How green is the desert?

HI-TRAC: The author's shorthand for Happiness Index, Infrastructure, Talent, Regulations, Access and Capital. The six pillars that make UAE a great place for a startup. This week's article is about infrastructure and access.
The Food and Agriculture Organization states that the demand for cereals, both for human consumption and animal feed is projected to be three billion tonnes by 2050. In developing countries, the increase in food production will need to more than double (2009 FAO article entitled "Global agriculture towards 2050"). Another set of heat-maps and graphs from the World Resources Institute projects water-stress levels all the way up to 2040 on account of factors such as global warming, urbanisation, shift in agriculture patterns towards animal-based food production and increasing populations in developing countries.
At the same time, the jury is out on what initially appeared to be promising solutions. Aquaponics, hydroponics, greenhouses, vertical farming, artificial light and similar. Take vertical farms as an example. Andrew Jenkins, research fellow at the School of Natural and Built Environment at Queen's University Belfast, indicates that a square metre patch of lettuce grown in a traditional greenhouse requires 250kWh of energy a year. In comparison, lettuce grown in a purpose built vertical farm needs an estimated 3,500kWh a year for the same square metre. Similar studies on the economics of vertical farms indicate that energy costs take up 40 per cent of the total cost of production. Which in turns leads to carbon emissions.
Very importantly, these methods of agriculture have not been able to provide the kind of calorie-rich food required on a daily basis. Just how much kale, cherry tomatoes, lettuce leaves and arugula do you need to consume on a daily basis to fulfill daily energy needs? A quick look at the day-long feeding patterns of grazing animals provides an indication. Cereals, root vegetables and other forms of energy rich foods such as bananas, nuts and fleshy fruits have not been produced in quantity in these forms of agriculture.
For true food security, energy-rich foods, including animal-based produce is the current standard.There is clearly a gap and a plethora of solutions are claiming to help solve the problem. Some of these are genuine and others are plainly opportunistic. There are at least a hundred TED Talks on the subject of the future of agriculture.
One possible solution that is more closely linked to traditional sustainable architecture has been brought to the Middle East by Atle Idland, founder, general manager and managing director of Desert Control Middle East. The proposition is that it does not require heavy upfront investment from farmers and is not energy intensive.
The solution was originally patented by Norwegian scientist Kristian Morten Olesen. Since 2005 he has been working on Liquid Nanoclay (LNC), a process to mix nano-particles of clay with water and bind them to sand particles in order to condition desert soil.
He says: "With this process we can change any poor-quality sandy soil into high-yield agricultural land in just seven hours."
According to him, the process involves creating a half-metre deep layer in the soil that turns it fertile. Olesen continues in the company he founded, Desert Control in Norway as the chief technology officer. The chairman and CEO is now Brage Johansen, who says: "I have worked with cleantech and greentech for a decade and I have never seen a solution with more global potential than this. Greening of desert areas will contribute to ten of the UN's seventeen Sustainability Goals."
Idland intends to take the LNC product to market as a service direct to end users via partners and distributors. The revenue will be from savings generated by using the LNC process. He confidently claims: "Our model will succeed because it covers the whole value chain - from mixing LNC in our unique machines, our patent protection in 64 countries including the UAE and more importantly because we are the only solution that can be applied on existing greenery."
Speaking about the investment and commercials, Idland says: "We are currently funded by angel investors, grants and shareholder contributions. Commercial pilots in the Middle East will bring in revenue and we aim to be profitable in the second quarter of 2019. We believe that we can rapidly expand because LNC is produced in situ in every location and country that we enter. Our raw materials are already available where we go - clay and water. For example, parks and golf courses can break-even on investment in seven to 12 months.
Idland states a larger purpose: "Of course we have a strong, savvy and committed team. But we want to create partnerships in the markets that we enter. That's one way of stopping the march of the desert and the resulting forced migrations stemming ultimately from food insecurity."
This thinking is reflected in Idland's choice of reading. Rumi's The Big Red Book. Poetry about the mysteries of love and friendships that really appeals to him.
Sanjiv is Founding Partner at Bridge DFS, a bespoke financial advisory firm (www.bridgeto.us). #hashnocash is a favourite term for the digital banking and financial services evangelist, practitioner, advisor. Views expressed are his own and do not reflect the newspaper's policy. He can be contacted at sanjiv@bridgeto.us