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The 10th global forum of the World Agri-Tech Innovation Summit brings together companies, innovators, and investors from throughout the agriculture and food production supply chain. The overarching goal is to find and present solutions and business models to foster a transition to a sustainable economy of the future. The summit will identify the technologies, finance, and business models needed to deliver a greener, more food secure future, from breeding resilience and diversity into the food system to tackling labor shortages with robotics and automation to supporting farmers to adopt new regenerative ag practices.

The summit combines digital and physical elements, with high-level panel discussions, and roundtable debates.

Click here for more information.

It is a stark truth that there is a significant gap between the amount of agricultural goods produced and food needs globally. By 2050, the world’s population is expected to reach 10 billion, and in order to keep up with the pace of demand, annual cereal production will need to rise to 3 billion tons, up from the 2.1 billion tons produced today. While agriculture in the Middle East represents a mere 13% of the region’s GDP, the sector plays a strategically important role in promoting resilient food systems, keeping critical economic sectors alive, and forming the base of many economies. Out of the region’s total population of 296 million people, 84 million, or 28%, are entirely dependent on agriculture.

Historically, agriculture has long been at the center of social and economic life in the Middle East, with diets relying on the production of cereals and livestock, and later, fruits and vegetables produced on carefully irrigated land. With its generally more arid climate and more limited water resources, necessity has driven the region to be a center for both ancient and contemporary agricultural innovation, from irrigation practices to fertilizers. Nevertheless, scarce arable land and water supply have continued to prove increasingly detrimental to regional food production, making many countries heavily dependent on imported agricultural products and, accordingly, highly vulnerable to fluctuations in international commodity markets. The situation is growing increasingly dire and is only poised to get worse with the continuing environmental degradation linked to climate change.

Climate change, demographic patterns, and food trade imbalances

Throughout the world, weather and desertification patterns have become increasingly irregular. Almost two-thirds of the Middle East population lives in areas lacking sufficient renewable water resources to sustain crop production. On average, 83% of water use in MENA goes to agriculture, in contrast to the mere 4% devoted to industrial purposes.

The region’s high urbanization rate, reaching 70% today, and the expected population increase to 329 million by 2050 renders it particularly vulnerable to climate change’s pernicious effects. The Malthusian premise of population growth leading to inevitable scarcity and suffering helps to explain the decline of agricultural productivity, but is limited in its ability to explain — or propose solutions to — the issue at hand, in the region or globally.

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Source: MEI@75

The farming initiative promotes food independence in the country with the world’s oldest bread by converting unused urban land into productive wheat fields.

Carrying sickles, a group of Jordanians gather to harvest a wheat field that spreads around Amman’s City Mall. Logos of international supermarkets and franchises tower above the golden wheat, as dozens of people reap a crop that for thousands of years has been cultivated in the region.

This collective harvest last summer in west Amman’s affluent neighbourhood of glitzy shopping malls was part of a grassroots initiative promoting food sovereignty by converting unused land into wheat fields.

Named Al-Barakeh Wheat – which can be translated as “blessing” – the project took off in late 2019, when founders Lama Khatieb and Rabee Zureikat’s social enterprise Zikra for Popular Learning started growing wheat.

“Our first harvest was in the spring of 2020, in the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic,” says Zureikat. Around that time, Jordan had one of the world’s strictest lockdowns. With a total ban on movement, food was distributed by government buses and trucks.

eople were standing in long queues waiting for bread to be distributed,” says Zureikat. “We harvested our wheat and started baking our own bread at home. We felt it was powerful being able to rely on ourselves, it was an amazing feeling.”

After successfully growing a tonne-and-a-half of wheat, Zureikat and Khatieb started locating empty plots of land in Amman and mobilising others to join their efforts to restore Jordan’s wheat fields and encourage Jordanians to grow their own food.

Since their first harvest in 2020, hundreds have joined the collective farming initiative, which teaches participants to cultivate wheat for an entire season and become self-sufficient in their wheat needs for a year.

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SOURCE: AL JAZEERA

Technology has transformed almost every aspect of our lives, and no doubt, the agriculture sector has constantly been developed to meet the needs of humans by using modern machines to help in farming. And lately, the agriculture industry has been using Robotics, Internet of Things, and Artificial Intelligence to improve crops' quality and reduce the need for manual labor, thus reducing human errors.

Ultron is the first chemical-free weeding robot in the MENA region developed by LUXEED Robotics using a localized laser beam while leaving the crops unharmed. The laser beam detection is accurate due to the artificial intelligence software; it hits the weed at its growth center to prevent it from growing back.

LUXEED Robotics focuses on onion and lettuce crops. They help farmers reduce the need for manual labor that is both time-consuming and costly, as well as increase the quality of their crops by switching from herbicides to the safe laser beam.

Like any other person who is trying to grow a business, the co-founders from Lebanon, have faced many challenges along the way:

• The COVID-19 crisis postponed many of their shipments, as they were buying components from China, because the main components are not sold in Lebanon

• Helping Beirut after the blast has distracted them from the startup

• The lockdown and road closing prevented them from reaching the farmers in different areas

• The unstable Lebanese market is also a risk for an early-stage startup

Despite all the challenges, the co-founders have successfully executed what they had planned. Also, applying to "Berytech's Agrytech Program" helped them achieve their dreams and work on their business during the economic crisis in Lebanon due to the program's funding.

Hear from the co-founders

LinkedIn page

L'Atelier Paysan is a francophone collective of small-scale farmers, employees and agricultural development organizations. They provide courses to help organic farmers achieve technical and economic self-sufficiency, as well as to encourage the re-appropriation of farming skills in general.

Self-build training courses enable farmers to create their own individualized tools that are both appropriate to their farming techniques and economical. In addition, a farmer who builds his or her own tool will be able to fix, adapt, and modify it.

Click here to learn more about the collective and the courses offered.

SIVAL is the only trade show in France to present a comprehensive and impressive offering of equipment and services for all plant productions: arboriculture, vegetable crops, seeds, viticulture, horticulture, medicinal and aromatic plants, cider, mushrooms, and tobacco, with 700 exhibitors and 26,000 professional visitors each year in the city of Angers. 

SIVAL is also addressing future production concerns by focusing on innovation and future agriculture by hosting young innovative enterprises, SIVAL Innovation Competition or the AGREENSTARTUP competition for new businesses. SIVAL is firmly committed to the AGtech movement. It provides actual solutions for linked and precision agriculture, as well as robotics, data, AI, and alternative production methods.

For many years, one of the Exhibition's key development strategies has been internationalization. SIVAL attracts visitors from 55 countries, with 12 % of exhibitors not coming from France.

Click here for more information and registration.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are the backbone of the economy throughout Europe. 99% of the companies based there fall into this category, which is defined as companies with fewer than 250 employees and an annual turnover of less than 50 million euros. In Europe, approximately 100 million people work in a small or medium-sized enterprise. SMEs exist in all industries. Many innovations and processes originate from the work of SMEs. Sustainable business, competitiveness, resource efficiency and social cohesion depend to a large extent on strong SMEs. All SMEs together generate more than half of Europe's GDP. They are the pillar on which European prosperity rests. 

How to support SMEs and further promote (small) entrepreneurship in Europe is being discussed at the highest level in the European Commission. Read more here about what measures the European Commission is planning to strengthen SMEs and help them overcome the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic.

What can the Arab region learn from Europe in this regard?