Harvest for the World

The Jewish festival of Sukkot (Tabernacles) that has just concluded is also the harvest festival – celebrating the ingathering of crops. It is an ideal opportunity to highlight how Israel is helping combat world hunger and feed an ever-increasing global population. These examples of relevant news article are just from the last three months.

Israel has revolutionized agriculture globally with its scientific innovations. Israel’s Phytech, for example, has developed innovative crop sensors that boost agricultural productivity and are now being adopted worldwide.  Israel’s Kaiima Bio-Agritech is producing high-yielding varieties of essential food and feed crops using its proprietary (non-GMO) seed-enhancing platform.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNeA9N1DijY

Crop yields can also be increased by combatting pests. Israel’s EdenShield has developed a non-toxic pesticide with an aroma that repels pests. It is already used in Israel, Spain, Italy, Turkey and Greece and is soon to be launched in the USA, Mexico and the EU. Meanwhile, Israeli biotech Evogene has recently manufactured the first toxin against Western corn rootworm and bred bananas that are resistant to the hugely damaging Black Sigatoka fungus. Another Israeli biotech, BioFeed, has developed a “no-spray” solution to kill the fruit flies that have been devastating mango plantations in India.

Other ways to prevent food wastage is to pick crops at the optimum time.  Israeli start-up AclarTech has developed the AclaroMeter app that works with a smartphone’s camera and the Israeli SCIO molecular scanner, to monitor the ripeness, freshness and quality of fruit and vegetables. The SCIO scanner itself has been sent to US dairy farmers to help them check the nutrition of dry forage and deliver a more consistent diet to their animals.

You cannot grow crops without an adequate water supply and Israeli innovation in water conservation is benefiting water-stressed regions of the world, from Kenya to India to California. Thanks to Israeli drip irrigation, 15,000 farmers in Karnataka, southwestern India, are currently harvesting their first monsoon season crop in years. In another Israeli approach, Ben Gurion University’s desert research farm demonstrates how to grow crops in the drought conditions of a minimal rainfall climate.

Water is of course the basis for fish farming. Israeli aquaculture startup Latimeria breeds fish in desalinated water with salt added to save energy, minimize leakage and prevent harmful bacteria. Additional technology developed at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem promotes fish growth and is providing a vital food resource in Uganda. The solution is being further developed by Israeli startup Aquinovo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0x3O2C7ghY

Israel is devoting much effort to preventing hunger in Africa. Tahal Group – a subsidiary of Israel’s Kardan – is constructing three agricultural centers in Angola and a huge agricultural and water project in Zambia. Meanwhile,  Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame praised Israel’s agricultural technology, saying “Israel has continued to follow through on its commitments and objective of scaling up engagement across Africa.”

And President Faustin-Archange Touadéra made the first-ever visit to Israel by the head of state of the Central African Republic (CAR).  He said to Israeli President Rivlin “we have come to Israel in order to learn – your country is a school for us.”

Two of the most effective organizations working on the African continent are MASHAV and Innovation: Africa.  MASHAV (Israel’s Agency for International Development Cooperation) is continually busy from Burkina Faso to Zambia. Innovation: Africa’s latest successes in Uganda were ably documented in a video featuring the 8-year-old daughter of the Israeli NGO’s founder. Finally, while the international media has been bemoaning inter-tribal disputes in South Sudan, Israel has been distributing food aid to drought-stricken villagers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZq9D3shuxY

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/JZq9D3shuxY" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Israel brings overseas farmers to the Jewish State to pass on the knowledge to feed their own populations.  Israel’s Arava International Center for Agriculture Training (AICAT) has changed the lives of  many of its 16,000 foreign students. And 1,200 students from across Africa and Asia have just completed the 13th running of Israel’s unique post-graduate AgroStudies agriculture apprentice training program.  Meanwhile 10,000 high-tech professionals descended upon Tel Aviv for its 5th annual DLD (Digital Life Design) Conference. This year’s focus was on food tech in which Israel has over 500 startups.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dqkpt6qzjbU

Finally, whilst the United Nations Secretary General was being shown Israeli technological innovation to benefit the planet, the recently launched Israeli-developed VENµS satellite continues to orbit the Earth monitoring global agriculture issues and the health of the environment of our planet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECqCDrBxwwk

With Israeli innovation,

You shall eat, and be satisfied. 

Michael Ordman writes a free weekly newsletter containing positive news stories about Israel.

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com and a searchable archive www.IsraelActive.com

For a free subscription, email a request to michael.goodnewsisrael@gmail.com

Israel is the Cream of the Crop

The Jewish festival of Shavuot (Pentacost) celebrates Israel’s wheat harvest and the source of the prosperity it generates.  Israel’s agricultural technology is bringing prosperity to those nations willing to recognize the true benevolent nature of the Jewish State.

The theme of Expo 2015, which opened in Milan Italy on May 1st, is “feeding the planet”.  Already 22,000 have visited the Israel Pavilion and marveled at its 70-meter wall where crops grow vertically on minimal irrigation.  One week previously, 35,000 (including 200 Gaza farmers) attended Agritech 2015 in Tel Aviv where Israel’s Netafim installed the biggest agricultural wall in Israel.  Netafim’s drip-irrigation technology is currently growing crops that feed over a billion people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHU4cuUJhY4

Also on display at AgriTech was a new technique developed by Hebrew University researchers that extends the life of vegetables for weeks without refrigeration.  In parallel to AgriTech, AgriVest 2015 at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot showcased the top Israeli agri-tech startups.  It featured a competition, won by Israel’s DouxMatok for its development of sweeter sugar that reduces the amount of sugar required in foods.

One prominent visitor to Agritech was Devendra Fadnavis, Chief Minister of India’s Maharashtra state.  Mahasashtra is the second most populous sub-national entity in the world, with Mumbai as its capital.  Fadnavis sees Israel’s agriculture technology as key to stemming the appalling suicide rate, due to poverty, of farmers in Maharashtra.  Staying with India, it is working with Israeli companies to import Israeli grafting technology in order to improve crop yields and pest resistance whilst reducing water usage and the indiscriminate use of fertilizers.

We now cross over to Africa to hear the Tanzania-Israel Business and Investment Forum (TIBIF) 2015 in Dar es Salaam discuss agribusiness and the use of Israel's scientific and technological innovations for the economic development of Tanzania.  1000 miles to the south, Israeli startup Platfarm is running a pilot in Zimbabwe of its platform for farmers in developing countries to improve their production and delivery to buyers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjld7wxxsIY

Back home in Israel, technology is helping to maintain the high quality of Israeli agricultural exports.  Whilst most exporters perform only random checks on their produce, Israeli fruit exporter Eshet Eilon inspects every piece of fruit for quality and ripeness.  It uses spectral imaging at a rate of five tons an hour and rejects anything that contains disease or fungus.  Meanwhile, Israel’s Pointer Software Systems has developed Pickapp, which provides farm managers with real-time tracking of the progress of harvesting and the quality of the produce harvested. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PynkVEjwYHk

Israeli farms don’t just produce crops; they also include fish farms, such as those built by Israel’s LivinGreen.  During the past year, LivinGreen led an educational project in Ghana, building fish farms from local materials.  LivinGreen also participated in projects in Ethiopia and China.

It is also traditional to consume dairy products during the Shavuot festival.  So it is timely that Israel’s Ministry of Agriculture has just released the latest figures regarding Israel’s milk production.  Despite a 21% drop in the number of dairy farms since 2005, milk production has increased by 59%.  Milk yield per cow in Israel is the highest in the world.

So I hope you enjoy this video of how Israeli agricultural produce (grapes, tomatoes, wheat, olives, fish, milk, dates and pomegranates) is transformed “from field to fork” into a healthy and tasty culinary experience.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOsWL9kyZzs

Israeli companies are already heavily involved in futuristic agricultural innovations.  Take for example Melodea and Valentis, who demonstrated their technology at Imaginenano 2015 in Bilbau Spain, Europe’s largest nanotechnology conference.  Both are using cellulose nanocrystals to make a variety of groundbreaking products out of plant-derived waste.  And Israel’s White Innovations are just one year away from launching the Genie – a 3D printer that “prints” nutritious cooked meals.

Finally, the story has just emerged about how Israel prevented a major terrorist attack during the summer conflict with Hamas.  A Hamas terrorist cell planned to use a wheat field to camouflage the exit hole from their tunnel into Israel.  However, some religious Jews from Bnei Brak purchased the wheat just a few days prior to the planned attack.  The Jews wanted to make “Shmura” (guarded) Matzo for Passover and had to harvest it quickly.  When the terrorist cell emerged into the now barren field, they were easily spotted by the IDF, who dealt swiftly and decisively with the threat.

Keep rooting for Israel and reap the rewards.

Michael Ordman writes a free weekly newsletter containing positive news stories about Israel.

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com and IsraelActive.com

For a free subscription, email a request to michael.goodnewsisrael@gmail.com

It Happened Here First

http://blogs.jpost.com/content/it-happened-here-first

http://blogs.jpost.com/print/5254

You probably already know about the most famous of Israeli “firsts”. Such as Intel’s microchip breakthroughs, SMS technology, the digestible camera and cherry tomatoes.  But every week there is news of exciting discoveries and innovations from the Jewish State. Last week, there was even more than usual.

Dr. Itai Amir of Israel’s Maayanei Hayeshua hospital discovered a new strain of bacteria when examining a patient’s blood culture. The microorganism – named Eisenbergiella Tayi - assists in digestion and has attracted major scientific interest.  And in another discovery, Hebrew University of Jerusalem researchers have identified the cause of the dreadful intestinal inflammation side effects of chemotherapy.  The scientists isolated the protein Interleukin-1 (IL-1 beta), and are confident that its effects can be blocked.

Three “first of their kind” Israeli medical devices were in the news recently.  Israel’s BioControl Medical has developed the first device to treat chronic heart failure using neuro-stimulation.  It works by stimulating the vagus nerve on the right side of the neck. Trials are currently being conducted at 80 medical centers in the US, Europe and Israel.  Next, CerOx from Israel’s Ornim is the first and only non-invasive device on the market monitoring blood flow to the brain in patients with severe brain trauma.  It uses ultrasound and near-infrared light to measure oxygen saturation and prevent brain damage.  But pride of place goes to Israel’s Brainsway, which has launched a new era in the treatment of brain disorders such as Parkinson’s and Schizophrenia. Brainsway’s Deep Brain Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) has also received CE approval to treat depression and its systems have just been installed at Stockholm's Karolinska University Hospital.  Sweden has one of the highest rates of depression in the world.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePbkiGuIk_s

Israel is always the first to respond to international humanitarian disasters such as in Haiti and the Philippines.  But it has also become the first State that countries call on to request all sorts of assistance.  For example, a team of Israeli scientists has just gone to Bhubaneswar in India, to test a pilot program called “phyto-remediation” that uses plants to remove pollutants from contaminated wetlands.  In another venture, Israel and Germany are launching “The Africa initiative" - a joint project for humanitarian relief in those developing countries.  And the Greek charity Bouroume has made its first visit to Israel to see how Leket Israel organizes 50,000 volunteers to pick, rescue and distribute fresh produce to the needy.  No wonder 170 countries nominated Israeli Ambassador to the UN, Ron Prosor, for his first role since Israel joined a UN Human Rights group.  Ambassador Prosor was chosen to run the elections for the UN Human Rights Committee!

When Israeli cleantech company Energy Industries is called on to implement environmentally friendly energy solutions for its customers it always looks first for local natural resources.  So in Ghana it extracts methane from a local landfill site, and in Georgia, hot springs are used to power greenhouses.  Over in California, the 392-megawatt concentrating solar power (CSP) plant built by Israel’s BrightSource Energy has commenced operations.  The five-square-mile Ivanpah solar energy generating system in the Mojave Desert is generating nearly 30 percent of all of the US’s solar power.  It has even inspired a pop music album – and that must be a first for a solar power station.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tIXhVMOU3A

Three new Israeli innovations provide “first-contact” alternatives for computer users.  You can use the gesture technology from Pointgrab and become one of the first to operate your Lenovo computer from up to two meters away, even in low light conditions.  Or obtain a first-class degree by using the N-trig active pen to write over electronic lecture notes on your Intel Educational Tablet. But first prize must go to the UpSense Super Keyboards from Israel’s Inpris.  They are the first-ever invisible keyboards to enable fast typing by either blind or fully sighted users.  You can even help finance their launch and be the first to receive one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5zEkhQiYmU

Before you answer any accusation that Israel always puts its Jewish citizens first, first read my weekly newsletter.  Every week it contains news stories about Israel’s minorities, such as the Israel Education Ministry’s national program to encourage Arab children to read at home.  Maktabat al-Fanoos (“Lantern Library”) will deliver 4 first-stage books free to over 45,000 children at 1,750 pre-school kindergartens in Arab communities.  Over the border, Jordan is the first foreign country to purchase supplies of Israel’s new natural gas deposits.  And one year after Israel first started treating Syrians wounded in their civil war, Israeli doctors at Rambam Medical Center discharged a six-year-old Syrian boy who had first arrived six weeks earlier in a coma. His father was overjoyed, as his son was the last surviving member of his family.

Not for the first time, I’ll finish with an animal story.  Achziv is the first ever beach on Israel’s Northern Mediterranean coast to be declared an internationally recognized protected dolphin habitat.  Achziv offers deep waters for the dolphins to feed in.  I suspect, however, that these intelligent creatures are not the first to recognize that the Jewish State is a safe haven from troubled waters.

Please spread the word about Israeli innovation.

And remember - you read it here first!

Michael Ordman writes a free weekly newsletter containing positive news stories about Israel.

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

For a free subscription, email a request to michael.goodnewsisrael@gmail.com

On the Right Track

http://blogs.jpost.com/content/right-track

http://blogs.jpost.com/print/4748

The Hebrew month of Elul traditionally accompanies calls for the return of the Jewish People to the “correct path” in time for the upcoming New Year. Whilst the media speculates about Israel’s political direction, my assignment is to highlight how the Jewish State continues to steer the world on the route to a better future.

Israeli organizations are heavily involved in keeping the rest of the world on the right track. The Executive Director of Israeli charity Beit Issie Shapiro, Jean Judes, spoke at the United Nations about Community Based Rehabilitation and explained some of the organization’s innovations to help children and adults with disabilities in society.  And with the US announcement of the new Power Africa initiative, it is important to highlight that Israel’s “Innovation: Africa” has been powering rural East African schools, medical clinics and water pumping systems with Israeli solar technology for the past five years, benefiting over 450,000 people.  In South Africa, a police interpreter took the only available track to miners trapped following their fight with an illegal rival gang – by means of an instant harness from Israel’s Agilite.  The Israeli device received much praise and was recommended to all South African rescue personnel.

Tel Aviv University Professor Eugene Rosenberg was tracking the damage caused by “white plague” bacteria to the corals in Eilat when he discovered that some corals had immunity.  From this, he extracted the natural therapeutic virus BA3, which can now be used to protect the world’s threatened coral reefs.

Photo – Eilat Coral - Wikimedia Commons (WT-en) Jpatokal

Bringing a child into the world can involve much pain. Successful pain relief from epidural anesthesia relies on the skill of the doctor to find the right track for the needle. Now, Israel’s Omeq Medical’s new sensor-based system eliminates the 30 per cent failure rates and frequent complications by guiding the doctor to the exact spot.  An international team led by Weizmann Institute researchers has engineered another medical breakthrough. It has “turned off” the immune system’s automatic rejection of foreign transplants.  The team manufactured weaker immune cells and introduced the biochemical interleukin-15 to guide them through the body to the lymph nodes.  Meanwhile, researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have discovered that flu viruses (including deadly strains) use the protein neuraminidase to disable the body’s natural killer (NK) cells.  The HUJ scientists inhibited the protein and thus cleared the way for NK cells to fight the viruses.

Photo - Influenza_virus_particle - Wiki Commons

(Center for Disease Control and Prevention)

Those of you tracking Israel’s relationship with the Palestinian Arabs at grass roots level, should be familiar with the thousands of trucks of goods and materials that drive through the Kerem Shalom crossing from Israel into Gaza each week.  You may, however, have missed reading about the comprehensive agricultural seminar that Israel arranged especially for sixty grateful Gaza farmers to attend, or the hundreds of Israeli and Palestinian Arabs who (mostly in secret) are becoming business partners and colleagues in joint start-ups that are slowly transforming the PA economy.

The right track to a superior world will be laid through a better education for our next generation.  Six-time NBA All-Star (and prospective Israeli) Amar'e Stoudemire called a “time-out” from the Maccabiah games and took to the road to promote science education in areas outside of Israel's main cities.  Israeli schoolchildren are progressing exponentially in the field of Mathematics. Israel’s team of High school and Junior High mathematicians won 6 medals to reach 13th place out of the 97 countries competing at the International Mathematical Olympiad in Santa Marta, Colombia.  A huge improvement on the 31st place achieved in 2012.

Tel Aviv University has also invested in Israel’s future with its new Student City. The complex covers nearly a quarter mile and has Energy and Environmental Design gold status.  And venture capital guru Jon Medved used the venue of another of Israel’s top educational institutes – The Technion – to give an outstanding analysis of Israel’s innovation success and the direction it now needs to take.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srf6SXYUsnQ&feature=youtu.be

Technologically, Israel is definitely on the fast track.  Israel saw the highest rate of growth in Internet speeds in the world last year, thanks to the investment in infrastructure made by communications companies.  Israel is at the forefront of developments into 5G communications. It will also demonstrate how the Brain-Computer Interface is turning “science fiction” into “science fact” at BrainTech Israel 2013 - Israel’s first ever International Brain Technology Conference in Tel Aviv in October. 

Finally, Israel is visibly on the right track for the world’s migrating birds.  The Israeli government is investing 10 million dollars revamping and expanding birding centers to increase the enjoyment of thousands of tourists that come especially to witness the one billion birds that make the Jewish State a vital stopping place on their bi-annual journey.

Join the Israel track – we’re really flying!

Michael Ordman writes a free weekly newsletter containing Good News stories about Israel.

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

For a free subscription, email a request to michael.goodnewsisrael@gmail.com

An Extraordinary State

http://blogs.jpost.com/content/extraordinary-state