Circular Economy in Food Waste

Long description

Global crop losses due to insect pest infestations account for up to 30% of total crop-yield annually, almost rendering agricultural production system uneconomical. Our project involves the transformation of agri-food systems to yield higher revenue to smallholder farmers, by valorizing organic food waste as a substrate culture media in the production of a low-cost Bacillus thuringiensis biopesticide for crop protection. With growing urbanization and consequent waste generation Solid State fermentation process is a unique-method, that ferments organic food-waste in low-economic-environments, without need for complex-reactor-setup, less capital investment, transportation-costs, bioconversion pre-treatment, and high energy input. Since the cost of biological-substrates represents 30%–40% of total biopesticide production costs, the valorization of food-waste as substrate media reduces the biopesticide ultimate market price. Biopesticides produced through this novel Solid-State Fermentation process shall be produced at a micro and decentralized level by low-skilled women entrepreneurs. Due to the modest technical skills required for the Bt-biopesticide production process the project has the potential to produce affordable and in mass produced microbial biopesticide in multiple locations spread across the country. This decentralized system of small-scale biotechnology units is also an ideal option for farmers to exercise local pest control and viable pest management techniques, with potential to catalyze sustainable local agrarian development. Our technological solution is at TRL-6 with a developed Prototype.

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