Digital technology, agricultural technology, AI, and biotechnology applications in food and farming.
I. “You Have Been Penalised and Demoted to Clerk” “You have been penalised and demoted to a clerk.” A few months ago, Ms L, a store manager at a Bianlifeng branch in Beijing, suddenly received a message to this effect on her handheld terminal. As part of her daily routine,…
Is genetically modified rice truly safe? Why can it not be commercialised without scrutiny? On 18 April, a Philippine court ruled that the commercial promotion of Golden Rice is unconstitutional, once again reflecting society’s cautious stance towards GM staple crops. The court also ordered the Philippine government to revoke the…
“Save our rice!” “IRRI, get out!” In October 2023, these furious chants echoed across several Filipino farmer protest rallies. The demonstrations took direct aim at the Sixth International Rice Congress, hosted by the International Rice Research Institute (hereafter IRRI). Against the backdrop of climate change and the drive to cut…
Picture a plate of vegetables before you, not harvested by muddy-handed farmers out in the fields, but cultivated as a technological feat within a vertical farming tower built of metal and plastic. How would you react? In 2018, while in Berlin, I found myself utterly captivated by the vertical farming…
Earlier this year, four years after moving to the Netherlands, my partner and I finally rented a hectare of land in Utrecht province, and I began working on my farm. Before I decided to set up a farm, I completed placements at several small organic farms in the Netherlands. During…
I. Tang and Wen make their home in a valley threaded by a stream. The watercourse is modest, running at about half a metre deep, but it flows all year round and is even marked on maps. Heading south, it merges with several other waterways before feeding into the Ohio…
Author’s Note My partner, Mr Panghu, and I live in a small town in the Great Lakes region of the American Midwest. The local farmers’ market was founded nearly thirty years ago, and we have witnessed over a decade of its history. This series of short pieces aims to document…
