Business Day: Finding answers together

Programme

Theme sessions

1. New proteins: where to find them and how to use them? Stacey Pyett and Ingrid van der Meer

2. The climate challenge translated into manageable actions Charon Zondervan, Tim van Hattum and Theun Vellinga

3. Data and platforms: what are the business perspectives? Arjen Daane, Paul Goethals, Sander Jansen and Sjaak Wolfert

4. Phenotyping: innovative measuring and modelling to improve performances Rick van der Zedde and Benny van der Fels

5. The circularity challenge: finding and implementing solutions at different levels Ingeborg de Wolf, Saskia Visser, Gulden Yilmaz and Raymond Jongschaap

6. Finding the balance between sustainable production and healthy nutrition Willem Ruster, Joost Blankenstijn and Thom Achterbosch

1. New proteins: where to find them and how to use them?

Dreaming of duckweed? Curious about crickets? Get to know WUR’s protein transition team!

As part of the protein transition, WUR is working with partners near and far to increase access to sustainable proteins. We foresee a future in which our proteins come from a wider collection of sources, tailored to local resources and demands. In this session you’ll get an introduction to protein sources of the future, from chickpeas to chlorella to crickets. We will discuss the appeal and limitations of emerging sources, and address bottlenecks to bringing these proteins into the mainstream diet.

2. The climate challenge translated into manageable actions

Finding answers to the climate challenge together

Climate change has a major impact in terms of its effects on food security, quality of life of people in cities and functioning of the ecosystem. There is an urgent need for solutions in the transformation to a decarbonized economy. There are no simple and clear-cut solutions to increase society’s adaptive capacity and drive sustainable development; the only way forward is to connect and co-create solutions. We invite you to join us, by bringing in your expertise, network and capacity to change and transform. Wageningen University & Research is committed to develop evidence-based and scalable solutions for climate action, together with you and your organisation.

Sub-themes

1. Towards climate-smart food systems: development of smart food systems that contribute to climate mitigation or reduce the negative impact of climate change, taking a farmer-to-consumer perspective.
2. Climate adaptation for a healthy environment in cities and surrounding areas: how to adapt and improve the living environment in cities and suburbs to increasingly extreme weather conditions. In this track all aspects dealing with a healthy environment will be considered.
3. Innovations for climate mitigation solutions: development of innovative climate mitigation actions that reduce carbon emissions and increase carbon storage, with broad support within society.

3. Business perspective for data and platforms

The journey of bringing the results of research and innovation projects to commercialization goes through a number of technology readiness levels (TRLs). The system innovative character of our research projects on the field of data and platforms learns that the gap between innovation and societal acceptance and economic viability is sometimes hard to bridge. In this break-out session we will briefly introduce three state of the art research projects with market potential followed by a discussion in which we hope to get your input for mutual cooperation and valorization of the presented projects.

4. Phenotyping: innovative measuring and modelling to improve performances

High-tech measurements on plant and animals

Large scale accumulation of data on plant- and animal performance in their natural environments. To understand, model and optimise our food production sytems. In live demonstrations our experts will show vehicles, robots and drones that capture data. You will learn the current state-of-the-art and how your business can benefit from these developments in this booming domain. Key topics are: smart agriculture, the new phenotyping research centre, various experiments: climate room, greenhouse and field-based breeding, post-harvest shelf life measurements, and animal health, welfare, behaviour.

5. The circularity challenge: finding and implementing solutions at different levels

Finding answers to the circularity challenge together

Are you also struggling with what a circular agri-food system means for your organization? What role can you play in this? How to arrive at a circular system? Or do you have more specific questions? In this interactive session we will get to work with your issues! After a brief introduction and some examples of how we work on solutions at WUR, you will get to work yourself. You will be supported by experts from WUR. After the WUR business day we will sent you a report detailing the issues you have worked on.

6. Finding the balance between sustainable production and healthy nutrition

Can sustainability and nutritional improvement move into the same direction?

Agri & food firms make major efforts to improve the sustainability of their supply chains. At the same, pressure is building up to improve the nutritional profile of products. How do these changes match with consumer preferences? What is the right momentum to pursue product and value chain changes? Can sustainability and nutritional improvement move into the same direction? During the Business Day, we will set the scene on key developments in the Netherlands, Europe and globally. And consequently discuss these challenges and opportunities with you building upon flagship WUR projects on sustainability and nutrition.

• SUSFANS
• The Sustainability Consortium
• True and Fair Price
• Personalised Nutrition and Health