FILIPPO TOMASI

design engineer



1/3 of the world food production is wasted



1.9 million tonnes of food is wasted every year in the UK only. It is the equivalent of one Giza pyramid a year!

The problem we found rely on the linear process of the food industry: there is very little control over the quantity required by the market and farmers are forced by supermarkets to overproduce to sustain their business.

Not only the linearity of the food system creates the problems mentioned, but the length of such a supply chain also eliminates our connection to food and nature. The environmental cost behind the commercial processes has remained untransparent to consumers, which does not empower consumers to make sustainable or ethical choices.



CHEMICALS VS. ORGANIC



The use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides is without any doubt necessary to feed the world's population, but it also true that this practice is causing enormous environmental problems. Every year an increase in the order of 4% is recorded worldwide, but the resources of some chemicals like Potassium are non renewable and won't last for more than 100 years.

Agriculture is also the biggest user of potable water and most of it is lost due to poor soils' retention.

Consumers are aware of these problems and therefore the request of "organic" labelled fruit and vegetables is raising. Usually this food is better cultivated in terms of genuinity and with stronger regulations regarding chemical use, but this often doesn't mean better for the environment and the soil.



SOIL DEPLETION



In the far front of the supply chain, on the farm, our current agricultural products heavily rely on industrial farming which uses chemical fertilizers, insecticides, and pesticides to coordinate the growing of crops. Industrialized agriculture has drastically changed the natural landscape, soil fertility, and biodiversity of our country over the past hundred years. Economically, it also threatens small-scale quality food producers and the local economy, creating barriers for locals' access to good quality food.



PROCESS





Through a critical process of research, analysis, and fieldwork, we have recognized the potential of urban agriculture movement for building a local, decentralized, ecological food system. In support of urban agriculture, we proposed a biomimetic fertilization-aggregation system integrated with food waste management of urban household and community. We designed a gardening appliance which uses anaerobic digestion, a series of natural processes that degrade household food waste to nutrient-rich fertilizers and biogas in absence of oxygen, to provide natural fertilizer or digestate for growing plants locally in the urban environment.



TESTS & DEVELOPMENT





The aim of the project is to find a better way of growing our food. We analyze the current scenario with farms visit and customers interviews. We were initially interested in the organic way of production, but in most cases it is proved to be only a way of marketing products without substantial changes to the way they are produced. We then explored permaculture and forest gardening, to understand if these growing methods were more suitable at environmental level. Finally we analyze the food chain more in general, to find out the first unsustainable issue was food waste. It doesn't really make sense to waste resources to grow some waste: from here we developed some initial tests to see how we could use food waste to grow new plants. The experimentation was based on two main processes: aerobic and anaerobic digestion. The fastest and best way to transport the nutritive elements from the food waste to the roots of a new plant is with an hydroponics system, which was tested to be the most efficient solution.



A NEW FOOD SYSTEM





Growing plants and food takes a lot time, human effort and resources. Morphosis not only help to reduce the complexity and difficulty of local food waste management for businesses, but also to increase commercial value through a boosted and autonomous food merchandise cycling system.



VEGETABLE FOOD WASTE





Different kind of food were tested to raise the security standards required by law. We restricted the feeding list of the digester to fruit and vegetable waste only, to avoid any possible contamination from meat and fish pathogens.



DIGESTOR





Engineering calculations were carried on in order to correctly match the digester tank and the vegetables growth. The optimal ratio for households was found to be 1Kg food waste/day = 15 plants/week.



WIP SHOW 2019





The project was showcased in January 2019 during the RCA Wip show in London.





Filippo Tomasi © 2021