Black Soldier Fly Larvae - New Fish Food?

THE Twynam Group says it will build and operate 20 fly factories across Australasia to produce fish food after being granted licences by waste-to-protein recycler AgriProtein Technologies. 

The fly factories will produce industrial volumes of the insect-based feed MagMeal for use in farming and aquaculture as an alternative to fish-meal. 

AgriProtein managing director David Drew said the use of Magmeal would relieve pressure on dwindling wild fish stocks and contribute to food security across the region.

Mr Drew said flies would be reared on existing organic waste. When operational, the 20 factories combined would be able to recycle 1.8 million tonnes of waste a year.

 Fly larvae are a natural source of protein for fish.

“Today marks another step in the fight to replace fish-meal in aquaculture and animal feeds – the start of a global roll-out of the only tried and tested, commercially-viable alternative,” Mr Drew said.

Twynam Group chief executive officer Johnny Kahlbetzer said Twynam was always seeking new ways to make a difference in sustainable agriculture and energy production.  

“Working with AgriProtein is helping to resolve two sustainability issues, waste management and depleting fishery resources,” Mr Kahlbetzer said.  

“We’re looking forward to pioneering this new sustainable sector with them.”

 The fly factories will produce industrial volumes of the insect-based feed MagMeal.

AgriProtein will announce the agreement at today’s award presentation of the Australian government-backed Blue Economy Challenge 2016. The company won a $450,000 award for its industrially-scalable solution to the depletion of fish stocks in the Indian Ocean.

Mr Drew said the government had launched the Blue Economy Challenge as a project to re-engineer aquaculture.  

“So we’re investing our award in building the scale needed to do that, chiefly in research, market-making and product development,” he said. “Huge thanks to the good people of Australia for this vote of confidence, which will help us fulfil our mission to find a better way to feed the world.”

Fly larvae are a natural source of protein for fish and other animals. MagMeal is described as a high-protein feed made from the dried, milled and de-fatted larvae of the black soldier fly (Hermetia illucens). Unlike houseflies, black soldier flies avoid human habitations and are not considered a pest.

Using an armada of 8.5 billion flies, a standard AgriProtein factory takes in 250t of organic matter per day and produces nearly 5000 tonnes of MagMeal and 2000t of MagOil per year to replace the use of fish-meal.

Mr Drew said the licencing covered the set-up and operation of fly factories - including the technology required to separate organic from non-organic waste used to feed the flies and their larvae.
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Black Soldier Fly larvae have been investigated for this type of option for a number of years, mainly with strong advocates in the USA.
It can offer a real solution for dealing with organic wastes and creating alternative value for the larvae as a food.

Original article on Queensland Country Life

A New Paradigm for Urban Sanitation - An Urgent Need

Addressing the urban sanitation crisis: Time for a radical shift

SUBMITTED BY MARTIN GAMBRILL ON WED, 11/16/2016

Co-authors:

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation – Jan Willem Rosenboom
The University of Leeds – Barbara Evans
Emory University – Christine Moe & Eduardo Perez
The World Bank – Sophie Trémolet, Valérie Sturm, Clémentine Stip
WaterAid – Andrés Hueso
Plan International – Darren Saywell

Children in Maputo, Mozambique
Photo credit:
Isabel Blackett/The World Bank

A successful city is economically and culturally vibrant, healthy, safe, clean and attractive to business and tourism, and provides quality of life to its citizens. This vision is appealing but remains hard to realize as developing cities have to cope with changing demographics and climate with limited financial and human resources. The sustainable development goals have given a new impetus for cities to be inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable (SDG11), ensure citizens’ health and wellbeing (SDG3) and secure access to sustainable water and sanitation services (SDG6).

World Toilet Day on November 19th is the opportunity to remind ourselves of a few facts and propose a set of guiding principles for a renewed and revitalized urban sanitation agenda.

Many cities struggle to deal with the most basic municipal task of managing human excreta. Some are effectively “drowning” in human waste. Urban population growth continuously outpaces gains in improved sanitation access and, globally, nearly one billion people live in urban slums with poor or no sanitation. Only 26% of urban excreta is deemed to be safely managed. The results? Environmental degradation, endemic disease leading to mortality and morbidity, especially among children, poor school attendance and performance, low productivity, constraints on the delivery of essential urban services such as housing, transport, safe water and drainage, and, ultimately, limits on economic growth and urban development. In short, a silent crisis that impedes the realization of the urban transformation framed in SDG11.

Urban sanitation has a fundamental role to play in achieving the SDG goals identified above. Business as usual will fail to deliver the kind of sanitation that underpins the envisioned urban transformation, by operating at too small a scale and focusing on infrastructure alone rather than on city-wide solutions. What is required is a radical shift in mindsets and practices towards an urban sanitation approach that impacts political priorities, funding, planning, design, management and governance.

Mobile desludging tank being wheeled out of an alley in the
city of Hanoi, Vietnam. Photo credit: Jan Willem Rosenboom

This radical shift will require the engagement of all stakeholders and a political transformation that touches all citizens, rich and poor, informal and formal, to facilitate the roll out of universal urban sanitation services. This is critical not only for reasons of equity, and to respond to the human right to sanitation, but also because the consequences of inadequate sanitation eventually affect everyone, as excreta-related pathogens spread easily across dense urban environments.

To make progress, urban development professionals and stakeholders need to better understand how sanitation impacts the functions and form of the city and how it supports economic development and promotes equity. To achieve sustainable, equitable and safe management of excreta for the whole city, sanitation sector professionals must transform their thinking and practices to deploy both old and new solutions in smarter ways.

We, from The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, The University of Leeds, Emory University, WaterAid, Plan International and The World Bank, have come together as a group of practitioners to galvanize this agenda by sharing conversations globally and mobilizing contributions from decision-makers and other practitioners across disciplines.

We propose that this renewed urban sanitation agenda should aim to:

• Embed sanitation within the framework of urban governance and municipal services provision.
• Establish clear roles and responsibilities, with accountability and transparency.
• Provide ‘safe management’ of excreta throughout the sanitation chain – for both onsite sanitation and sewers – to ensure separation of fecal contamination from people across the whole city.
• Focus on outcomes rather than technologies – allowing for diversity of solutions and approaches.
• Base decisions on secure operational budgets being available (including for operation and maintenance).
• Facilitate progressive realization, building on what is already in place.
• Commit resources to training city leaders and technicians of the future to solve complex problems rather than deliver predetermined solutions.

 On this World Toilet Day, we invite you to join us in responding to this shared responsibility.

Related:

• Toolkit: Tools for diagnosing urban sanitation challenges
• Blog: Targeting urban sanitation: Looking behind aggregated city-level data
• Blog: Fecal Sludge Management: the invisible elephant in urban sanitation
• Blog: 5 lessons to manage fecal sludge better 
• Blog: A tale of two cities: how cities can improve fecal sludge management 

 -------------------------------

Submitted on the water blog last week but important enough to be very widely distributed, including in the more fortunate regions where clean water and effective sanitation is the norm.

Most Australians live with good to excellent water quality and decent effective sanitation.   That is not the situation in many regions of the world, where urban sanitation is, well,............. bloody awful! [ in the Australian vernacular].

As urban density rises especially in poorer countries urban sanitation seems to decline.  It does need reversing to allow a rise in dignity and health for the less fortunate.

World Toilet Day 2016 - November 19 was a time for reflection and change.

Zoysia Seed - Supply Update

In Australia we are dependent on imported seed of zoysia from the USA.

Over the past two years supply has been poor, and the amount available has often been inadequate or hard to find.  Mostly related to lower supply by US producers and an inability to meet biosecurity requirements for Australia.

In the latter few months of 2016 this seemed to be improving, with hints of more seed around by 2017, as shown by US operators still offering seed for sale in late 2016.

And just recently it seems that new seasons stock may be available by early 2017.

A major issue seems to be resolved - and Compadre as well as Zenith varieties could be available.

Compadre especially has not been available in Australia since the mid period of 2014, mainly due to poor supply in the US and a difficult task in meeting biosecurity for Australia........it was too hard!

Our initial work seemed to indicate Compadre offered slightly superior performance in most Australian conditions due to better cooler condition performance, and strong lateral coverage by the grass.  Not much in it.......but Compadre was the more suitable we believed.

However, Zenith is preferred in SE Asia.

No details as yet on time of availability of new seasons seed .......but local Australian stock of Zenith is effectively now just about run out.  Anyone looking to sow zoysia seed might have to wait for new stock to arrive.  For planning purposes, think January 2017.

USDA, EPA Announce U.S. Food Loss and Waste 2030 Champions

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Gina McCarthy announces the inaugural class of the U.S. Food Loss and Waste 2030 Champions, U.S. businesses and organizations pledging concrete steps to reduce food loss and waste in their operations 50 percent by 2030. Champions announced today include Ahold USA, Blue Apron, Bon Appétit Management Company, Campbell Soup Company, Conagra Brands, Delhaize America, General Mills, Kellogg Company, PepsiCo, Sodexo, Unilever, Walmart, Wegman’s Food Markets, Weis Markets and YUM! Brands. “The founding 2030 Champions have shown exceptional leadership in the fight to reduce, recover and recycle food loss and waste,” said Vilsack. “The staggering amount of wasted food in the United States has far-reaching impacts on food security, resource conservation and climate change. To help galvanize U.S. efforts to reduce food loss and waste, USDA and EPA announced the first U.S. food loss and waste reduction goal in September 2015. Today, the first 15 Champions are stepping up to do their part to help the nation reach this critical goal.”

“Reducing food waste is good for business, it’s good for the environment, and it’s good for our communities,” said McCarthy. “We need leaders in every field and every sector to help us reach our food loss goal.  That’s why we’re excited to work with the 2030 Champions and others across the food retail industry as we work together to ensure that we feed families instead of landfills.”

In the United States, EPA estimates that more food reaches landfills and incinerators than any other single material in our everyday trash, about 21 percent of the waste stream. Keeping wholesome and nutritious food in our communities and out of landfills helps communities and the 42 million Americans that live in food insecure households. Reducing food waste also impacts climate change as 20 percent of total U.S. methane emissions come from landfills. Each 2030 Champion establishes a baseline marking where they are today and will measure and report on their progress toward the goal in a way that makes sense for their organization. There are many ways to look at food loss and waste and definitions vary. 2030 Champions are encouraged to consult the Food Loss and Waste Protocol for information on defining and transparently measuring food loss and waste.

For food waste in the U.S., EPA’s Advancing Sustainable Materials Management: Facts and Figures provides an estimate of the amount of food going to landfills from residences; commercial establishments like grocery stores and restaurants; institutional sources like school cafeterias; and industrial sources like factory lunchrooms. USDA’s Economic Research Service estimates that the amount of food that went uneaten at the retail and consumer levels in the baseline year of 2010 represented 31 percent of the available food supply, about 133 billion pounds of food worth an estimated $161.6 billion. Cutting food waste in half by 2030 will take a sustained commitment from everyone. Success requires action from the entire food system including the food industry, non-profits, governments and individuals.

USDA research estimates that about 90 billion pounds comes from consumers, costing $370 per person every year. USDA’s Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion produces a resource, called Let’s Talk Trash, which focuses on consumer education, highlighting key data and action steps consumers can take to reduce food waste. Details on becoming a U.S. Food Loss and Waste 2030 Champion can be found at www.usda.gov/oce/foodwaste and www.epa.gov/sustainable-management-food. Businesses not yet in a position to make the 50 percent reduction commitment can participate in the Food Recovery Challenge or the U.S. Food Waste Challenge.

Issued November 22 2016.  For more information, visit www.usda.gov.

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A good start.........less is being done in Australia to reduce food waste.  Timely to reconsider as we approach the Festive season.

Can the Cavendish Banana Survive?

1. Science + Technology

With the familiar Cavendish banana in danger, can science help it survive?

October 24, 2016 12.59pm AEDT

Facing down a future with no bananas. Chris Richmond, CC BY-NC-ND

Authors

1. Ioannis Stergiopoulos
   Assistant Professor of Plant Pathology, University of California, Davis
2. André Drenth
   Professor of Agriculture and Food Sciences, The University of Queensland
3. Gert Kema
   Special Professor of Phytopathology, Wageningen University

Disclosure statement

André Drenth receives funding from Horticulture Innovation Australia

Gert Kema is a senior scientist and professor of tropical phytopathology at Wageningen University and Research. He receives funding for his R&D program on banana, see www.panamadisease.org. He also co-founded two companies dealing with banana and owns shares in Yellow Pallet, a company that produces transport pallets from banana fiber.

Ioannis Stergiopoulos does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above.

Partners

University of California provides funding as a founding partner of The Conversation US.

University of Queensland provides funding as a member of The Conversation AU.

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Translations

Read this article in English

•  

The banana is the world’s most popular fruit crop, with over 100 million metric tons produced annually in over 130 tropical and subtropical countries. Edible bananas are the result of a genetic accident in nature that created the seedless fruit we enjoy today.

Virtually all the bananas sold across the Western world belong to the so-called Cavendish subgroup of the species and are genetically nearly identical. These bananas are sterile and dependent on propagation via cloning, either by using suckers and cuttings taken from the underground stem or through modern tissue culture.

The familiar bright yellow Cavendish banana is ubiquitous in supermarkets and fruit bowls, but it is in imminent danger. The vast worldwide monoculture of genetically identical plants leaves the Cavendish intensely vulnerable to disease outbreaks.

Fungal diseases severely devastated the banana industry once in history and it could soon happen again if we do not resolve the cause of these problems. Plant scientists, including us, are working out the genetics of wild banana varieties and banana pathogens as we try to prevent a Cavendish crash.

The cautionary tale of ‘Big Mike’

One of the most prominent examples of genetic vulnerability comes from the banana itself. Up until the 1960s, Gros Michel, or “Big Mike,” was the prime variety grown in commercial plantations. Big Mike was so popular with consumers in the West that the banana industry established ever larger monocultures of this variety. Thousands of hectares of tropical forests in Latin America were converted into vast Gros Michel plantations.

But Big Mike’s popularity led to its doom, when a pandemic whipped through these plantations during the 1950s and ‘60’s. A fungal disease called Fusarium wilt or Panama disease nearly wiped out the Gros Michel and brought the global banana export industry to the brink of collapse. A soilborne pathogen was to blame: The fungus Fusarium oxysporumf.sp. cubense (Foc) infected the plants’ root and vascular system. Unable to transport water and nutrients, the plants wilted and died.

A cross-section of a banana plant, infected with the fungus that causes Fusarium wilt. Gert Kema, CC BY

Fusarium wilt is very difficult to control – it spreads easily in soil, water and infected planting material. Fungicide applications in soil or in the plant’s stem are as of yet ineffective. Moreover, the fungus can persist in the soil for several decades, thus prohibiting replanting of susceptible banana plants.

Is history repeating itself?

Cavendish bananas are resistant to those devastating Fusarium wilt Race 1 strains, so were able to replace the Gros Michel when it fell to the disease. Despite being less rich in taste and logistical challenges involved with merchandising this fruit to international markets at an acceptable quality, Cavendish eventually replaced Gros Michel in commercial banana plantations. The entire banana industry was restructured, and to date, Cavendish accounts for 47 percent of the bananas grown worldwide and 99 percent of all bananas sold commercially for export to developed countries.

Bananas in Costa Rica affected by Black Sigatoka. Gert Kema, CC BY

But the Cavendish unfortunately has its own weaknesses – most prominently susceptibility to a disease called Black Sigatoka. The fungus Pseudocercospora fijiensis attacks the plants’ leaves, causing cell death that affects photosynthesis and leads to a reduction in fruit production and quality. If Black Sigatoka is left uncontrolled, banana yields can declineby 35 to 50 percent.

Cavendish growers currently manage Black Sigatoka through a combination of pruning infected leaves and applying fungicides. Yearly, it can take 50 or more applications of chemicals to control the disease. Such heavy use of fungicides has negative impacts on the environment and the occupational health of the banana workers, and increases the costs of production. It also helps select for survival the strains of the fungus with higher levels of resistance to these chemicals: As the resistant strains become more prevalent, the disease gets harder to control over time.

Aerial spraying of fungicides on a banana plantation. Gert Kema, CC BY

To further aggravate the situation, Cavendish is also now under attack from a recently emerged strain of Fusarium oxysporum, known as Tropical Race 4 (TR4). First identified in the early 1990s in Taiwan, Malaysia and Indonesia, TR4 has since spread to many Southeast Asian countries and on into the Middle East and Africa. If TR4 makes it to Latin America and the Caribbean region, the export banana industry in that part of the world could be in big trouble.

Cavendish varieties have shown little if any resistance against TR4. Growers are relying on temporary solutions – trying to prevent it from entering new regions, using clean planting materials and limiting the transfer of potentially infected soil between farms.

Cavendish banana trees in China infected with new fungal disease TR4. Andre Drenth, UQ, CC BY

Black Sigatoka and Panama disease both cause serious production losses and are difficult to control. With the right monitoring in place to rapidly intervene and halt their spread, the risks and damage imposed by these diseases can be considerably reduced, as has been recently shown in Australia. But current practices don’t provide the durable solution that’s urgently needed.

Getting started on banana genetic research

If there’s a lesson to be learned from the sad history of Gros Michel, it’s that reliance on a large and genetically uniform monoculture is a risky strategy that is prone to failure. To reduce the vulnerability to diseases, we need more genetic diversity in our cultivated bananas.

Local banana varieties in southern China. Andre Drenth, UQ, CC BY

Over a thousand species of banana have been recorded in the wild. Although most do not have the desired agronomic characteristics – such as high yields of seedless, nonacidic fruits with long shelf life – that would make them a direct substitute for the Cavendish, they are an untapped genetic resource. Scientists could search within them for resistance genes and other desirable traits to use in engineering and breeding programs.

To date, though, there’s been little effort and insufficient funding for collecting, protecting, characterizing and utilizing wild banana genetic material. Consequently, while almost every other crop used for food production has been significantly improved through plant breeding over the last century, the banana industry has yet to benefit from genetics and plant breeding.

But we have started taking the first steps. We now know the genome sequences of the banana and the fungi that cause Fusarium wilt and Sigatoka. These studies helped illuminate some of the molecular mechanisms by which these fungal pathogens cause disease in the banana. That knowledge provides a basis for identifying disease-resistant genes in wild and cultivated bananas.

Researchers now have the tools to identify resistance genes in wild bananas or other plant species. Then they can use classical plant breeding or genetic engineering to transfer those genes into desired cultivars. Scientists can also use these tools to further study the dynamics and evolution of banana pathogens in the field, and monitor changes in their resistance to fungicides.

Availability of the latest tools and detailed genome sequences, coupled with long-term visionary research in genetics, engineering and plant breeding, can help us keep abreast of the pathogens that are currently menacing the Cavendish banana. Ultimately we need to increase the pool of genetic diversity in cultivated bananas so we’re not dependent on single clones such as the Cavendish or the Gros Michel before it. Otherwise we remain at risk of history repeating itself.

https://theconversation.com/with-the-familiar-cavendish-banana-in-danger-can-science-help-it-survive-64206 

See link above for original article.

• Agriculture
• Genetics
• Genome
• Crops
• Bananas
• Plants
• plant breeding
• Fruit
• Pathogens
• Fungus
• genetic engineering
• Plant pathology
• monoculture
• Fungal pathogen
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