Transcript
Speaker: That was the birth of sort of agriculture consulting which is a global and technology agnostic controlled environment and urban agriculture consulting firm. I would say now 10 years since we started in 2014 we do a bit broader work across climate smart agriculture but we're still sort of known for being like the urban vertical farming CEA consultants for all kinds of different clients. Hello and welcome to the Regenerative Design Podcast. I'm your host, Mathieu Maheus, and each episode I interview leading authorities in regenerative practices, people who excel at doing well and doing good.
Speaker: So are you passionate about protecting our planet for future generations while thriving in business? Well, you're in the right place because this podcast is dedicated to making our world better and your business more successful.
Speaker: So welcome, everybody. Today we have a very special guest here with us. His name is Henry Gordon Smith. Henry is an incredible guy. He has an impressive list of achievements. We'll go through a little bit of that, but he's the founder of Agri texture. He's the founder and CEO of this company that is actually changing the industry in terms of urban farming, vertical farming. And he's consulting in that field. He's also consulting a lot of other companies in the field of sustainability. So I think he's a great guest. He is also a graduate from the Columbia University in New York. And he now he just told me more recently that he started lecturing. So that's really incredible. Henry, welcome to the show. Thank you, Matthew. Thanks for having me. Hi, everyone.
Speaker: Hey, so this is really cool. So my first question to you, Henry, is really like, where did all of this start? Tell me, where how did this journey of yours begin? Yeah, and I think when you're a young person looking for your place in the world, it's really hard to figure out what you're going to do. And I think the same applied to me. I grew up around the world. So I was born in Hong Kong, and I grew up all across Southeast Asia and Europe. And obviously, I sound American, so I had a sort of touch of ah American culture through the international schools I went to. So suffice it to say, I was sort of a third culture kid and very international. So I thought I was going to get into diplomacy, not really knowing what I was into. So I studied political science from an undergraduate degree. And then while I was studying, I had a visiting professor in the last years of school who was an expert on water wars. And water wars were these political and physical battles that happened over water scarcity. And this sort of blew my mind and shifted my interest into
Speaker: climate change, I felt like this was the greatest challenge we have ahead of us. And I wanted to find a solution to it. I dabbled in the public sector, got really turned off by the bureaucracy and how slow it was. And that's when I started landing on business and sort of social entrepreneurship or environmental entrepreneurship as a solution to these problems. But the question was like, what am I gonna do? Like how do I find space in that? Like what's it, so what's the gap? So, you know, a lot of my successful business contacts said you need to find a gap in the market. And in order to do that, I started three blogs, because I had experience blogging. And I wanted to share ideas and figure out what I liked and what other people liked. And one of those blogs was called Agriculture. And it became quite popular, as it was about integrating agriculture into the built environment, as well as using some of the new technologies like hydroponic greenhouses and vertical farms that were getting interest. But there was a huge lack of information online.
Speaker: And sort of the analytical approach of the blog, where I would feature news and be you know encouraging of the sector but also critique it, um did a number of things. It created ah a sort of a brand that people associated with agriculture, a level of trust, and also started to foster me as an analytical thinker about the trade -off between different business models and technologies. And so long story short, I mean, I studied food security and urban agriculture. I did my master's at Columbia, as you mentioned, and sustainability management. And then years after I started the blog, maybe three years after I started the blog, people started requesting consulting services from me. I got contacted by Deloitte and they said,
Speaker: you know we have an unused tower that a client wants to do a feasibility study for see if they can do a vertical farm in it but at that time that was like a it was like a crazy question at that time and nobody had the data but i I did I had some data to provide on that on the yield numbers and the estimates So I said, OK, it'll cost you this much. And that was the birth of sort of agriculture consulting, which is a global and technology agnostic controlled environment and urban agriculture consulting firm. I would say now 10 years since we started in 2014, we do a bit broader work across climate smart agriculture. But we're still sort of known for being like the urban vertical farming, CEA consultants um for all kinds of different clients, which we can talk about. But that's sort of been the journey.
Speaker: Wow, that's ah really incredible incredible. I really love that. And it's a perfect example for our show, right, to show people that if we can actually save the planet and create business, and in fact, I think it's it's necessary to to move forward because what you mentioned about the bureaucracy and and the government, things just move too slow. We don't have time, ah right? we Within the next five years, we really have to move fast forward into ah changing our our economies into the green way of producing food. that's yeah We're going to talk specifically about food. so I'd love to hear even more from your back story. As a kid, was there something that triggered you about working with plants? or was it was Is there a link there?
Speaker: You know, it it wasn't a very obvious link, but I think it started with me for for cities, right? Like I grew up in Tokyo and Hong Kong in the earliest years of my life. And in both of those cities, there's just you know extreme density. there's um There's exciting architecture that you get to look at. There's, you know, in in the case of Hong Kong. It's sort of like really a lot of high rises juxtaposed with islands and jungle. Right. So like on one side of my building. I was looking out over water and and I would see the city and the other side. I was just looking at this like jungle hill. So it's always and then in Japan, like
Speaker: They do really interesting ways of integrating technology, but also gardens throughout the city, green spaces. So I just liked those. And as a kid, I was always drawing cities. I was always drawing layouts of buildings and cities. and um like it was always I always wanted to... I don't know, I sort of wanted to be an architect. If you gave me a pen and paper, I would be just busy for hours, I would would not get bored. And, um and I was always like inventing new planes and new buildings and new ways of designing things. And I think that that the youth, you know, in those cities really inspired me and my dad's a civil engineer or was rest in peace, he recently passed away, but he was a civil engineer. And so, you know, at an early age, we were always like building things as part of my school of assignments. you know And I remember that very fondly with him is if assignment was to you know understand horsepower, like we built a little cart that we attached to our turtle to calculate turtle power and and like demonstrate that we understood how you know the movement of a certain animal can create a speed. right So just like just very engineering -focused things that I think formed my interest in the built environment.
Speaker: I was not I did not have a green thumb. I did not grow around around grow up around farms at all. But as a teenager, my parents bought a country house that we started renovating. So I would spend the weekends with my parents renovating it. My mom built a huge flower garden and my dad will vegetable gardens. So quite reluctantly at the beginning, I got involved in gardening based on what my parents were interested in. And then yeah, I mean, it wasn't really until that professor that I started shifting my studies and my academic interests into, let's call it resource scarcity, which you know water and food were directly connected. So it was ah it was a many steps, but not really an obvious background for me to get into where I am now. Yeah, that's really incredible. And the other day,
Speaker: on on the flight coming here to Toronto, I watched a movie from Temple Grandin. I don't know if you heard about her, but ah it it kind of rings a couple of bells where you as a kid learning from your teacher together with your father doing these assignments was really the the basis was really there, I think. Yeah, you never know what those like early stage experiences can can make an impact on you. But that's why it's so it's important to get experiences as early as you can to know what you like, what you enjoy, and and form sort of what you don't like as well.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, I agree. that's and That's very important, right? And was there a moment in your life that you, like, it seems like you've been on what I would call on a line with your purpose for many years, right? For 10 years. Over 10 years now, I've been very focused on one thing. And I think if you look at my LinkedIn, it's like you can see, like, I'm just dedicated to one thing pretty much. I really love that. And was there moments of doubt or were you like, or did you make a switch and say like, let's get it? I mean, look, I think when you hear the story the way I describe it sounds quite easy and like not bumpy and and smooth, but ah man, there were a lot of challenges. yeah I mean, first of all, I'm not um
Speaker: you know, i I wouldn't call myself a left brain person. I'm more of a right brain person, right? and And in order to understand agriculture and the physical dimensions of sustainability, you need to really strengthen your understanding of math, of engineering, of the science, of of research and academia. So there were weaknesses that I had that I had to consistently resolve and and get through. So that was one piece of it. um Another one was not having a farming background. I mean, I wasn't really taken seriously. I was sort of this talking head. And I think some people are still critical of me and don't really understand the breadth of my experience now that I have. um But in the early years, especially, there was a lot of um skepticism of of me, like, who is this guy? How can he comment on it? He's not a farmer. And that's totally fair. I i invested early on based on that feedback in in working on some farms. So I volunteered on tu but some gardens, some community gardens to get experience around the non -profit sector, but also because this community garden had a greenhouse that I wanted to learn from its challenges and we tried, we we worked on it making a winter ready with some colleagues of mine at Columbia University.
Speaker: I also interned at Sky Vegetables, a rooftop hydroponic greenhouse, and I worked on the farm to understand what it was like. So I tried to to get some experience to both, you know, get legitimacy, but also to humble myself and understand what farmers really go through, which most of us don't understand. And and and I'm glad that I did that. So there were some obstacles around that end and you know I think as part of those critiques you start to have a little bit of you know imposter syndrome like oh am I you know and and that that holds you back from from expressing yourself and a big part of how I got to where I am is having the confidence and consistency to express my opinions and so those those challenges of that critique as well as that interest and security really did affect me. And I had to really push through that. um I also, you know, with my political science degree, you know, I moved to New York, like I bought a one way ticket to New York, I had a job interview, like ah with Bright Farms, actually, and so they were very urban farming at the beginning, but they're just a greenhouse company now.
Speaker: And I didn't get the job, right? They said, you're not an architect. You're you're not a grower. right So this is like, I just got rejected for this job. And so I started to have to re you know educate myself more. So that's when i I did a certificate in food security and urban agriculture. That wasn't enough. I needed to also go and get my master's degree from Columbia University. That sort of did it because I combined that with the on -hand farm experience. And then I sort of had the right education title plus the experience. plus the blog and those three things combined started to really deliver as far as me getting job opportunities and eventually consulting opportunities. So there were a lot of challenges around the way. My parents were quite skeptical. They sort of didn't understand why they had gone through giving me all this education for me going to summer culture. um So it was it was it was difficult, but I think, you know, what I learned to do was to carve my own voice and to like,
Speaker: you know, you have to figure out what you like, right? So you have to try things and see what you don't like. And then once you figure out something you sort of like, or you have a hypothesis, you're going to like it, you have to really commit to it fully. And I think that's what it's like committed fully. So that the momentum around that and the flow of the positive feedback loop of like saying, Oh, I really do love this. I love the rewards of this work. I love the impact. I love learning about it. That's how you find what you're interested in. And I guess that's been fueling me for over 10 years now. That's incredible and and I think that's so important also for our listeners like once you've figured out what you
Speaker: what you're here to do on this planet in this lifetime, you just get after it and and you keep going. and And that's actually the only way, right, to to overcome all the speed, all the bumps, right? Because if you're doing something you don't like, you there will be challenges and you'll give up. But if you know, like, your vision is there, and I can clearly see you have that big long -term vision, then everything is possible, right? I mean, that's the story, right? Like you you have to go day by day, like you really have to re motivate yourself a lot. But I find it very satisfying. I love the work we do at Agri picture. I really do. Yeah, amazing. So let's dive into that. I have one question that's on the top of my mind. Like, what is your biggest light bulb moment within this industry over the last three years? Because I think a lot of innovation has happened in the last three years, right?
Speaker: Oh, I mean, yeah, I mean, innovation sort of relates to business models and technology. I mean, honestly, the thing that keeps coming to mind for me that I think really got stuck with me in the last three years is, and it's a bit of a puzzle, is like, people really just don't most people will not do enough preparation to do something right. They'll get lost in the passion. They'll get lost in the excitement, in the potential profitability, or whatever their main incentive is, and they will lose track of the proper preparations needed. And when it comes to something like agriculture, which is generally has low margins, and then now we're talking about tech -enabled agriculture in a novel setting of being closer or in a city,
Speaker: the risks of the project being successful increase so it's very important to taper your naive yet like good you know hopes for a project with the realities and the way to taper them is by preparing properly is by having a methodology like our methodology, we believe, to plan these farms and conduct feasibility. Instead, I see so many entrepreneurs, even large, well -funded companies just not prepare enough and almost ignore some red flags for failure that they see. And this is really disappointing because we we need more, like you said at the beginning, we don't have that much time and we need more successful projects.
Speaker: So you know I think it's ah it's been a difficult light bulb for me to realize that people don't necessarily want to do that extra work. They really just want to skip ahead. They want it to be, I guess, easy. They want to sort of believe that it's going to be easy. And the reality is it's just much, much harder than that. And so we're seeing so many failures in the vertical farming sector in particular as a novel, but probably the most novel technology in the this approach that we're talking about, so many of them fail with the same mistakes. Mistakes like not choosing your customer properly, mistakes like overemphasizing technology, mistakes like, you know, choosing a location because it's cool versus it actually makes the best business sense. Mistakes like um
Speaker: Greenwashing, right? And sort of telling this hyped up story of food security and sustainability and not actually looking at your own real numbers. These are consistent. problems that, yeah, certainly over the last three years, that have become a light bulb in my head because we should know better by now. you like in you know yeah in In the early days, it was kind of okay. But now it's like, there's so many resources ah to to figure it out, to get it right. Just plan better. That's sort of what I have to share on that question.
Speaker: Yeah, I really love that because that actually makes a massive difference between a project that that will be successful and one that is just going to be there for a couple of years and then it disappears. Because that's what I also see in in landscape architecture or architecture that they make these beautiful renders of green ah roofs and things like that. And then when it's construction, they forgot about the the whole um the whole Yeah, engineering of the building and then it never really happens. Or like you said, they'll just start because it's cool, right? And that's what I really like about your approach that you make sure that things ah move forward. So let's dive a bit more into that. Do you want to go a bit deeper in in your specific approach?
Speaker: Well, so, you know, when I was a ah Columbia student, Dixon de Palmier, who's the author of The Vertical Farm was my advisor. I got to create my own course because there weren't enough food courses in the program. So I created my own course called Challenges in Vertical Farmings. And this course had the sort of intent to take the theoretical ideas of vertical farming and design a practical one for New York City. And Dixon de Palmier, I had the honor of him being my sort of advisor and mentor through that. And in that process, it was fun because we sort of battled because I was like, I wanted to be practical. Like I wanted to try to make money. I wanted to you know actually impact food access if I could because I was going to place it in the Bronx. I wanted the size and shape of the building to meet the floor to area ratio requirements of zoning.
Speaker: you know, and Dixon kind of wanted to make it bigger. He's like, make it taller taller, you know, and I was like, it actually can't be taller on this site. So that was like fun, as I sort of felt like I was taking his visionary, very impactful approach, and trying to make it like practical. And in that process, I developed a methodology where step by step, how do you plan these farms, you know, and who are the kinds of stakeholders you need involved to plan these farms. And that became really the foundation for Agritecture's consulting methodology because most of the work that we've done historically have been feasibility studies for all kinds of urban farms and vertical farms. So, you know, it's interesting how that, you know, small student work became a foundation. You know, obviously my team and my expert colleagues have built upon that.
Speaker: But it really it really goes through a similar journey of sort of drafting out your idea and then validating it with market research and then you know analyzing the site and then designing the farm in detail and then selecting various technological solutions and building an ah economic model around that and then you know sort of reporting on the risks and opportunities and feasibility of that. I mean, those are really the steps. And in addition to doing it as part of that study, I did it i tested it before We did it as consultants through a number of workshops, I would go to different cities, and we would pick a site and we would go through this methodology and variations of it as I refined it with three different teams and each team would have
Speaker: like an architect, a grower, an engineer, a sustainability manager, a marketing professional. And these were sort of the interdisciplinary teams that I believe were important to develop these farms. And if I look at our team now at Agrotechter, that's our dream team, right? We've got all those roles within our company. So it's really funny how the small things turn into big things. Yeah, that's incredible. And i ah so if I get it right with your clients, you really go from the first conceptual i idea with the with the potential investors to really setting up the whole farm and and you also continue with them and in like monitoring.
Speaker: Yeah, we do a we do a range of services now, but I would say what you're talking about is our feasibility studies that are, you know, probably again, the the vast majority of the work that we did, especially in the early years. So yeah, I mean, a client will come to us and say, I'm thinking about doing like a boutique farm focused on, you know, rare plants that are typically like flown into New York. And this was the case with Rob Lang at Farm One, which is one of the clients that We really yeah we like all our clients, we really enjoyed working with Rob because he had more clarity about what he wanted to do at the beginning that allowed us to really smooth out the execution process. So he knew, he he was a home chef, he knew he wanted to disrupt this particular part of the market focused on premium products.
Speaker: So you know our challenge was to to really get the information on the performance and and sourcing for all these varieties of unique crops that had never been grown in CEA farms before. So our methodology sort of allowed us to do that. But we ended up going through that process with with Robin getting his first farm designed and built. And so that is sort of um You know, that's the that's the sort of standard journey that we we go through, so to say. um And I think that there is some work that we do afterwards, but it's kind of like, in in the case of those work, what I wanted to say is kind of like an accelerator, right? We sort of like your questions and coach you. You get access to our team over a period of time for the feasibility study. We charge a consulting fee versus taking a piece of the business.
Speaker: And then after that, I feel like our clients get access to us for a lot of support introductions, more technology recommendations, they hire us by the hour for support services, which quite a bit of now, some of these include like optimizing it or Yeah, like benchmarking, like we have some clients that will hire us, and they'll say, you know, why don't look at our farm and benchmark us to like global standards. on our capx e cetera or or review our farm performance before we scale up because obviously they they tend to expand and move into a larger facility. So there's some work around that but the vast majority of our work is planning. you know like We're a planning company and I like that kind of work but we we can do other work on the support side but I think
Speaker: You know, I think that we people see us as planners and that's what we sort of market ourselves as. And, you know, we're the group you go to to get your idea onto paper, to get the data, the economics, partners, everything like that. And we do that kind of work even across our other client segments besides the entrepreneurs we're talking about now. Yeah, that's incredible. And then your name for the company is obviously the the best fitting name for that. I really love that. that's it Thank you. That's a really good one. Here you go. Agree texture. So I would like to dive now a bit deeper into the bigger picture on a global scale, because I know you also have a lot of of experience in sustainability. You spend quite a lot of time on it. um First question maybe, do you like the word sustainability?
Speaker: I mean, I like the word sustainability. It's fine. I mean, I think like i like a lot of words that get overused. The thing I don't like about sustainability is um is yeah the way people are using it as sort of a Like, we're sustainable now, you know what I mean? a process. Like, in my in my Columbia studies, I wrote about this very early on, that it's not an A to Z sort of thing. it's ah It's an ongoing cycle of observing your impact and refining it. And it's it's an ongoing journey of sustainability and self, you know, you can look at yourself as well. Like, it's an ongoing journey of self -improvement. You've never arrived. Like, you've never, like, made it.
Speaker: So I think that kind of thinking is very important to encourage. That's the one thing I don't like about sustainability or sustainable or some of the labels related to it. This podcast is brought to you by the Garden of Your Dreams Masterclass. Are you struggling with finding the right tools and tricks for your garden? Are you lacking the confidence to cultivate the garden you have always wanted? Do you have a backyard with lots of potential but you get overwhelmed by the lack of knowledge and time to do gardening? Then the Garden of Your Dreams Masterclass is for you.
Speaker: If we look at the word exactly what it means, it's quite interesting. It's sustainable. It's just to sustain. It's actually status quo. So I think we should go beyond because we have to. Yeah, it's more regenerative, right? yeah That's it. That's what we have to do. So now I'd love to have your intake on like the food production on a global scale, right? The food systems of our planet. What do you think that is the right let's call it the right mix to support our global population, which some people say is still going to grow, but i I see it actually declining, that we have sufficient healthy food for anybody in the world. Because as it turns out, we have more than enough food. Like obviously there's still people suffering famine, but that is more related to war. It's not about
Speaker: the it's the There's more than enough food. It's just the quality and how it puts pressure on our planet, right? So I'd love to have your intake ah on that. Yeah, it's such a big question. but um But you're right. I mean, it's not necessarily about the volume of food. It's it's about the distribution of it. It's about the reduction of the food waste. you know We have pretty much as many children who are malnourished in the world as we do that are obese in the world, right? So it's like we've got paradoxes in the food system. um We also, you know, ah I'm starting a new course called Smart Agriculture for a Changing Climate that I started teaching at at Columbia University's Sustainability Management Program. And so I'm also, I would say, refining my framework of understanding of climate smart agriculture more broadly, which is certainly bigger than urban agriculture. So one of the key things is just so different in different parts of the world, whether it's the
Speaker: crops that are a threat from climate change or whether it's the types of farmers. So there really is not going to be one one size fits all. um what What I would like to see that I i would say could apply um more around around the world is a couple of things. I mean I'd like to see more data sharing from the government level. I see a lot of new interest in farming and also interest from farmers that are trying to adapt to the new realities of volatility in their conditions.
Speaker: And I think that there could be, um there's ah there's a huge opportunity to distribute more data on what is known. So whether it's more in the developed world where this data is more available, you could have actual market data about demand. that would encourage a lot more farms. If you look at a place like the UAE, right, they have extreme climates, they have the liquidity to build farms, but their data is not strong as far as what they need to be growing. And so we're seeing some farms growing unnecessary excess products or repeating each other or repeating the same mistakes. So I'd like to see government
Speaker: get involved and maybe connect subsidies to the crops that they need to be grown. So for example, if we have a significant gap in potatoes, if you can find a way to grow potatoes, we would subsidize that. So directing the subsidies more towards food security and and adaptation, I'd like to see more of that. And the developing world's obviously harder because of the tech literacy and the distribution of that data, but there are still ways to distribute it through like on the ground farm consultants and agronomists that do interact with a lot of the farmers. And we do see tech deploy more. So that's one thing is more available data to drive strategy for
Speaker: ah Many stakeholders, but mostly the farmers, ideally connecting subsidies to that. I think more pathways for entrepreneurs, I think, you know, there's something consistently happening around the world, which is that, you know, farmers are moving away from agriculture, but simultaneously, we are seeing an interesting renaissance. This podcast is a demonstration of that. My career is a demonstration of that. The course at Columbia, we're seeing like a renaissance of interest from young people to say that agriculture is a great challenge that we see opportunities to get involved in um and again we want to take that energy and move it in the right direction so I would really like to see more pathways for entrepreneurs because I see them as a key catalyst for bringing new approaches to agriculture and those pathways are not just about giving them incubators or funding or
Speaker: But ideally connecting them with real farmers, that they can learn from what I learned, which is you know to be humbled by the realities of that experience and to take some of the initial naive ideas about technology and bring them down down to earth. And I think that if we could, you know, this one idea of sort of yeah like I called it like Brother Farmers and it was like taking farmers from one place, you know, like outside of the city and connecting them with new farmers in the city so they learn from each other because the farmers in the city, urban farmers are more adept with with technology, they're more adept with marketing, they're more creative with the business models and the the the farmers outside of the city are just more reality check and they have the work experience, they know what the realities are and if something's gonna work. So you want those two groups really talking to each other. So that's number two, I would say is the pathways.
Speaker: um I think that, you know, number three, I would say is like more understanding of the technology itself and its performance. And again, that can be filled by some of the previous things I mentioned a little bit. But I'm talking really specifically about Agriticture's thesis as we move into the next 10 years of our business, which is that the capex for agriculture will need to go up in the face of climate change and so how where do you go for the data to make those decisions about that technology because it could be a low -tech solution like regenerative agriculture um but that still increases aspects of your capex in my opinion it could be simple irrigation or could be anything as intense as a like automated vertical farm all those decisions require an approach to define what that capex is going to be worth it what the ah ROI will be what the risk will be
Speaker: So, you know, with our software, we've built calculators for greenhouse and vertical farms that make the cost of understanding that CapEx so much cheaper and more available. And I think I'd like to see more actors or more people join us and support us to develop these sort of calculators for these technologies um So that many kinds of farmers at a low cost can understand these things or even just groups of people talking about this can actually look at the numbers because often we're talking about the sector we're speaking about like ideas that are up in the sky like it's great to contextualize it and so what my vision for our software is that
Speaker: You know, we can put in any location on Earth, look through a range of technological solutions and get quick estimates of the financial returns of that as well as some of the sustainability impacts across water or jobs, etc. So I think that's the third part that I'd like to see more of. Yeah, I really like that if we can get the numbers right, you can calculate it, you can prove it, you can optimize it, otherwise you're just like guessing, right? And that's a big part in the technology. But doing the same mistakes, like I said earlier, like, that's what frustrates me about greenhouse and vertical farms, like there's ways to do it, there's ways not to do it, and the information is available now. So just get yourself educated, you know?
Speaker: Yeah, I think everybody that wants to get into urban farming has to work with you so you can actually optimize it because it will definitely they will win back the money because they won't be making any mistakes. And I think that's a really great, great way of looking at it. And I have a question around nutritional nutritional density of the food grown in greenhouses or more or urban farms is basically the same, right? Do you have any evidence that it's the same as or or that it's as good as grown and in soil? Yeah, i mean I mean, there's limited data on this question. It's a question I get a lot. um ah there's the To be frank, there's limited data on this question. However, um and there's many kinds of farms, like outdoor farms, right? So it's like, what are we comparing against as well?
Speaker: But I did see, for example, um Farm One did some research on their Bricks content and you know that's one measurement of nutrition and sugar and flavor, very high performing. um In Farm, I saw some of their data as well, very high performing um and relative to what the norm the norm is. yeah I would say from my perspective, my opinion is that while there are many factors that drive nutrition and flavor, which are quite, especially flavor is quite qualitative, but no nutrition is more quantitative, is freshness. Like how fresh is the product? Like that, to me, scientifically and intuitively makes sense. If the product is fresher, but hasn't been shipped for a long distance, the likelihood of nutritional quality is high, especially if it's a product like leafy greens or strawberries or something like that that's perishable. If it's wheat or soy or corn, it stores pretty well. It's not a big issue.
Speaker: which is another reason to think about, okay, what kind of farms do we need? Why would we grow wheat in vertical farms? If there's no freshness value to it, why would you build all that equipment and justify that cap X? You know what I mean? Like nice maybe you have some other savings. That's a bit of a tangent. I think freshness is a really big driver. I think the the growers skill is a big driver as well. Like how well they manage the nutrients the plants need, whether it's in a hydroponic system or soil -based system, it can it can be totally different. yeah I really think it varies a lot, but the data I've seen is that you know nutritional quality goes down, the less fresh, perishable products are. So I'd say freshness is the biggest driver, one of the biggest drivers for me, which is why localization of food systems can improve the nutritional quality of crops in some cases, in the in the perishable fruits and vegetable cases.
Speaker: However, I will say, as somebody who does a lot more hydroponic work, I do think that there are certain micronutrients in soil that you can't get in the same way in hydroponics. So, the exact science... Is that mainly minerals or what's the specific... Yeah, I mean, there's so many different kinds of soils and there's so many micronutrients. and you know you can get really complex mixes of macromicro nutrients in soil you can't get in hydroponic systems so that is a plus and i think if we if we could feed everyone from sort of
Speaker: regenerative organic production, I would love that. But I just don't think that's a reality and i to give everybody the fresh, high nutritional product we can. I don't think that that that works. So I'm a proponent of a sort of mixed approach, a mixed system. So, you know, if if if i if it's if it's if it's the warmer season and I'm in New York, I should be trying to buy crops from upstate farms, right? That's probably the healthiest Most environmentally friendly product I can get, but in the winter I should try probably buying from greenhouses in New York State or nearby or vertical farm in some cases, depending on what the product is.
Speaker: Yeah, I really love that approach because that and that's something that people should be aware of more or think about more that like, okay, what is local? What is in its seasonal? And how is it produced? And I think with your approach of adding vertical farms and on specific locations around cities or high demand areas, you you will make a huge difference, but and especially in these countries like like I'm in Canada at the moment in Toronto, it's It's really cold here for like quite a while. and Same in New York, I think. So what do you do? You ship in ah salads from Mexico or you try and grow it locally and in ah in a controlled environment and actually store carbon and while you're doing that?
Speaker: So I ah really appreciate that that ah intake on that. And ah quite interestingly, I think it's also like if we go into the nutrition of of the food, which is way more important than and the kilogram of the food, right? is that I see I met ah an amazing farmer here in Canada that is doing it lots of things around activating water and adding minerals and like he build like a vortex and you might have heard of these kind of things and he said he changed his perspective that it's not so much about soil but it's about water. Water is the key aspect that can carry all the nutrition and he said you actually have to activate the water
Speaker: kind of energize it by movement. And then all the nutrients, ah minerals, all the things will actually stick to it way better and the plants will absorb it way better. And I've seen things he's growing. It's it's crazy. like he so Have you heard of wood vinegar? No, I haven't heard of that. Have you heard of biochar probably? You heard of biochar? Yes. Well, this farmer made a derivative, a liquid. A liquid version. We might want to look into that because he adds that to his products and he showed me his garden where he did carrots with it and carrots without it. Literally, the carrots without it were
Speaker: The people that are are ah listening, it's a couple centimeters, maybe one or two. And the other carrots were like 10 centimeters already, same. he He just wanted to show that. So I think that's incredible that there's still so much signs or knowledge about things we don't know yet that we can still optimize, right? That's why we need more people involved. And I think you know the example you're talking about is yeah is a really good one of how certain small technology and interventions can make a difference. um I mean I used to work for a water company that was doing nano bubble aeration and this is a bit of a trend adding nano bubbles to various hydroponic setups with some positive results but what you're describing as well I mean it's pretty well known that the microbes in the roots of the plants they need highly oxygenated water to transfer the nutrients into the roots
Speaker: So that's one of the benefits of hydroponics is you remove the soil and you can control the amount of oxygen and water and nutrients go into those roots and and making sure that microbial activity is as it should be. So there's great great potential there to to to still unlock. And then also in the controlled environment of of the greenhouses, do you have data of that? Because as it turns out, yeah you will know that ah maybe not all of our listeners that a lot of the nutrients are the plants take a lot of the nutrients from the air, because there's also minerals and gases and other things in the air, and they take that up through the leaves, right? So do you have any research or or evidence on on this? I mean, certainly it's it's well established that you know increasing this the parts per million of CO2 in ah an indoor facility, even some semi -closed facilities um will increase the yield of the plants, right? So that that's how the the plants will, you know,
Speaker: to do part of their photosynthesis and absorb yeah which is important to their growth. um so other Other minerals or gases to add in? is there i know to I haven't looked at that. I'm not sure. and I've talked to my agronomist about that one, but I'm not sure which other major minerals nutrients are absorbed through the stomata, I guess, is what it would be. Yeah, that's amazing. So yeah, I think ah lots of exciting things happening. in unknown still It's very exciting. It's an exciting field. So I encourage people to get involved in it. Yeah. So find one of the final questions, how how is your experience with teaching at the Columbia University? How is that?
Speaker: I mean, first of all, it's extremely humbling. I mean, I you know got contacted by Columbia University, the Sustainability Management Program, which is what I graduated from. It's a master's program focused on business and sustainability as part of the School of Professional Studies. So I think I was the third cohort when I graduated. And so now it's become much more advanced. And when I was there, there weren't a lot of agriculture classes. So they contacted me and they said, you know, you're one of our sort of big agriculture graduates. So can you develop a course? And I started thinking, well, what would the course be? Like, what would the course it be that I wanted to take, you know? So I came up with a course on climate smart agriculture, which is really sort of a broad term put forward by the FAO and the World Bank that focuses on three pillars of um of agriculture, which are, you know, really adaptation to climate change, improvement of productivity in sustainable ways, and then also mitigation, sort of like the the dream for agriculture.
Speaker: I'm mostly focusing on the adaptation piece, and so what we're doing is we're investigating a range of technological solutions, everything from agri -voltics to AI, IoT, big data, regenerative agriculture, agroforestry. We're investigating those upfront in the course, and then we're going to take a look at um every continent on earth and look at like, what are the crop losses that are occurring from climate change that we know about today? What are some of the projections about where they're gonna get? And I want the students to really become analytical about low to high tech solutions to those problems. If we're talking about rice production in India, you know is the solution robots? you know like What is the solution to that? And I want them to you know understand and embrace that nuance. So they've got a variety of assignments like
Speaker: developing a food security tool for policymakers or a climate support agriculture technology matrix for stakeholders to choose different technologies. um And in the end, they have to propose a specific technological solution, low tech or high tech, to a specific crop in a specific region. and And that's the final assignment. So it's been a real pleasure. I so far really enjoyed it. We had our first lecture last week, and I teach every Thursday. and um Yeah, it's it's it's it's challenged me to push beyond my typical, you know, hydroponics, urban agriculture knowledge. I'm looking at animal husbandry, I'm looking at aquaculture, I'm looking at staple crops. So I love i love that because it's really broadening my my understanding, expanding my own research as I sort of teach and learn with the students.
Speaker: Yeah, that's incredible. I really like that. And I think it's interesting to you'll get different experiences. Maybe I believe in the power of young people having new angles, new ideas. So I think that's very exciting that you get to do that. Yeah, I mean, that's my hope. right I've talked about new people getting involved. Like if I can get three of the students to be um like me or close to me as far as their motivation to make a difference in the food system, then I'd say that the class is a success. So that's really what I want is I want to help those students really find and carve their way in this exciting new sector.
Speaker: Yeah, I think there's a lot of young people that are very hungry to make an impact because I'm talking to another company, their name is Soil Capital and they have started, you heard about them maybe, they started with the carbon credits system and they have like a whole team of ITers that are running these things up and they they have they the one of the founders told me we have to tell the people to go home because they want to work night and day to to put this out there. like the the They're working too much. So they really want to move forward with this. So that's very very hopeful, I think. Great. Yeah, we need more people. there's Time is running out. So yeah, yeah that's what it's... Okay, my final question to you, Henry. This is a bit of a different question. We are... Oh, can I ask your age, if I may?
Speaker: I'm 37 years old. 37. So let's add another 40 years down the line from now. You have won the Nobel Peace Prize. You're asked to go on stage. What do you say?
Speaker: um've i've I've won the Nobel Peace Prize at 70 and I'm asked to go on stage. You changed the industry. You helped food security and ah you were rewarded for that. I don't know. I guess the message of my ah life is pretty corny. It's like all great things start small like they do with seeds in nature or for trees or in your life. Right. You you need the the there's a huge power of ideas that are taken into reality. You know, you you could take your ideas and make them real by putting them onto paper, um thinking about what they're going to become and acting towards them and never underestimate the power of those ideas when they're put into action. Because I certainly, um even today, suffered from this Nobel Peace Prize, which is great. but we about I have to pinch myself that, you know, we are where we are now, that that my career has grown in the way it has.
Speaker: And I think it it really goes back to creating space for those wild, bold ideas and then starting to put them into action. Never underestimate it. And um and you know we need to foster more of those. Yeah, incredible. So on that note, we're going to end the show here. Just a final question for people that are listening and want to reach out or are interested to work with you. How can they best ah contact you? We'll put it in the show notes. Yeah, there's so many options. I'm pretty active on LinkedIn. I published a weekly newsletter on Climate Smart Agriculture, so you can find me at Henry Gordon Smith on LinkedIn and you can reach out. um i If you're interested in our consulting services, just go to agritecture .com and you can fill in a form and request our services, whether you're an investor looking to invest in the sector or an entrepreneur or a policymaker, we have services that we've executed in a portfolio related to them around the world for all of those.
Speaker: And then if you're curious about just getting started, if you're really early, I encourage you to go to design .agritecture .com, where you can check out that calculator I told you about. And at a very low subscription, you can estimate the CAPEX, OPEX, and details of any greenhouse or vertical farm in the world, and take advantage of our award -winning urban farming classes, which are a great introduction to urban agriculture in general, and also controlled environment agriculture. And that's all at design .agritecture .com. Okay, amazing. So thank you very much, Henry. Thank you, Matthew. Great speaking with you.
