Fruit Benefit guides

“Beans from New Zealand, strawberries from Spain, Tomatoes from Morocco. vegatables and fruits travel more than you. but unlike you, they don't appreciate it.” This standard and a laugh commentary is on the coronary heart of the French startup Agricool’s mission: to deliver economical, healthy, and in the community-grown produce to city facilities.

The young co-founders Guillaume Fourdinier and Gonzague Gru are the sons of French farmers. like the delivery of most startups, their theory sprang from frustration with the repute quo. “once we moved to Paris for school, we couldn’t find food that tasted like the meals from domestic,” says Guillaume. “in particular strawberries.”

Even the strawberries grown within the Brittany place of France, simply three hours from Paris, didn’t style right. “every little thing grown in France goes through Rungis (the Paris wholesale market), so there is just too much time spent in transportation, storage, and packaging…all the compromises are made on taste.”

The use of what they discovered researching agriculture and company, they looked for a way to supply reasonable, tasty, and fit food correct in the city. to maximize efficiency, profitability, and concrete area constraints, they concentrated on plant density and absolute control of the ambiance. “if you desire affordable strawberries within the city you should grow dense—as many as viable in a small area,” says Guillaume.

They got here up with the idea of the “Cooltainer,” which grows meals internal recycled delivery containers. The strawberry flowers are planted vertically and watered by using a closed-circuit drip system, with LED lights mimicking the June sunshine. “We gentle the Cooltainer from 7 a.m–eleven p.m., in order that they grow extra at once,” he explains. “That way, we harvest 4 times as a substitute of a couple of times, so altogether we may still be in a position to produce seven a whole bunch strawberries per yr in just 30m² as an alternative of 4000m² on a farm.” and they can obtain this the use of ninety percent much less water.

In October, they parked their prototype Cooltainer at Bercy Park in Paris’s 12th arrondissement, receiving lots of attention from the press and curious Parisians hoping to rating clean strawberries. but Guillaume is short to notice that they're nonetheless within the experimental part. The Cooltainer is its own contained ecosystem, which presents certain challenges. there's a hive of bumble bees to pollinate the flowers, but there are also pests like aphids that deserve to be controlled devoid of the use of pesticides. “people say, ‘In agronomy after we do this continually we use this, however I don’t be aware of if it is going to work in the Cooltainer,’ so we should invent and verify every thing,” says Guillaume. “we're both sons of farmers, so we have a great experience of how to develop whatever, however we’re now not specialists on agronomy or engineering,” he explains. happily, the clicking attention and guide from the eco-minded Paris city corridor have helped Agricool elevate sufficient funding to start hiring the consultants they need.

“Once we have perfected the strawberry Cooltainer, we’re going to are trying tomatoes and then lettuce, which is really handy to grow.” When these prototypes are competent—mid-2016 is the target date—they hope to create a community of Cooltainers in and across the metropolis, each independently run by using a full-time urban farmer but equipped by using Agricool. “So possibly you might have 2000 of these across the Parisian suburbs, where the food is harvested and delivered in the neighborhood on demand…like Uber for agriculture,” says Guillaume.

Positive concerning the viability of their startup, potential city farmers from in all places the world have already signed up at Agricool’s website to acquire guidance about getting a Cooltainer in their metropolis. “We need to get local, inexpensive vegatables and fruits to urban centers around the world, no longer just Paris."