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See humanprogress.org

Eight Centuries of Increasing Food Abundance in England: Baking, by Harry Backhouse

Baking products have become much more abundant for skilled and unskilled workers alike.
See humanprogress.org

La famille de la laitière / Milkmaids's Family, circa 1641, par Louis Le Nain (1593-1648), Saint-Pétersbourg, musée de l'Ermitage

La famille heureuse / The happy family (1642), par Louis Le Nain (1593-1648), Paris, musée du Louvre

Progressive gloom ignores a marvelous historical economic measure, by By George F. Will, Columnist, July 19, 2023, The Washington Post

Progressivism’s name connotes confidence in mankind’s ability (guided by progressives) to progress. Yet, progressivism often seems pessimistic. This encourages Americans’ low pain threshold and high capacity for complaining, traits unbecoming in a populace many of whose hardy predecessors walked to Oregon.

Progressives’ obsessing about race is not only undiminished by decades of improvements in race relations (e.g., approval of interracial marriages was 4 percent in 1958 and 94 percent in 2021), it is inversely related to improvements. There are vocal interests with large political and lucrative financial stakes (e.g., the “diversity” consultants industry) in the myth of nonprogress. Similarly, portions of the government have an interest in insisting on its failure, despite trillions spent, to substantially improve economic equality: Hence the government’s practice of not counting transfer payments and tax rebates (the earned income tax credit) as income for those of modest means. Counting those augmentations of income would reveal that the 2021 poverty rate was not 11.6 percent, but 2 to 3 percent.

Inaccurate assessments of present conditions relative to the past fuel grievance politics and forebodings about the future. A corrective for these is the concept of time-price. Consider this from Yale University economist William D. Nordhaus, a Nobel laureate, writing in the 1990s:

“One modern hundred-watt incandescent bulb burning for three hours each night would produce 1.5 million lumen-hours of light per year. At the beginning of the last century, obtaining this amount of light would have required burning seventeen thousand candles, and the average worker would have had to toil almost one thousand hours to earn the dollars to buy the candles. In the modern era, with a compact fluorescent bulb, the 1.5 million lumen-hours would need twenty-two kilowatt-hours, which can be bought for about 10 minutes’ work by the average worker.”

In “Life After Capitalism,” George Gilder, citing Marian L. Tupy and Gale L. Pooley in the Cato Institute’s volume “Superabundance,” writes that “between 1980 and 2022, workers have been able to buy some 300 percent more goods and services with their hours and minutes.” The secret sauce is applied knowledge. Economist Thomas Sowell is right: “The cavemen had the same natural resources at their disposal as we have today.” They lacked only know-how. As did the nail-maker before the Industrial Revolution, making one nail a minute. Today’s nail maker can produce 3,500 per minute.

“We buy things with money,” Tupy and Pooley write, “but we pay for them with time.” And “time prices can be calculated on any product with any currency at any time and any place. This means you can compare the time price of bread in France in 1850 to the time price of oranges in New York in 2021.”

In 1902, a Sears Roebuck 53-cent hammer cost almost four hours of blue-collar work. Today, Home Depot’s basic hammer ($6.50) costs about 12 minutes of that work. Walmart’s $98 bicycle costs nominally 720 percent more than Sears’s $11.95 bicycle in 1910, but blue-collar hourly compensation has increased 18,450 percent. So, the time-price of a basic bike has fallen 95.6 percent.

At the mid-20th-century dawn of the shipping container era, the first ship carried 58 containers. Today’s largest ships can carry almost 24,000, which end to end would extend more than 90 miles. In 1956, hand-loading cargo at U.S. ports cost $5.86 per ton; 50 years later, 16 cents. By such efficiencies, time — the precious and intractable scarcity in an era of multiplying abundances — is restored to us to use to demonstrate the fecundity of freedom.

In “Superabundance,” Tupy and Pooley say that although the Homo sapiens species is 300,000 years old, there has been economic growth for only about 0.08 percent of that time. Global income per person per day (measured in 2011 U.S. dollars) was about $2 when Caesar Augustus reigned, and had grown to only $2.80 when Thomas Jefferson was president.

Economic growth has not just coincided with, it has been caused by, population growth — more brains, more trade in knowledge. There are, however, those who consider people a plague, and who favor ever-larger regulatory government to prevent ruinous human ingenuity and planet-threatening dynamism. Such people resent the time-price metric of economic (and hence social) progress because it measures the results of millions of unplanned and uncoordinated decisions, cooperations, inventions and refinements.

The metric frustrates those who believe, and who benefit from, pessimistic predictions that the supposedly retrograde present is a harbinger of a stagnant future of scarcities — unless government plans a better future. The time-price metric blows to smithereens the idea that progressivism is conducive to progress.
See washingtonpost.com

Birds With Benefits: How Eagles Are Helping Dairy Farmers in Western Washington, by Rebecca Dzombak, July 24, 2023

Bald eagles and other raptors clean up fields for free and scare off pest birds like starlings. “You support the wildlife, the wildlife supports you,” one farmer says.
See civileats.com

Être en mesure ou non de sortir 400 $US / To be able or not to spend 400 $US

Regenerative farming practices are a 'transition for farmers': Nestlé North America CEO

Food and beverage company Nestlé is changing the way it harvests its ingredients by investing in regenerative farming practices to reduce its carbon footprint and maximize crop yields. Nestlé North America CEO Steve Presley joins Yahoo Finance Live to discuss inflation's impact on its consumer brands, where its growth drivers are, and its plans for sustainable farming.
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See finance.yahoo.com

Shaky ground: A company called Indigo is paying farmers to trap carbon in their soils. Some researchers say the climate benefits are dubious, by Gabriel Popkin, 27 Jul 2023

My remark (GW): the support of regenerative ag by big companies does not seem please the author who does not think that big companies may be honest and may have a positive contribution to climate change mitigation.

Lance Unger has been doing things a little differently lately on his farm near the Wabash River in southwestern Indiana. After last fall’s harvest, rather than leaving his fields fallow, he sowed some of them with cover crops of oats and sorghum that grew until the winter cold killed them off. And before planting corn and soybeans this spring, Unger drove a machine to shove aside yellowing stalks—last season’s “trash,” as he calls it—rather than tilling the soil and plowing the stalks under.

For these efforts, a Boston-based company called Indigo paid Unger $26,232 in late 2021 and an even larger chunk late last year. That’s how much an emerging market values the hundreds of tons of carbon that, in theory at least, Unger yanked out of the atmosphere with his cover crops or left in the soil by not tilling. Slowing climate change isn’t a priority for him, he says, and it hasn’t been easy to change his longstanding farming practices. But he says the money made it worthwhile. “I need to see economic benefits.”

Indigo also made money in the deal. It took a 25% cut of the bundle of credits it then sold at about $40 per ton of captured carbon. Buyers were companies such as IBM, JPMorgan Chase, and Shopify, which were looking to offset greenhouse gas emissions from their operations and bolster their green bona fides.

For advocates, the exchange represents a beautiful marriage of idealism and capitalism in the service of an urgently needed climate solution. “Are we going to wait for the planet to catch on fire?” asks Chris Harbourt, Indigo’s chief strategy officer. If applied across the globe’s farmland, soil-based carbon capture could offset between 5% and 15% of greenhouse gas emissions every year, according to an influential 2004 study by Ohio State University soil scientist Rattan Lal. “I and many other scientists have a lot of confidence that we can build carbon in soil,” says Deborah Bossio, lead soil scientist for the Nature Conservancy.

Millions of dollars of soil credits have already been sold, and companies like Indigo are ramping up aggressively to claim a piece of an industry that could overall be worth $50 billion by 2030, according the consulting firm McKinsey & Company. With other carbon markets based on planting or preserving trees facing accusations of peddling questionable or outright fraudulent credits, some buyers may see soil as a safer option.

But as the industry heats up, so does the skepticism. Some researchers say the science of how soils store and release carbon is too uncertain to support an industry claiming to be cooling the planet. They accuse companies like Indigo of exaggerating the benefits of their programs.
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Indigo’s leaders say these studies will add confidence, but waiting years for results to come in before launching their marketplace would have meant a disastrous delay. “We need solutions right now to reverse climate change,” Harbourt says. In December 2022, Indigo said it had paid more than 400 U.S. farmers $3.7 million for regenerative practices implemented on more than 170,000 hectares. Next year, it hopes to ramp up to 2.2 million hectares under contract. The chemical and seed giant Corteva has enrolled more than 400,000 hectares farmed by its customers in Indigo’s program.
.../...
See science.org

Canadian researchers start a soil carbon measurement project, by Matteo Cavallito, 22 May 2023

An annual project in the state of Saskatchewan will collect data on soil carbon occurrence. The goal is to assess soil effects and generate measurable and verifiable emission credits.

Assessing precisely how much carbon is stored in the soil and how it changes over time. That’s the goal of a project launched in Canada by a group of researchers from the Universities of Saskatchewan and Guelph and other institutions and companies, including Hebert Grain Ventures, that will take place on a 32,000-acre plot near Moosomin in south-central Canada.

The initiative is supported by CANZA (Canadian Alliance for Net-Zero Agri-Food) recently founded by Royal Bank of Canada, in partnership with a number of companies such as Maple Leaf Foods, Nutrien and Loblaws to support farmers in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The research, The Western Producer website reported, will last 12 months. And it will involve survey techniques such as remote sensing and spectroscopy, a tool which is known to have interesting applications in soil analysis.
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See resoilfoundation.org

Soil organic carbon stocks potentially at risk of decline with organic farming expansion

Organic farming is often considered a strategy that increases croplands’ soil organic carbon (SOC) stock. However, organic farms currently occupy only a small fraction of cropland, and it is unclear how the full-scale expansion of organic farming will impact soil carbon inputs and SOC stocks.

Here we use a spatially explicit biogeochemical model to show that the complete conversion of global cropland to organic farming without the use of cover crops and plant residue (normative scenario) will result in a 40% reduction of global soil carbon input and 9% decline in SOC stock.

An optimal organic scenario that supports widespread cover cropping and enhanced residue recycling will reduce global soil carbon input by 31%, and SOC can be preserved after 20 yr following conversion to organic farming. These results suggest that expanding organic farming might reduce the potential for soil carbon sequestration unless appropriate farming practices are implemented.
See nature.com

The limits of our personal experience and the value of statistics

It’s tempting to believe that we can simply rely on personal experience to develop our understanding of the world.

But that’s a mistake. The world is large, and we can experience only very little of it personally. To see what the world is like, we need to rely on other means: carefully-collected global statistics.

Of course, our personal interactions are part of what informs our worldview. Every time we meet people and hear about their lives, we add one more perspective. This is no doubt a great way to see the world and expand our understanding — but we can’t lose sight of the limitations of this.

This article aims to remind us how little we can learn about our society through personal interactions alone, and how valuable statistics are in helping us build the rest of the picture.

New Sustainable Development Goals Tracker

We’re very excited to have launched our new Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Tracker, where you can monitor global and country-by-country progress toward the United Nations SDGs.

The SDGs are targets for global development that were adopted in 2015, which all countries have agreed to work toward achieving by 2030.

What are the SDGs all about?

SDG 15, as one example, is about conserving life on land, by sustainably managing forests, combatting desertification, halting and reversing land degradation, and halting biodiversity loss.

All together, the SDGs cover many areas of human life, life on our planet, and our planet itself.

We'll be highlighting all of the SDGs in a series of posts on our social media over the next two months, leading up to the UN SDG Summit 2023 on 18–19 September — so check us out there, too!

Economic Growth

Good health, nutrition, a place to live, education… Many of the things we care about most require goods and services produced by people: the care that nurses and doctors give; the food we eat; the homes we live in; the education that teachers provide.

Economic growth means an increase in the quantity or quality of the many goods and services that people produce.

The history of economic growth is the history of how societies left widespread poverty behind. In places that have seen substantial economic growth, few people now go without food, almost all have access to education, and parents rarely suffer the loss of a child. The work of historians shows this was not the case in the past.

Similarly, the history of economic growth is also the history of how large global inequalities emerged — in nutrition, health, education, basic infrastructure, and many other dimensions. In some countries, the quantity and quality of the goods and services underpinning these outcomes grew substantially over the past two centuries; in others, they did not.

Of course, economic growth does not reflect everything we value. On Our World in Data we provide thousands of measures that try to capture these many other dimensions, covering topics such as biodiversity, pollution, time use, human rights, and democracy.

Economic growth is, however, central to shaping people's overall living conditions. Just as in the past, the future of global poverty and inequality will depend on whether, and which, countries are able to substantially grow their economy. As such, it is one of the most important aspects of understanding our world today and what is possible for the future.

On our new page, you can find all our data, visualizations, and writing on Economic Growth.

Homicides

Homicides — when people intentionally and illegally kill others — are the most serious crime.

They are a common cause of death globally and a leading cause in some countries. They not only rob the victims of their lives: they also hurt the victims’ friends and families and harm the broader community.

Our new page provides data and research on how frequent homicides are, how this differs across countries, and how their frequency is changing over time.

We’ve also published a new article on homicide data that describes how sources differ and when to use which source.

Tourism

Tourism has massively increased in recent decades. Aviation has opened up travel from domestic to international. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of international visits had more than doubled since 2000.

Tourism can be important for both the travelers and the people in the countries they visit. For visitors, traveling can increase their understanding of and appreciation for people in other countries and their cultures. And in many countries, many people rely on tourism for their income. In some, it is one of the largest industries.

But tourism also has externalities: it contributes to global carbon emissions and can encroach on local environments and cultures.

On our new page, you can find data and visualizations on the history and current state of tourism across the world.

Malaria: One of the leading causes of child deaths, but progress is possible and you can contribute to it

We do not have to live in a world in which 1,320 children die every day from a disease that is preventable — malaria. Malaria is one of the leading causes of child death.

We know that progress against malaria is possible because it was once prevalent in many parts of the world that are now free of it today.

How have we made this progress, and how can we continue? Economic development has played a key role, but this is a slow process.

There are opportunities right now to protect people from malaria — with the use of insecticide-treated bed nets. This simple and cheap technology has saved millions of lives in the last few years.

As we explain in the article, each of us can individually contribute to this progress right now by making a donation to the organizations that are achieving this change — for example by following the donation recommendations at GiveWell.org.

Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson are on a camping trip

In the middle of the night, Holmes nudges Watson awake, and says, "Watson, look up at the sky and tell me what you see."

"I see millions of stars, my dear Holmes."

"And what do you infer from these stars?"

"Well, a number of things," he says, lighting his pipe:

Astronomically, I observe that there are millions of galaxies and billions of stars and planets.

Astrologically, I observe that Saturn is in Leo.

Horologically, I deduce that the time is approximately a quarter past three.

Meteorologically, I expect that the weather will be fine and clear.

Theologically, I see that God is all-powerful, and man, his creation, small and insignificant.

What about you, Holmes?"

"Watson, you fool. Someone has stolen our tent!"