For the further development of the Munich projects in this direction, it’s very handy to also have the Venture Lab for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics right around the corner. Later, we’re shown a small robot that screws a targeted weed out of the soil. It’s the broadleaf dock, Rumex obtusifolius, that makes life difficult for organic farms, and not only in Bavaria. As organic farming is based on lower pesticide use, this weed has to be laboriously cut out by hand. A job that the researchers envisage will in future be done by robots.
Very impressed, I wrap my poinsettia in newspaper. There’s a lot to be said for high-end, high-tech research. The infrastructure promotes collaboration, creates experimental spaces, leaves nothing to be desired. You can feel the curiosity, the commitment, the enthusiasm of the researchers to contribute something towards meeting the great challenges of our time.
Transferability, the sticking point
It makes sense to me that vertical indoor systems can make a decisive contribution to the food supply of urban conurbations like Singapore or Abu Dhabi in the future. But it’s unclear whether this development also has potential for Dakar or Nairobi. The researchers themselves said that low-tech solutions are needed for Africa.
And that’s the sticking point. Protein extracted from peas for plant-based substitute products, valuable oils for medical applications, polymers from algae as alternative packaging materials – these are all great developments that may reduce our ecological footprint, and will also find a market. Just like the poinsettias next to the mulled wine stand on a dreary day in central Munich.
But in the past 50 years we haven’t yet managed to ensure food security for areas in which the number of people going hungry is again increasing. Technology- and capital-intensive solutions, such as those produced so successfully by the scientists at TUM, disappoint when it comes to transferability to areas that are systemically shaped by other framework conditions. And they don’t address the distribution system at the root of the undersupply.
The successes of TUM’s venture labs are inspiring. I’d love to visit the venture lab that offers a breakthrough to end world hunger. To see the infrastructure that is necessary for innovations that consign hunger crises to history once and for all. To know the rankings that give points for this. To celebrate those achievements as unicorns.
Back in my hotel room on Kaiser Ludwig-Platz, a room with just the right amount of dust, I place my poinsettia on the window sill. It looks wonderful there.