Our own Prof. Thomas Graham will talk about "The Many Faces of Controlled Environment Agriculture: Realizing Opportunities in an Agricultural Identity Crisis".

Everyone is welcome. 

Abstract:

‘Controlled Environment Agriculture’ (CEA) is a rapidly growing and evolving component of our overall agriculture/agri-food sector. This rapid evolution has befogged the notion of just what constitutes CEA; can it even be labelled as narrowly as ‘agriculture’ anymore? Controlled Environment Agriculture has evolved to include everything from the prospects of orchards on Mars, to molecular farms in a Canadian snowbank – and just about everything in between. This seminar will consist of a guided tour through the various personalities of CEA and the opportunities that lay within each of those identities, or at least as many as we have a chance to get to in the brief time we will have together. The tour will include, but certainly not be limited to, stops on the Moon and Mars, the Arctic and Antarctic, major urban centres, and northern and remote communities alike. On this tour we will also come to appreciate (or so I hope!) the role(s) that CEA can play in addressing the diverse set of local, regional, and global challenges we all are facing. Controlled Environment Agriculture will be explored against the backdrop of existential threats such as those presented by the climate crisis, to the social/economic/political crisis surrounding food insecurity both domestically and across the planet. We will also hear how CEA is improving nutrition, medicine, and moving in the direction of biodiversity preservation. Finally, it would not be a seminar on CEA without briefly exploring some of the tech (UofG centric) that is driving CEA’s evolution. I hope you can join me on the tour!