Vocabulary

 

secure	head (3)	collaboration
bit (3)	common	produce (2)
last (3)	embrace	pressure (3)
align	challenge	consumption
crisis	indicate	sustainable
input	plant (3)	greenhouse
output	pesticide	less/lesser/the least
tackle	code (2)	pressing (2)
Earth	consider	resistance
require	average	sustainable
key (2)	efficiency	natural resources
expect	crack (2)	crack the code (2)
bolster	behavior	commitment
involve	relentless	drive/drove/driven (2)
weight	share (3)	approach (2)
rely on	match (3)	grow/grew/grown (2)
crush	rival (2)	operation (2)
insight	field (3)	end up with
facility	times (2)	square meter
guess	rough (2)	network (2)
per	yield (2)	lead/led/lead (2)
list	measure	fraction (2)
tweak	replicate	the list goes on
solve	cooperate	bottom line (2)
way	optimize	all kinds of
hue	improve	caterpillar
moth	pest (2)	constantly
harm	habitable	human touch
detect	propeller	fly/flew/flown
touch	fertilizer	innovation
crop	goal (2)	good/better/the best
adjust	nutrition	compartment
sensor	based on	continuously
solve	behavior	take to the next level
rely	face (2)	carry the weight (2)
effort	ongoing	experiment
adopt	structure	figure out
realize	going on	modification
mimic	emulate	implement
behave	condition	circumstance
flip	face (2)	the long run
link up	situation	on your own

 
 
 
 

Video

 

 
 
 
 

Transcript

Ernst van den Ende, WUR Head of Plant Sciences: “If you want to feed the world in 2050, then in the next forty years, we need to produce the same amount of food as we did over the last eight-thousand years.

And that gives a little bit of an indication of the pressure on the food system.

We just face a huge challenge. With the growth in population, with the change in consumption behavior. With the climate crisis, how do you secure your food production?

The real secret is the sustainable production. It should be with less inputs, with less fertilizer, less pesticides, less water. It needs to be sustainable. Otherwise, we will destroy our planet, yeah?”

The security of the food system is one of the world’s most pressing challenges.

But the story of how this small country became an unexpected food superpower might just have some answers for how we tackle it.

Consider this: if everyone on Earth ate the diet of the average American, that would require all the habitable land to be used for agriculture — and we’d still be 38% short.

And that’s right now.

What do we do when there are two billion more people?

.     .     .     .     .     .     .     .

 
Well, the key is more exciting than it sounds, and that’s efficiency. Basically, how do we produce a lot more on the land we’re already using, and do it using a lot fewer natural resources.

When it comes to sustainable agriculture, one country has seemed to crack the code. Bolstered by a national commitment to produce twice the amount of food with half the resources, the Netherlands has become the world’s number two food exporter.

Ernst van den Ende, WUR Head of Plant Sciences: “It was very close collaboration between the government, science organizations, and the industry. And they started out of a common interest. So they say, okay, we want to go for sustainable production, but everybody was aligned.”

Everyone involved in the system was aligned and embraced innovation to reach that shared goal, and that has driven efficiency on a level unmatched anywhere else in the world.

If there’s one place that approach is most clear, it’s in their unrivaled greenhouse growing operations.

Ernst van den Ende, WUR Head of Plant Sciences: “There’s a very nice example of about tomato, which really gets a good insight on how we want to produce our foods in sustainable ways.

So, if you produced tomatoes in an open field situation in Spain, then you will, uh, end up at the end of the growing season with four kilograms per square meter. If you do this in a high tech greenhouse in the Netherlands at the moment, you will end up with 80 kilograms per square meter which is 20 times more.

But the best part of the story is that the 80 kilograms of tomatoes, we do it with four times less water compared to an open field situation. Water is one of the big challenges that we face.

Just had a cup of coffee. Do you know how many liters of water were needed to produce that cup of coffee? Rough guess.”

Reporter: “Ten?”

Ernst van den Ende, WUR Head of Plant Sciences: “150. So, high technology offers, really, a possibility of producing a lot of food per square meter in a sustainable way.”

The Dutch lead the world in tomato yield while using a fraction of the water that other countries use. But it’s not just tomatoes.

.     .     .     .     .     .     .     .

 
Measured by yield per square mile, they’re the world leader in the production of chilies, and green peppers, and cucumbers. Number five for potatoes, onions, and carrots. The list goes on.

But the bottom line is they’ve been able to get so much out of so little.

Ernst van den Ende, WUR Head of Plant Sciences: “If we are able to produce 80 times more with four times less water, that’s, that’s great. That’s great news.”

Most people know that greenhouses allow a grower to tweak every little thing, but the Netherlands is taking it to the next level. They’ve perfected the greenhouse as the ideal environment to continuously test and implement all kinds of ways to optimize growth.

From things as simple as testing what hues of LED lights can increase pest resistance and improve nutritional value, to things as crazy as moth killing drones.

Joroen Sanders, World Horti Center Researcher: “So we’re, at the moment, we don’t have any products which can actually control the moths. And then finally they will produce caterpillars, and those caterpillars they can do a lot of harm to many different crops.

A drone is able to detect the moth. Also, to see how it’s flying and with it wings, propellers will just, will just crush, actually, the moth.”

.     .     .     .     .     .     .     .

 
Wow. There’s a relentless drive towards innovation to create better and more efficient growing techniques. They’ve even started taking the human touch completely out of it.

Some of the latest tech relies on AI to learn plant behavior and constantly adjust conditions without any input from a farmer.

Joroen Sanders, World Horti Center Researcher: “For example, what we’re testing in this compartment is a climate computer. So we have different sensors, and it actually, we measure the plant activity. Based on plant activity, the computer is actually controlling the whole climate by itself.”

Ultimately, the key to solving our global food challenge isn’t just in relying on super efficient food producers to carry the weight for everyone else: it’s learning from and adopting that technology.

At the World Horti Center, you see that effort first hand in an ongoing experiment. They’ve built, basically, a greenhouse within a greenhouse. Inside the largest structure, they’re able to replicate any climate on earth to figure out what modifications need to be made to realize the same yields they’re getting in the Netherlands in any other country on earth.

Erwin Cardol, World Horti Center, CEO: “We have a cooperative project going on with Columbia. And we can, in fact, mimic, we can emulate the climate, the current climate conditions in Columbia, put their crop in and see how crop behaves under the circumstances that we have in Columbia.

We can totally flip the seasons around. We can make it a sunny day on Christmas. We can close the curtains on a sunny day and make it completely dark.

I think, in the long run, the future of the Netherlands should not be to be a producer for the rest of the world. We should be a developer for the rest of the world.

We are the country that will export our knowledge on creating production facilities all over the world.”

Ernst van den Ende, WUR Head of Plant Sciences: ‘Innovation starts, really, by bringing all these networks together. In the world we live nowadays, you need to link up with other people. You can’t do it on your own. We need to produce more. We need to do it with less inputs. And we need to do it better.”

*     *     *     *     *     *     *

 

Questions

Tomato, Cherry Tomato. In the future, will the world need to produce more, less or the same amount of food?

Bell Pepper, Chili Pepper, Green Pepper. Should the main strategy to greater food production the use of more fertilizers, pesticides and putting more land under cultivation?

Cucumber, Pickles. Does the presenter think the world should aspire to living the “American Dream”?

Cabbage, Brussels Sprouts, Bok Choy. The most “successful” food exporting countries are the US, Canada, Australia, France, Argentina, Ukraine and Russia. Is this right, wrong, partially right, yes-and-no, it depends?

Lettuce, Romaine Lettuce. Are there competing interests (conflicts) between the Dutch government, agriculture, farmers and scientists; or do they cooperate and work together?

Broccoli, Cauliflower. What comparison did the horticultural expert make?

Onion, Garlic, Green Onion, Leek, Scallion. What has been The Netherlands’ “secret weapon” or the secret of its success in agriculture? Give some examples of their methods and techniques.

Beans, Peas, Lentils, Chickpeas. Only temperate-climate crops can be grown in The Netherlands. Is this entirely true, mostly true, partially true, largely false or completely false?

Carrot, Radish, Turnip, Beet, Parsnip. The main mission for Dutch agriculture is to produce even more food to feed the world. Is this correct or incorrect?
 
 
 
Eggplant, Zucchini, Squash. Agriculture is a very important activity in my region and country. Yes, no in the middle? What are some important crops?

Spinach. Is there much trading in agricultural products? What produce does your country export and import?

Celery. Has farming changed (dramatically) over the decades?

Dill, Parsley. Are there problems and challenges in agriculture? What problems or challenges does agriculture face?

Potato, Sweet Potato. My friends and I would like to be farmers. Agriculture is a very popular occupation.

Pumpkin. What might happen in the future?

Edible Weeds (Dandelion, Lamp Quarters, Nettles). What could or should farmers, the government and ordinary people do?