Reducing Carbon Footprint, Improving Plant Health
About This Project
Reducing Carbon Footprint, Improving Plant Health
Author: Avram Slovic, Senior Commercial Director, Latin America @ Invaio
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At Invaio, we firmly believe that the primary goal of technological advancement should be to create a positive impact on humans, plant life, and the environment as a whole. That is why we are implementing technology solutions to address agricultural pests and diseases, while also helping farmers reduce their carbon footprint.
By nature, all plants can sequester carbon, capturing and storing atmospheric CO2 to reduce its environmental effect, while also channeling it for beneficial use in the carbon cycle.
The increasing production of Greenhouse Gases (GHGs) from farming operations worldwide, combined with the loss of forest mass, poses a threat to this balance. Moreover, pests and diseases continue to affect the health and population of trees and crops that would otherwise have the ability to maintain environmental balance through carbon sequestration. Just like humans and animals, plants suffer a constant onslaught of pests and diseases and this is a difficult and costly battle to fight in the tree crops such as fruit, nuts, and coffee. This also brings additional environmental costs through the current adverse impact on biodiversity, the use of water, fuel and labor.
This is precisely our challenge and unique opportunity: we strive to enable people all over the world to address these problems by delivering cutting-edge scientific and nature-inspired solutions that combat agricultural pests and diseases while respecting and protecting the environment and reducing growers’ carbon footprint.
How? Invaio is leading a two-way, plant- and planet-health revolution: on one hand, we help the planet by providing a targeted treatment that reduces the application of synthetic chemicals (pesticides), thus preventing large amounts of carbon from being emitted, ground water from being contaminated, and unintended species from being exposed. On the other hand, with this mindful approach, we protect trees and crops and help them become healthier, thus better and more efficient at carbon capture (with fewer sprays).
“The Invaio system is a Precision Delivery-engineered needle for trees that has the potential to replace a significant part of the aerial and ground based chemical sprays applied today to suppress insects and fungal diseases.” explains Gerardo Ramos, Chief Scientific Officer of Invaio.
“Application of such minute doses using our unique Injection technology, in comparison to tractors or airplanes, can get the same or even better level of efficacy and protection. At the same time, we are able to apply new natural active molecules that are beneficial for the tree that would never have reached them otherwise. Our systems and technologies can stay in the tree for months at a time, delivering small and persistent doses of targeted treatments: we are providing a health solution that is good for the environment, for the safety of the farm operators, and for the plants’ health – all at the same time”, says Ramos.
Healthier plants also means more food to harvest. In fact, this solution can generate a path to preserve an estimated 37 billion fruit trees on the planet that serve as an important carbon “sink” in agriculture and also provide food for humans and animals daily.
“Through our work with orange producers in the state of São Paulo, Brazil, we believe that we can cut the number of chemical sprays per year by over 50%, by delivering precision doses of biocontrol molecules directly into the trees.”
“Our approach brings the potential of 5 billion liters of water that will not be getting pulled out of the ground for spraying, and 125 million tons of CO2 that we can make sure does not get emitted, just in Brazil each year. Make similar reductions in all citrus growing regions globally and you’ve made a serious large-scale positive impact on global carbon emissions” explains Avram Slovic, Sr. Commercial Director of Latin America.
“Throughout all of the major agricultural regions we are working with perennial growers, from oranges in the US, Mexico and Brazil to Olives and Apples in Europe and more. We are excited to showcase to the industry, farmers and consumers how our solutions will not only make food healthier, but the planet as well”, explains Peleg Chevion, President and Chief Commercial Officer of Invaio. “We are focused on real impact and transformational solutions for crop health. We wouldn’t be changing the game if we only solved disease or pest prevention and cure, but didn’t include making a positive impact on carbon and overall ecological impact simultaneously.”
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Invaio’s multidisciplinary team of scientists, engineers, and innovators pursues breakthroughs in bioactive discovery, precision delivery, and systems thinking to implement novel solutions, to reduce agriculture’s environmental footprint, and act as stewards of tomorrow. We’ve learned to think outside of the box and seek sustainable solutions by integrating multiple technologies, with the objective to create the types of true breakthroughs required to solve the urgent and complex challenge of climate change.
