819 – “INVESTING IN SALTWATER AGRICULTURE: THE NEXT BIG THING”

In this program, Hazel Henderson and NASA Chief Scientist Dennis Bushnell continue their exploration of the massive global potential in shifting over-investments in food and agriculture dependent on the planet’s 3% of freshwater to the other halt of the plant kingdom: the 10,000 salt-loving (halophyte) plants that can fill human food and fuel needs for the foreseeable future. These crops grown with saltwater: e.g. nutritious quinoa grains in health foods and tasty salt-tolerant rice in Chinese markets are grown in 22 countries. This can expand to feed growing populations, relieve pressure on freshwater and provide food and fuels from the Earth’s 40% of degraded and desert lands. Halophyte plants require no fertilizers or pesticides and capture CO2, all to help accelerate the global transition from fossil fuels to renewable resources, cleaner, knowledge-richer economies. Today, investors can capitalize on cheap unused land, cheap water, cheap plants and free sunshine! This is a paradigm problem and due to her-behavior of financial markets.