With the goal of spurring innovation in the food system, The Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) launched the Seeding The Future Global Food System Challenge. This week the organization announced their finalists for the last stage of the competition which will determine the winners—to be announced in January.
Two winners will be selected from the four finalists for the grand prize category, receiving $250,000 each. Of the six finalists announced for the Growth Grant, three winners will be announced and will be awarded $100,000 each.
“The submitted ideas for all award categories are very innovative with high impact potential to create a safer, nutritious, sustainable, and equitable food system, resulting in food that is trusted, affordable and accessible by consumers,” said Bernhard van Lengerich, founder of Seeding The Future Foundation. “The remarkable response in this first year of our Challenge has inspired us tremendously.”
The Seeding The Future Grand Prize Finalists are:
- Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in collaboration with North Carolina State University; AUDA NEPAD SANBio; SinnovaTek (US); National University of Lesotho (Lesotho), McCain (South Africa), offering advancements in thermal processing to reduce food waste and address malnutrition,
- International Rice Research Institute, Philippines, presented their safe rice varieties project to deploy newly developed arsenic-excluding rice varieties for safer consumption in arsenic-polluted regions,
- Solar Freeze presented portable, solar-powered cold storage units for rural smallholder farmers of perishable produce in order to reduce post-harvest food loss, and
- WorldFish for its nutrient-rich small fish production project for the production of dried, small fish powder that preserves nutrient-dense fish that is healthy and affordable for consumers.
Seeding The Future Foundation funded The Challenge. The organization works to empower transdisciplinary teams who develop scalable and high impact innovations in three areas: safe and nutritious food for a healthy diet; sustainably produced; and accessible, appealing, affordable, and trusted by consumers. They seek food innovations that cross over those three areas that can bring meaningful change to the food system.
Nearly 900 submissions to The Challenge were received by the IFT, vying for the $1 million dedicated annually to the initiative. The global organization has approximately 12,000 individual members from 95 countries. It is committed to bringing together the brightest minds in food science, technology and related professions from academia, government, and industry to solve the world’s greatest food challenges through the advancement of food science and innovation.
“IFT is thrilled to have the opportunity to collaborate with the Seeding The Future Foundation in launching The Challenge in its inaugural year,” said Corrine Calice, senior director of knowledge and learning, and experiences at IFT.
The winners of both the Growth Grants and Grand Prizes will be announced in January 2022.
