New Crop of Companies Reaping Profits from Wasted Food
Just as Rumpelstiltskin spun gold from straw, scores of new companies are trying to spin profits out of food waste. Several start-ups are chasing ways to use food waste to make other edibles. Some are aiming to quickly distribute food that is about to be thrown out. And yet others are working to use every last ounce of ingredients. Food waste, in other words, is now a platform for commerce.
 
Why Land Means Hope for India's Vulnerable Single Women
Single women are among the most vulnerable and invisible of India's landless class, often from lower caste indigenous communities. One district, Mayurbhanj in Odisha, is challenging gender inequality in the country's land laws by offering land and shelter to women living alone. Over the three years since the program was launched, 68,000 single women have been identified across Mayurbhanj and 19,000 are deemed eligible for land titles.
 
The Key to Africa's Prosperity? Cultivating 'Agropreneurs'
Dismiss the thought that the key to Africa's financial well-being lies in oil or other standard bearers of economic prosperity. Greater investment in Africa’s farming sector, in particular smallholder farmers, is imperative and should take priority over economic drivers, such as oil. The $35 billion Africa spends on importing food from other countries would be better spent on farmers.
 
Open Agriculture Initiative: Is Digital Farming the Future of Food?
OpenAg is a new venture seeking to digitize agriculture. They hope to equip every global citizen with the ability to generate specific soil-less environments for plants to grow in, and to create a common global platform for farmers to save, download, and replicate entire climate formulas from any part of the world. OpenAg sees this as the solution to the problems of high food miles, climate change, and urbanization.